Church starts at 11!

Sunday, P&W rehearsal was really... interesting, hilarious, sad, a hot ghetto mess! While rehearsing the same 2 songs we went over last week, one of our repeat but non-members came into church drunk.

Now the old church we came out of used to have drunk people stumble into the sanctuary somewhat regularly Friday nights. (But on a Sunday?! Ok, I get it. Times are hard.)  Those inebriated people were the highlight of my pre-adolescent church life. My older brother and I both remember the man who came all the way to the front of the church via the center aisle to strike the high cymbal while nothing musical was going on. I guess that's just what drunk folks do: make a scene.

To make matters worse, said individual took over one our mics and joined in with us. I guess even he knew "Every praise is to our God." He wasn't threatening anyone and we all know him so my dad (the head deacon) did not escort him out.

While I'm all for drunk folks coming into church, I am not for them messing up my rehearsal! In the words of my outspoken sister, "church starts at 11." We'll take all drunkards, crackheads, and other wildly types at that time.

You on point Tip? All the time Phife.

The #ileadescape was on point tonight! (as usual)

Tonight's guest was Tye Tribbett. While I'm personally on the fence about whether I like him as an artist or not (I'm leaning toward "kind of') he definitely had a good word for the frontliners. He came from II Kings 5:1. While I was not familiar with this story, I'm def putting it on my to-read list. What I know is that I could relate to what Tye was saying.

Often, people have no idea what what you deal with personally. Due to the type of person that I am (discreet) and due to the relationship I have with our congregation (peripheral) I try to keep my issues MY ISSUES. What I will say is that people come to me with all kinds of worries and problems. My prayer list stays long. On top of that, I have my own worries and problems. What Tye said is that, like Naaman, God knows what's going on with me, as do a few key people. However, it's the responsibility of a P&W leader to lead the people into P&W. Everybody doesn't need to see every layer of you. When people see all of the intricate layers, they have to pull those layers back to move into worship. (insert Wowwww face here) It's so true. Would people be able to go into worship if they knew everything I struggle with? Not to be mistaken for being fake, but people are funny acting and are not definitely not as accepting when they know certain things.

The last point that I know I need to apply came at the end of the call when they did a few Q&As. Tasha Cobb explained that preparation is 90% of the battle. And Tye explained to us how hard he works his choir members. I remember those days when I used to sing with a popular choir back right before their peak. We rehearsed weekly and we rehearsed hard. We knew those songs backward and forward, sideways and everything in between. We could sing in a box and we could sing with a fox. We could sing in the rain and we could sing it on a train... That's totally not how I've been operating. Note to self: rehearse harder and more frequently. Got it.

Ok y'all, that's it for the night. So glad I actually remembered to dial in. I put a reminder in my phone. (Something else Tasha spoke about tonight: use the tools and gadgets God has given us to help us add more balance into our lives.) Preach, preacher!

Rooted and Grounded

As a P&W leader, I think it's paramount that you stay grounded in your relationship in God. Here's how I achieve that.

Prayer - I jokingly tell my friends that I can get a prayer through, but it's not a joke. I pray first thing every morning when I enter the bathroom. I used to try to pray at night, but I realize I was going to bed so late that I'd fall asleep before I could get through my prayer, which is sad b/c I don't pray long. Changing to morning prayers works for me. Then throughout the day I continue to pray. I attempt to pray before starting my work, when I talk to my friends and they have issues, etc. Always short prayers, but the Bible says to pray without ceasing, not pray for a long time. I also tune in to the Fellowship Missionary Baptist Church of Chicago prayer line. (209.647.1699 PIN: 781740#) They record the call so you can dial in at any time to listen to a good word and prayer. I frequently attend Angela Martin's Onderful Prayer. This prayer time is especially for women and never disappoints. I leave feeling refreshed every time. As you can see, I have various streams that help me to stay prayerful.

Read - Reading the Bible can seem daunting. What to read? Where to begin? The real problem with me is having the discipline to read period. I have gone to being one who would hardly crack open my Bible during the week to reading at least 4 times week. A HUGE improvement. How did I accomplish this? The Bible app. I read the verse of the day. I signed up for a Bible plan where I read a scripture and passage followed by a prayer starter... Now to handle the question of what to read, I began reading books of the Bible for which I have little knowledge. This helped me to come up with my own interpretation of what is important and what God is trying to say to me/us today through this book of the Bible. I'm currently reading the book of Numbers. I don't read for long periods of time. Frequency is more important to me than duration.(That's my personal belief, but I encourage you to do what works for you.)

Accepting that I'm different. - This is something I struggle with, but am getting better. I used to think I could hang out on Saturday nights and roll into church Sunday morning and do a good job as a P&W leader. I know better now! I need to get to bed at a decent hour Saturday night so that I'm not dragging Sunday morning. I need to stay focused and not be distracted by whatever it is that I could get into Saturday night. Not to say that I don't occasionally go out Saturday nights, but I really watch it. I'm also learning to be comfortable with who I am. I'm not a big ad-libber. My best qualities are that I'm good holding my part, harmonizing w/out being taught parts, and am genuinely excited about the P&W part of service. I love singing back-up! That's just me. Sometimes its difficult to accept your talents and not be envious of others. Thinking "if I could write like so and so or sing like so and so" won't get you anywhere. God has given each of us unique talents and traits. You should always try to learn and improve, but in the end, we have to be happy and content with what we've been given and who we are.

Having the right people in your life is a great way to learn and grow in the Lord. My mother-in-law is that person for me. She knows so many scriptures that I've never heard. She has good insight into practical ways the scriptures apply to our every-day lives. She sends me emails of interesting scriptures and YouTube clips of worship songs. A good mentor can help you grow without feeling like it's hard work. I have sisters in Christ at work that are fabulous prayer partners and encouragers. We share good sermons, books, and study aids with each other.

I don't know if I've ever mentioned this, but my mother is the pastor of our church. I'm also one of the children's church teachers which means that I don't get to hear the Word the Sundays I'm with the kids. While I love and respect my mom's ministry, sometimes I need to hear the word from someone else. That someone else for me is Pastor John Hannah of New Life Covenant Church. He comes on at 2 pm CT on 1390 am in Chicago. He's a beast in Christ! You can literally feel the anointing through the radio waves at times! I think most of his congregation is around my age so I find that his messages are tailored to non-seniors who live an urban lifestyle. He seems in touch with the times, but doesn't compromise God's standards. He challenges me to do it God's way. We all could use that type of advise! Sometimes hearing it from someone else helps. (No disrespect, mom. :)

The last blessing that has been a tremendous support to me as a P&W leader is the #ileadescape by Tasha Cobb. While I have only been the call 2 times, these were the best 2 hours of my P&W life. She has different people share whatever God puts on their hearts for what she calls "front liners." (P&W leaders and teams, praise dancers, etc.) She's having a face-to-face meeting this summer. Check out the monthly call. You will not be disappointed.

So there you have it; all of the things I do to stay connected to God. I encourage everyone to figure how you can do the same.

Blessings!

P.S. Longest post ever!

To-do List

Time to start preparing for our church anniversary which is in June.

We'll probably have live music so this will be more akin to what the rest of the country is doing. That leaves me to figure out what we should sing. I know I want to sing Every Praise is to Our God. Still thinking about the rest. I'm also going to ask if my aunt, who used to lead P&W but left when she got married, if she wants to join the team for this service. We also have one member of the church who wants to join the team on a permanent bases.

We also have to find uniforms. Last year, we ordered shirts for the ladies and wore black pants or skirts. The tops looked nice so we'll likely go in the same direction. Since we only have 1 male, he wore a black suit and picked a tie that matched one of the colors in the shirts. That was pretty easy.

Last and probably most important, we need our mics in decent working order. One stand collapses to half its size and I don't know how to keep it tightened. Two mics must be of lower quality because they always sound muffled or lower than the 1 good mic. And there's another mic that is ok. I could really use some technical support. I have know clue what I'm doing.

Will keep you guys posted about how this all shapes up.

Last Sunday's playlist:
Create in Me a Clean Heart
This is the Air I Breathe (... Somehow, even though we sing this song frequently, I managed to mix up the words)
I Will Always
Blessed Be the Name of the Lord

Easter P&W

Happy Belated Easter Weekend!

If you are like me, then you were in church a lot this past weekend. My organization belongs to a larger organization so all of the churches in the Midwest District met for Good Friday service. Usually we do a corporate praise team, of which I'm sometimes a member. This time, for whatever reason, they decided to let one church's praise team take charge.

While, I'm not a huge fan of the selections of songs for the corporate praise team, I have to admit that this time, they sounded good. I actually knew the songs! This is one of the problems that I usually have singing corporately - there's not a lot of say in what we sing. They tend to pick these dreary sounding, dead songs that no one (meaning I) have never heard. I don't think a district meeting is a good time for songs that aren't in the top 40, IMHO. I'd rather sing an oldie but goodie that everyone knows than the latest random off of a new artists' LP. That's just me. But I digress. The song selection and sound was pretty good.

Sunday followed suit. I did my best Israel imitation and tried to talk a little more between the songs. It went well. This is definitely not my forte, but I'm trying. Guess I got inspired by Resurrection Sunday. But now I have bigger fish to fry. My praise team has not rehearsed in probably at least a month. We've got to get back on task.

I ordered about 4 tracks for us to sing and we've only sung 2. Of those 2, we've only sung them once. Which means no one probably remembers the words or their parts. So we've got to start over. My goal is to build our arsenal of songs by at least 5 this year. I'll let you know how that goes...

All in all, Easter weekend was pretty good for P&W at the services I attended. At least no one fell backwards off of the stage, as was the case at my mother-in-law's church. (I know I'm wrong for laughing, but if you knew how big their stage is, you'd wonder how could anyone manage to fall.)

Good Friday Play List
You are the Living Word
Lord You're Mighty
(I'm drawing a blank on the others. I wonder if that means it wasn't as good as I remember. lol)

Easter Play List
High Praise
How Great is Our God
Lord I Lift Your Name on High
Emmanuel (We worship you)

Wow, really?!

I gotta keep it 100: P&W was outta control this Sunday. So much so, I stopped P&W to tell my ignorant (and I mean that in the true sense of the word - i.e., not in a mean/evil way) audience that it's an insult to me and God for them to not stand when asked, talk, and walk during P&W like nothing is going on. I straight pulled a Pastor Morris! (My old pastor, God rest her soul, used to check fools real fast.)

But seriously, I can't believe people were as rude as they were. I guess I shouldn't be shocked. As I mentioned in my blog's subtitle, this is my experience as a P&W leader at a small, ghetto immature-congregation church.

One funny thing did happen. During the business meeting we had following Morning Worship, Pastor asked if anyone had any other topics they'd like to discuss. To which one of our younger members said "Yeah, the praise team needs a hype man!" #dead #rofl

All I can say is that God knows when we need to laugh.

I guess that's why the Tye Tribbetts and Kirk Franklins of gospel are so popular. Sometimes you need theatrics to get the point across I guess. (Sad, but true.) Lord help me, cause that's just not my forte.

There's a lull in my life

Today's title is an old Nat King Cole classic that I've only heard Natalie Cole sing. (Love her singing the old stuff.) At any rate, this is how I feel about my worship team right now.

So we ordered some new tracks about a month or two ago. We had 2 great rehearsals and since then people have been out sick, at work, absent due to the weather here in #Chicago, and busy dealing with other parts of the ministry. Due to these challenges, we're kind of at a moment of inactivity when it comes to rehearsal.

Is it asking too much that the praise team be on point in 2014? As the P&W leader I guess I better start leading! I used to be cheerleader for like half of my life, so I gotta muster up some "We've got spirit,yes we do" into the troops. If the praise team isn't excited to learn some new songs, how do we expect the congregation to be excited about worship? Time to ante up!