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Of late I have been struggling with leading worship. You see I’m the conscientious kind of person who tries to give my best effort every time.But I have been feeling frustrated because we don’t seem to be engaging God as I would like.
So the usual tendency is to try harder, pick better, more hip and happening songs. Or get more another instrument involved, or make the praise songs more driving etc. (Obviously those are some good ideas for breathing life into stale worship performances, but stay with me…)
So the next step for me is to focus on my character, being raised as a conservative evangelical (you know how it is with us “people of the Word”), you start to look for sin or character issues in your life because that must be what’s blocking the “anointing” from happening. (Now don’t get me wrong, this is very valid too, but what if your conscience is clear before God? Stay with me…)
Anyway, I have been reading this book by Bill Johnson called “When Heaven Invades Earth” and he said something that really knocked me off my pedestal. Basically he was talking about it is unbalanced to think that good character is enough, we need God‘s presence to be evident in us and moving through us! (Very loose quote, get the book and read it for yourself, chapter 8 I think)
WAIT a second! You can’t just toss CHARACTER aside! (That’s exactly what I was saying!) You see what Bill is saying is that even a “non-christian” can develop good character. Character is important but without HIS presence we just end up being little clones of “Mr. Nice Guy/Girl”.
Jesus was so much more than just a “Mr. Nice Guy” his power and danger came from his Father’s presence working through him.
So basically what I’m trying to say is that if we want to get worship back in focus we need all 3 things happening, and for me, at the moment, I need to really be seeking more of His presence evident in me and through me!
How about you?
 | ABOUT JUSTIN MULDER… I am a worship leader in South Africa. I currently head up the worship ministry for a Vineyard church plant called The Edge. I was in the ministry full-time for 9 years, which also included planting a church in Southern California. Currently I am tent-making, teaching I.T. at a private Christian school. I am passionate about worship especially when it touches every area of our lives, when we take it to the streets. Lastly I am also a drummer and played with a legendary group of people called “The Benjamin Gate”. Eventually I left them because the law of averages says that “eventually all drummers will spontaneously combust or fall victim to a bizarre gardening accident.” Ha ha… |
