Where's Your Heart?

To start off the new year, I began rereading a book by Bob Kauflin called Worship Matters.  It's a great book on worship and I highly recommend it to anyone involved in worship leadership.  In one of the beginning chapters Kauflin talks about all of the things that we have made worship out to be:  music, techniques, liturgies, songs, traditions, methods, technology, etc...  Kauflin then points out that while each one of those can certainly contribute to worship, they are not what true worship is all about.  Ultimately, worship is about our hearts.  It’s about what and who we love more than anything. 

Jesus said in Matthew 22:37- “You must love the LORD your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind” (emphasis mine).  Jesus wants our hearts.  He wants us to love Him more than we love music, our ministries, our loved ones or even our own lives. 

So, as a worship leader, where’s your heart?  What or who do you love the most?  Is it Jesus or is it someone or something else?  I think if we’re being honest, we can all think of times that the # 1 focus of our hearts during worship hasn’t been on Jesus.  And here’s the scary part that Kauflin describes so well from his own struggles with this in his book:  “I learned that I could lead others in worshiping God and be worshiping something else in my own heart”.

Yikes!

Just think about that.  We lead others in worshiping Jesus while at the same time our hearts are far from Him (Isaiah 29:13).  And what’s sad is that I know that I’ve been there and done that far too many times.  It’s so easy for my focus to be on the other things in life that I enjoy, love, or am looking forward to.  And there’s nothing wrong with loving or enjoying other aspects of our lives (family, friends, sports, vacations, etc…).  But you can’t really enjoy and love those things the right way until you love Jesus the most.  And so as worship leaders, our main concern each and every time that we lead can’t be on what songs we are singing, what the lighting will be, or what the song transitions are.  Our main concern has to be the state and focus of our hearts.

So, where’s your heart?

Worship Big!

Brad

'Tis the Season

With this week’s post I just want to thank our UNBELIEVABLE Drama Ministry and Team for all of their hard work, dedication, and time given with this past Sunday’s Christmas Play.  It was AWESOME! 

Including rehearsals, I believe I saw the play close to a dozen times and it was funny and moving each and every time.  I truly believe that everyone who attended received a blessing.

When new people start attending our church, they tend to get blown away by the amount of musical talent that our church has.  And it’s true!  For a church our size (or any size), we have a ridiculous amount of musical talent.  But, I like to remind people that it’s not just musical ability that we have in abundance.  We have a LOT of extremely talented actors.  I mean a lot.  And it’s great to see them have an opportunity to use their talents for Lord.

So, if you didn’t get an opportunity to see the play in person, check it out on our church website: 'Tis the Season

Merry Christmas and Worship Big!

Brad

How Much Do You Practice?

One of the hardest parts of either being in the Praise Team/Band or Worship Choir here at MPBC is how little rehearsal time we get.  Our normal choir practice lasts about 45 minutes and our normal Praise Team/Band rehearsal probably lasts a little over an hour.  That’s not a lot of time to work and prepare songs for worship.  So, what’s the answer to this problem?  Personal practice time.  Everyone has to come to rehearsal prepared and practiced up so that our rehearsals are less about teaching new music/reviewing old music and more about making sure each part or instrument fits into the overall complexity of each song.

So, personal practice time is HUGE.  If you aren’t prepared, you can’t rehearse.  And if you can’t rehearse, you hold everyone else in the group back.  And so, everyone here at MPBC is expected to practice on their own and come to rehearsal prepared.  But, the real question is not whether or not to practice on your own; it’s how much and for how long should you practice?

The old adage “practice makes perfect” is what I’ve always

gone by.  You practice until you get something right.  But is that enough?  I can do lots of things correctly once, but that doesn’t mean that I’ve truly mastered them.  Recently, I read a quote from Bob Kauflin that really sums up very well how much each of us needs to practice.  It says:

“The goal of practice isn’t doing something until you get it right. It’s doing it until you can’t get it wrong.”

Wow!  That is a completely different approach and mindset to practice.  It’s about a true mastery of your instrument or voice.  Imagine practicing so much that it is almost impossible for you to play a wrong chord or sing a wrong note.  But for those of us who lead worship, this is even more important.  When we aren’t worried about lyrics, chord progressions, notes, or drum fills we can truly focus on the Lord and leading others into his presence.  Psalm 33:3 tells us that we are to sing and play “skillfully”.  When we do this, it frees up our minds, hearts, and souls to truly worship the Lord.

So, how much do you practice?  Hopefully, until you can’t get it wrong.

Worship Big!

Brad  

Where is Your Focus?

When leading in worship, where is your focus?  I know that for most of us we would simply say, “I just focus on Jesus”.  And you wouldn’t be wrong with that answer.  But do you ever think about the people that you are singing/playing to?

Many of the songs that we sing/play are simply songs of praise to Jesus.  They give us an opportunity to pour out our praise, worship and adoration to our Savior and King.  But there are other songs that can have a more intimate and personal meaning to not only us, but also the people we are leading in worship.  And when we sing these songs I like to think about people in the congregation that might need to hear and/or sing the words.  Let me give you an example.

Recently, we have begun singing the song “Great Are You, Lord” during our worship times at church.  A couple of lines from the verse say “You give hope, You restore ev’ry heart that is broken”.  We have a lot of people at church who have lost hope and have hearts that are broken and need to be restored.  And when we sing these lyrics I think about these people and what these words might mean to them and how I hope that God ministers to them through these words.  Not only that, but many times I’ll try to make eye contact with some of these people or at the very least watch them to see how well these lyrics might connect with them and their needs.  It’s amazing to see how the Holy Spirit will use a song and words like these to touch someone’s heart.  They are reminded of their brokenness, but also of God’s ability to heal and restore.  And then in the very next line they get reminded that even in our brokenness God is worthy to be praised as we sing “Great are You, Lord”.

So, as we sing and play and lead, don’t forget the people we are leading.  Don’t forget their hurts, pains and troubles.  And don’t forget that through our worship and through the moving of the Holy Spirit, God can touch and heal hearts and fill each of them with hope.

Worship Big!

Brad

Christmas Music

Christmas.  It's almost here.  But can I tell you something?  I dislike Christmas music.  Is that okay to admit?  Christmas is the “most wonderful time of the year” unless you are a worship/music pastor in a church.  Why?  Because everyone loves Christmas music, just not “church” Christmas music.  If

you were to ask random church goers their favorite Christmas songs, they would list off about 15 secular Christmas songs before they listed one church song.  Everyone loves singing “Let It Snow”, “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”, or even “Silver Bells”, but very few people want to sing “We Three Kings” or “Gentle Mary Laid Her Child”.  Now, I’m not saying that there aren’t some very good, even great “church” Christmas songs (“O Come, All Ye Faithful”, “Angels We Have Heard on High”, and “Silent Night”), but the only time people hear them is in church on Sundays.  The rest of the Christmas season, they are bombarded with secular Christmas songs everywhere they go.  So, it’s hard to get excited about singing Christmas music at church.

The other thing that makes “church” Christmas music difficult is that you only sing these songs once or twice a year, tops.  Our praise team/band and worship choir learn one new song a month.  That means we spend 4 or 5 Wednesdays (depending on the month) learning a new song to teach the congregation.  We will then take 3 Sundays over the next month to teach the new song to the congregation.  After that, we will sing/play the song whenever it fits into a particular Sunday’s worship set.  But Christmas songs aren’t like that.  We still take 4 or 5 Wednesdays to learn them, but then we only sing them one or two times leading up to Christmas.  Then we wait eleven months before we break them out again.  It’s really kind of frustrating.

So, what do we do?  I mean, it’s Christmas, we have to sing something. Thankfully, a few years ago some worship artists started coming out with “Christmas” versions of their worship songs.  Sometimes, they would change the lyrics on a verse to something about Christmas and the birth of Jesus.  Other times they would take a traditional Christmas hymn and put it with the chorus of one of their songs.  Either way, it’s a win/win situation.  People get to sing songs about Christmas and the birth of Jesus, but they also get to worship with songs they are familiar with. 

The artist who is the best at this (in my opinion) is Paul Baloche.  He has actually published a couple of Christmas worship albums where he has taken traditional Christmas hymns and joined them with his modern worship songs.  But my favorite modern Christmas worship song is his Christmas version of “Offering”.  He added a new (Christmas) verse to his song and came up with something that feels new, familiar, and "Christmasy" all at the same time.  The video is below.  Enjoy!

Worship Big!

Brad

God Hears the Soul

I have been involved in music since I was around 7 years old and for me it is easy to pick up on who is a good singer, who is in tune, and as the old saying goes “who couldn’t carry a tune in a bucket”.  But I have come to understand that God doesn’t give a “hoot” about what someone sounds like, you see God hears the soul.  

Psalm 100:1 says “Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands”.  
Make a joyful noise, not a harmonious chord. There is a big difference in a noise and music.  God sees and hears our heart and soul when we sing, no matter what it sounds like to others.  The person that we hear every Sunday who loves to sing out in that awful voice is actually honoring God and it is very pleasing to him.  On the other hand if we sing every note perfectly and we are not doing it for the right reasons then it actually sounds bad to God.  

Matthew 15:8 says, “These people honor me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.”  

If you are a person who knows you really are not a good singer don’t worry about it, sing out!  If your heart and soul is in the right place, then God will hear your voice as something beautiful.  If you are one of the folks who think you are a good singer and you get distracted by the folks around you who aren’t as good as you, GET OVER IT. God may actually prefer to hear your neighbor’s voice over yours because He actually hears the soul.  

My prayer is that I will be right with God so that when I make a noise He hears my soul and that when I hear those awful notes from others that I will hear what He hears. I will hear someone praising God through a heart and soul that is prepared to worship.  

Geoff

Unbelievable

About 8 months ago, we started the official MPBC Facebook page after deciding to use social media as another avenue to reach people.  We started off with different ideas on content and timing of our posts.  Well, I'm sure that those of us on social media know it's power and how quickly things can spread.  Here at MPBC, we recently began to experience that with a post of a certain special music.  

We like to post our Wednesday night special music video's so that people that weren't here can experience it.  This particular video was posted on a Thursday and by the end of that same day, it had 800 views.  That was already far more that any other post had yet.  By the end of the weekend, it had it nearly 7,000 views.  Today, one week later, it has 8,300 views, reached 16,000 people, 224 reactions, 132 shares and 35 wonderful comments.  Check it out:

That's pretty cool.  Not only has that post performed extremely well, it has boosted the activity on every other post with another video currently at 5,000 views!  

Our page likes and shares have soared in the last week as well.  I would love for that to continue and for us to hit 500 page likes by the end of November!  This has also driven more traffic to the website, which is the goal of our page.  

Love it or hate it, social media is an extremely powerful influential tool to reach people of all ages and types and does so at incredibly fast rates.  Who knew that a church in Wilkesboro, NC could do what we do?  Who knew that our Facebook page would blow up in a matter of a weekend?  I've enjoyed seeing God's hand in what we do here and I pray it continues in ways we can't fathom.  

Of course, if you're on social media and haven't already, Like and Share us @ facebook.com/MPBCNC  !

Peace, 

Justin