Build your own friday night retreat worship experience!

Hey church, so it’s your turn to be involved in set list building. The retreat is less than a month away! It is always a great time and i know for me the worship is more intense and personal. I always feel like God hits me in a big way through musical worship when we are there.

I will soon embark upon putting together set lists for this killer weekend and i wanted you, fellow ACFers to decide what goes on Friday night. If you would like to, please post a comment with up to three of your favorite songs that we have either done so far or you know that we have done before. I have posted the set lists from every wednesday and sunday through my blog, you are welcome to go back through for a reminder. Most are found on myspace or purevolume if you need a listening reminder.

Oct. 9th is the deadline to cast your favorite worship songs. I would love to know which songs God speeches to you most through and therefore friday night worship will be up to the congregation. I’m excited for it, i hope its our best way to serve ACF’s tastes and preferences.

And don’t worry, we will still have a request time come saturday night! so don’t panic if you missed your chance to comment or forgot about a song you liked. I just want the church to feel like they have an integral part in the worship expereince, because after all, we are all there to worship the living God together, as one body!

If you are agaisnt blogging, you are also welcome to wall post your three fav worship songs to my wall. Your call! Thanks everyone and get pumped for the retreat, Oct. 24th-26th!

I’m never playing volleyball again…

Ha, volleyball. my new arch nemesis. So here’s the thing, i played volleyball with some awesome gentlemen this past thursday. However, i’m not great. Every now and then i can spike one. block one. get blocked one, or two. but jumping around in the sand is always fun right? this time…wrong. I miss judged a ball as i was illegally “attacking” on a serve and the ball landed directly down on my right thumb, hurting like heck. I never thought the penalty for illegally attacking was so steep. my mind panicked right away regarding playing guitar. Eric Stauffer telling me that’s exactly how he broke his thumb was not exactly comforting either. Anyway, i refused to go to the doctor because i did not want to be told it was broken. I iced, advilled, and tried not to move it much. By day 2, i thought it was broken, but pushed on. I was determined to still play. I had my dad pray for it while he was here which was very powerful for me because prayer is what healed my dad from his hospital bed my sophomore year. I don’t know if it was broken and the Lord healed it enough to play or it is not broken and the healing process happened to allow me to play guitar this morning, either way, Praise God because i was just able to hold a pick and strum! I was prepared to have it not be healed and know that God is still God. I laughed at myself that there are not too many injuries you can sustain as a worship leader playing guitar to actually knock you out of playing and i happen to find one!

Anyway, God is good and i hope everyone enjoyed a change of pace this morning with announcements first and a longer worship block in the middle, i know the worship team enjoyed it. The beginning of this service was called the ode to the key of C.

And of course this service went well, my parents were there, you can’t screw up for them right? hollar.

• Our God is Love :: Lee Mcderment
• Tis so sweet to Trust in Jesus :: William J. Kirkpatrick
• Give me Jesus :: Fernando Ortega
• Majesty :: Delirious?
• You never let go :: Matt Redman
• Heart of worship :: Matt Redman
• Came to my rescue :: Hillsong United

Chorus of the day: “You are bigger than we let you be. you are strong enough to set us free. by the pain of the cross, you bring life to the lost, you are love. you are love. our God is love.”

goodbye volleyball. you were sort of fun for a while. i’ll have you know i’m using my thumb on every space bar, so take that. can’t hold me down.

pray for this week that Steve Lutz’s words become the anthem of our hearts. This is the biggest most condensed mission field we all might ever have. Don’t let it pass you by. Your classes, the gym, the game, your lunch destination are all full with people similar to you who need to know Jesus. Don’t be fooled, this campus is searching. Most party to fit in. most want to be accepted. most don’t know what else to do. Show them purpose. show them hope. show them love. Don’t let them mistake Jesus for religion…

AHHH (CF)

whew, crazy. sometimes, things don’t always work well. sometimes I get really frustrated and let situations get the best of me. I suppose i should laugh when my amp sounds like its going to explode and stops working and after Andrew Mclean saves the day and gets me another one, i break a string and he goes back to his house to get me a string. I just want to say that he is my hero. True form of servanthood, without a doubt. Feeling rushed is one of those feelings i definitely hate, and definitely don’t manage well. 

However, ACF must start, and through it all, God is very good and helped pull things together. And there were sooo many good words this evening i can’t exclude them. I hope these set of lyrics stuck out to you all as well! 

“Break my heart for what breaks yours, everything i am for your kingdoms cause.”

“Sovereign, you are still sovereign, even when confusion has blinded my eyes.”

“Feel the pain, teaching us how much more we can take…reminding us, how far we’ve come. Let the pain, burn away from our hearts…we have time to start, all over again. And if you would shine your love down here. make our hearts as perfect as new. if you would shine your love down here, oh i promise i’ll reflect it right back at you.”

These lines definitely blew me away. From aligning our hearts to the way God’s heart breaks for people, to understanding Gods sovereignty, It all allowed me to connect with God in a rethinking kind of way. I love when song lyrics remind us of scripture, or the way to view the world and God. Sometimes it takes the emotionalness of songs to get me to understand or feel the point God is trying to make to me. And the last lyric is crazy cool to me. The idea of the hurting times being used by God to show us where we have come from and what we can endure. I hope that our prayer as ACF is united in begging God to shine down his love not only so we can be filled up, but so that we can reflect that love to his people, and overall to Him, who is worthy of everything we have.

My prayer for ACF, is that these words that impact us become out anthems, become more than just words on a screen. I hope they become moments where we connect to God. Moments where things make sense again or for the first time. Moments where we are lost in Gods presence and don’t need the projector to remind us to worship. Thank you ACF for being a great home and family to many people. i hope we can continue and grow to be a place where people feel comfortable letting go in worship. amen.

• Sing to the King :: Passion Band
• Hosanna :: Brooke Fraser (we played Starfield’s version)
• Oh Praise Him :: David Crowder
• You are still holy :: Rita Springer
• When Finally set free :: Copeland
• Everlasting Love (officially retired)

Cool lyrics i’ve been thinkin’ bout

As mentioned before, the church i attended the most this summer is called Elevation. They write their own material and came out with a CD while i was there. It was a huge blessing to get a copy and still be able to worship with my southern friends. I always enjoyed their lyrics and this one was hanging around my head today:

“We were far from you, and nothing in this world could fill us up…but you.”

Wow. Nothing. not most things, or 90 percent of the things. No things. How often do i try anyway? School, relationships, sports, grades, pride, self-accomplishment, you name it. we try. we try to fill ourselves up with all these things and it craps out. because it is true. Nothing in this world could fill us up. I believe i will never truly be fulfilled in life unless God is not only a part, but the central part of it. Only he fills up to the top. You won’t leave where ever you are the same if you let God do  this. He promises. Cool song, cool lyrics, called “we were far from you.” Amen.

Finally avenged the painful loss from freshman year…

I am the few. the proud. the ones who were here on campus (my freshman year) when the steelers and eagles played last. i remember the loss, the heartache, the crap i got from steelers fans for the next few months. the pain that never fully went away. It lingered, like a teacher going into the next chapter of powerpoints with 3 minutes left in class.

Today, my friends, my fellow Pain-ridden Philadelphia friends, and most importantly, my arrogant-always-trash-talking steelers fans, that pain was vanquished. I will not stoop to the level of the steelers fans did back in the day and taunt you and be a jerk for a long period of time because i know what it felt like. It simply needed to be stated that i am ok. This has made right the big wrong in my life. For this year, 2009, The steelers are not allowed to be called the better team over Philadelphia. It sounds and feels so right. For you freshman steelers fans. i encourage you to stay a 5th year and wait for the next battle, and at the point i will hope Pittsburgh wins, so you can know this feelings as well. that is all…

ready. SET. hike.

• Did you feel the mountains tremble :: Delirious?
• Remain :: Starfield
• Your Name :: Paul Baloche
• Everything :: Lifehouse
• Great are you Lord :: Jason Rhodes
• Mighty to save :: Reuben Morgan

I love Heritage hall. i wish we could be there every week. It just feels more like a church to me. I hope the classic “your name” was as solid for everyone else as it was for me. And to me, there is nothing more powerful than loudly singing “your all i want, your all i need, you are everything, everything” i truly believe if we mean that with all our hearts, we would see change. change in our lives, change for the good, change for the kingdom, a campus not left the same as we came, a life sold out and lifted high that sets an example for generations to come. My challenge to myself and everyone is to find ways or think about ways to make Christ your everything this week. What does that mean? how attainable is it? the questions could go on, But God is good and faithful, we know that always remains.

Significant doesn’t have to be big…just obedient

Aaron Henning is the man. I loved a lot of the one liner you should really think about this statements he had. The title of this post being one of them. Or, just when you are at the point of thinking you can’t trust your own abilities, that’s the time God is ready to use you fully. brilliant! how often do we miss that? i know i do.

I don’t know how officially i can speak for the entire worship team, but i feel like us as a team were really able to focus on worshipping last night, which always seems to make for a better service. Only one love seems to always be powerful, i love that song. Our God and King is “ruined for anything less” and has waited for us because His creation has stolen His heart. crazy stuff.

anyway, that’s our goal in all this, is to get ACF to stop reading or singing words off the screen and sing them from the heart, to understand what they mean, what they are singing and why they should worship with nothing holding them back. I hope we are getting there and that our obedience to worship will grow until God is ready to explode through us. as Aaron said, how much are you missing out on from God by simply not listening?

Set:

• Lord Reign in me :: Brenton Brown
• I am free :: Desperation Band
• Refiner’s Fire :: Brian Doerksen
• Only one Love :: Yvonne Parks
• Ends of the Earth :: Hillsong United

My hope is that everyone is enjoying the new songs. I know there are a lot, but soon they will all come full circle and be a part of ACF worship. I will post soon in the future regarding new songs and have an open forum to peoples thoughts about them. Thanks, have a great week!

Did you hear the organ? it was sick

The last song, “no one like you” had big shoes to fill when we didn’t have an electric, but i thought the organ was up for the challenge and in my mind it was! i loved it! ha.

anyway, i struggled to worship for a while this morning. It did not help that i was feeling progressively more miserable health wise as practice rolled on. Which brings up a good point or debate, what do you do when you don’t feel like it or fill in  your excuse for not truly experiencing God. I don’t mean to say i didn’t feel like it this morning. I am always excited to be there, but i was held back a bit by my distractions. Is it better to be obedient, push through, and attempt to worship meaningfully anyway? oooor if you feel like it is something that would bother you more, and drive you further from Christ that day, do you simply not really participate? i don’t know what the right answer. i do know that ACF tends to be very low on the charismatic charts. which surprises me a bit considering we have energy filled college students. my personal opinion is that people care too much about what others think. (or maybe they think the worship team sucks…eek!) But there are a lot of blank stares and non-lip syncing to words faces that surprise me a lot. I’ve learned as a worship leader not to rely on the response of the church, but rather the personal worship time i put into worship, so that it is genuinely flowing out of me on sunday mornings and wednesday nights. However, how do we stretch people out of their tiny worship God boxes? Or the original question…better to be obedient and not into worship, or to stay where you are at so  you don’t slip more in your God experience that morning? If you have a comment or thought, please tack on a comment, i’d love to hear some opinions.

Set:

• Your love is amazing :: Brenton Brown
• You are my God :: Dave Walker
• Shout to the Lord :: Darlene Zschech
• How deep the Father’s love for us :: Stuart Townend
• Knees to the earth :: Watermark
• How great is our God :: Chris Tomlin
• No one like you :: David Crowder

Every time we meet as a congregation we have a chance to glorify the living king with our musical worship. we also have an opportunity to totally miss what he wants to meet us for or how he wants to stir things up in your life….

which one do you find yourself in more?

Wednesday Worship 9/10

hey all. i think we had our first wednesday with no real technical problems. I know i felt like i had a good night of worship personally, which normally equates to congregation feeling the same, but i could be wrong. I know i felt God in the big tile room and it was cool to let go and just worship, like it was only me and Him, though it’s cool to open your eyes and realize you are simply in the midst of the body singing loudly. they are both cool concepts. I liked being able to “prepare our hearts for worship” if you will in the beginning with something very simply and repetitive. I’m open to feedback if that was a good thing or not so feel free to let me know. 

Set:

• Holy is the Lord :: Chris Tomlin
• Power of your love :: Geoff Bullock
• Hands of the Healer :: Eddie Kirkland
• Blessed be your name :: Matt Redman (with intro Lyrics by U2)
• Be Glorified :: Chris Tomlin

My prayer is that all of ACF can experience God more and more each time of worship. And that no matter what myself and the team can stay focused to worship freely ourselves. have a great week!

Inside look at the Vision

So i wrote on facebook that i had been blogging a lot about worship and i noticed some more traffic than normal. I sincerely hope this blog can work out how i intended. Not only for my self and my lack of using pen and paper to journal-ness. But also to stay connected with the people and congreation of ACF. i love ACF with all my heart and this year i never been quite so excited. I wish i could meet with people from ACF and the Penn state campus all the time! but you know how schedules are. So maybe this blog will help people understand who i am, that i never want to be that guy who is the too cool for people worship leader. I’m clearly less cool for people and honored for their time!

Alas, along with posting my thoughts on worship and set lists, i figured i would let people in on some of my vision…

Much like Aaron and his “series” of sermons, i am attempting to organize ACF worship in a similar fashion. So far, you have noticed a lot of new songs. The biggest complaint i heard last year is that we do a lot of the same songs over and over. clearly heard, so we are brining new songs to the table. (if you were one of those people who didn’t want new songs, i’m sorry, but you will have to take it up with 17 billion others who did) These new songs are ones i really felt God laid on my  heart this summer. From my experiences in Charlotte and just kept my ears open for songs i thought would bless the church. These new songs are hear to stay. i do not believe in pummeling the church with a one and done new song mentality. I have a list of about 15-20 new ones that i believe will be a part of our worship from now on. I believe it adds a bit of a spark and a new way to experience God.

Thus, the beginning of the year i am attempting to bring a lot of liveliness through new songs and keeping with most of our upbeat songs. I want ACF worship to be vibrant and a rejuvenating place to learn who God is. If it takes the emotional highs of music initially to set people free to worship, than that we shall do. I also don’t believe this is neccesary the whole year. I don’t want to play only upbeat songs for the sake of that. We will take the new songs we have and keep an uptempo feel that will carry us to the retreat, in which we will explode!

After that point, i believe it will be time to experience God with a little less bells and wistles. We will strip down more at times and realize that God is who he said he was. Every day. Elaborate music is great, but God doesn’t need it and i would hope his people don’t either. My vision is for ACF to experience worship in ways they haven’t. i want people to find God when they aren’t looking, to stretch themselves and go outside of the box on how they normally worship. I promise, there is nothing better than giving yourself over to God through song and experiencing him in that way. Music has always been powerful for me and i belive it can stir the coldest of hearts. There is nothing better than realizing you are a part of something that is bigger than you. I pray that everyone can experience this and that ACF can become a boistrous place of worship. A place where we are always recognizing God moving in our midst. A place where people can feel comfortable to raise their hands high if they want, to worship on their knees if they want, to sing as loud as they can if they want, to clap with a fervor for the Lord if they want, to truly feel Gods presence no matter what that looks like.

Yes. it’s time for a revolution. not only at Penn state in general and the spreading of the gospel. but inside ACF. Let’s let God overflo like he never has before. We need to be open to letting him in more than we do right now, however. Let’s take this year and worship with a reckless abandonment. There’s no more freeing way than that!

Anyway, i’m sorry that was so long. I hope that gives  you a glimpse into my vision and what ACF worship will look like for the fall. I am fully aware that each of us on the worship team are replaceable. God doesn’t need us. I am honored to be a part of the team and strive to worship the Lord in all facets of my life.

If you have thoughts on worship or cool experiences you have had in worship with the Lord, please share via post comment or email me! thanks to all who take their busy schedules to read this. i hope it is worth it.

God bless.