Here it is:
E – Salvation (Charlie Hall/Passion)
C – Blessed Be Your Name (Redman/New Song)
C/D – To Deserve (Stockstill/Bethany World Prayer Center)
C – How Great is Our God
I feel like we had a great sound again this week despite our lack of musicians again. I found out about 7PM that we would be running again without a keyboard player. With a little extra time last night to think about it, I was able to gear down and focus on the set list. I ended up tweaking one or two songs last night so make it a little easier on me playing the keys. I hate having to “dumb” things down for me to be able to play. We’re going to take things a different direction so we can count on our keys player being there. I’m going to take my list of electric guitarists and try to place subs in for the next six weeks while we work on developing our own from among our ranks.
Props again to my wife for being flexible and stretching herself to play electric and acoustic.
mjd
Chelsea’s dad and his wife are in town this weekend to visit us. They called Monday to let us know that they were coming up. It’s been a nerve wracking week as Chel has anticipated getting the house clean enough and the plans lined out for the weekend.
It turns out, we’re playing tour guides this weekend. The sad day is we don’t even know that much about this city. We’ve just moved here about a year ago. With most folks who come in, we take them to the famous Loveless Cafe (Praise the Lard and Pass the Biscuits) in hopes of seeing a star out having breakfast. Then we take them for a trip down the Natchez Trace Parkway to view a touch of the beauty this city has to offer. Today, it looks like we’re hitting downtown, music row, Opry, and Loveless. Too bad I can’t tell them anything about this stuff while we’re looking at it… I already can’t wait till bed time tonight…we’re going to be so tired getting up at 4:45 tomorrow to make it to setup…
mjd
I mean, come on! It’s Thursday and I’ve spent all week looking for an electric guitar player since Sunday. I think I’ve gotten 10 no’s personally – out of town or already booked. I’ve sent over a dozen emails to non-players who may know players. I’ve emailed other worship leaders. I’ve posted on my blog, Craig’s List, and other musician websites. This is just plain nuts! This has been a matter of serious prayer for us now for about 6 weeks and the Lord still hasn’t provided “the” player for us yet. So now, in addition to praying for a player, I pray that I would learn whatever he’s trying to teach me right now – QUICKLY…
mjd
You may or may not know who Colin Hay is. He was the lead singer/front man for Men at Work. I was actually introduced to him through an episode of Scrubs. He’s the crazy-eyed minstrel following J.D. around. Chel looked up the songs after the show and has added him to the playlists we regularly listen to. We were having dinner with Dave and Bekah Sims (our bass player and his wife) last night anyway, so we decided to round out the night at Wild Horse seeing Colin Hay’s show.
By far, my favorite part of the show was the first two songs which he did by himself. I’m sure the rest of the show was good, but I couldn’t see because of Cecilia Noel – his not-so-background vocalist. Based on what they said on the stage, I’m pretty sure they’re “together.” Now, if you’ve seen me during worship at a weekend service, you know I’m all about being expressive. I’m likely to wave my hands a little, hop around a little on the stage – but this chick took it to an extreme. Here’s the thing – when everyone at the Wild Horse should have had their cameras out taking pics of Colin – they didn’t, they had their camera’s out taking pics of her. I do have to say that she did some amazing things vocally on “Land Down Under,” basically playing her voice as a flute. I was enamored with her during that part – but other than that, she was a terrible distraction. Now, she’s playing at the Wild Horse and I’m just playing at the UC, but she seemed really out of place – and in my opinion – she stole the show right from underneath Colin with her high kicks, tambourine playing (I’m sure Stevie Nicks had some streamers she could have borrowed), and interpretive dance.
I don’t make everything into a “worship” or “spiritual” issue, but I honestly sat in my seat last night and I wondered to myself if I ever do similar things on the stage on Sunday mornings and “steal the show” from God. I’ve said this on here before, but one time God told me that I was stealing the affection of His bride for myself. I’m sure many of us have a tendency to steal the show from God.
Our group launches this Thursday at 7PM at our apartment! We hope to see you then! Email me for more info!
mjd
I heard Andy Stanley give a talk on finding your “sweet spot” about 5 years ago at a C3 conference…that talk comes back to my mind on a regular basis… Here’s what’s going through my head now, some of this is his, some of these things are my thoughts.
Life doesn’t always afford us the opportunity to work in our sweet spot, but I’ve found in my short life that my greatest hindrance to operating in my sweet spot is my fear of letting go of things that aren’t in my sweet spot. I’m amazed by the people God has surrounded us with at UC. The attitude (servant’s heart) and skill levels of these people astound me. If you’ve read Pastor Joe’s blog recently, you know he’s trying to “let go” of things right now and release other areas to people who can take it farther. I’m in turn trying to do the same thing.
It’s amazing that the areas of ministry I’m responsible for at UC are already too much for me to handle. (By handle – I mean that natural feeling I have that I need to control things.) Most importantly, if I try to maintain control of these items – I’m going to completely miss my two sweet spots – leading worship, and pastoring people. In the past, leading worship has always meant arranging music/selecting music, working rehearsals, working transitions, creative team involvement, scheduling musicians, setting up equipment, etc. Chel and I are really looking for “the” person to turn this over to at UC. I can’t tell you how hard it is to imagine my life without that, but if I can free myself from those administrative details – I can spend more time with people. With the other areas we’re responsible for, we’ve got people who know 10x more than we know – my involvement only confuses getting things done.
So what about you? Are you serving where you fit best? Are you holding onto things and causing life to be difficult for others? Are you using the gifts God’s given you?
Here it is…
D – Noise We Make (Charlie Hall/Passion)
F – Lord of All (Hillsong London)
C – Blessed Be Your Name (Newsong Arrangement of Redman song)
E – Better is One Day (Passion)
We were unable to grab an extra guitar player for the weekend, so Chel was playing double duty jumping back and forth between electric and acoustic. We got word about 7AM that our keyboard player wouldn’t be there, and since that was such a “filler” we knew it would hurt to miss it, so yours truly ended up playing keys. I haven’t been playing keys long, so for me to play during a service, I’ve got to practice – A LOT. This weekend didn’t afford me that time – so I was shaking uncontrollably because I was nervous – which makes it even harder to put your fingers on the right keys. We actually had a really full, really strong sound up to the last song, then my lack of confidence really was evident. I don’t have time to practice to get better – I really need a committed keys player – but so is the struggle. If you’re out there and you play rhythm or lead electric or keys, let us know!
Remember that time my status was moved from part-time temporary to Full-time and no one told me about it? Yes, that’s right. It’s really quite relieving because the decision has to be made within the next six weeks and I hadn’t heard anything about it, but I got my paycheck today (yay!) and didn’t include my overtime. I checked online and it appears I don’t get overtime any more – I’m full time but no one told me about it. I guess I can’t get benefits till open-enrollment next June. Hmmm…that’s a bummer. The relieving things is I didn’t have to take a pay cut in the transfer – that amazing… I was expecting a 20% pay cut in the transfer when it actually happened. Evidently they got tired of paying OT and decided to move me to salary… either way, I’ll take it.
mjd
