Worship

1. Submission to the Leader

2. A Lifestyle of Prayer

3. Preparation

4. A Lifestyle of Obedience

5. Excellence

6. A Lifestyle of Personal Worship

7. Humility

8. Vision

Todays Key:

9. Love for Gods Church

In Matthew 16:18 Jesus says to Peter “I will build My Church”.

The Church is His. They are His people. We have been asked to steward it until He returns.

The Church is not a place for my self actualization, or primarily an outlet for my gift. I have stated many times as leaders we must recognize, call out, equip, and release people into the fullness of their calling and gifting.

However the Church is not a vehicle to be used by me.

Phillipians chapter two says Jesus divested Himself of any self interest and was obedient to the point of death on a cross “therefore” God placed Him. We must have the same attitude.In order to be placed in the fullness of our calling we must lay down our life for the Kingdom.

We must serve His people.

When we have a proper understanding of our position in the body and our responsibility to serve Gods people it brings perspective and gives us more patience knowing God has our best interest at heart. The desire in your heart was put there by God and He wants it for you more than you want it for you. Lay down your life for the kingdom and watch God do a miracle in the body and in you.

Blessings,

Number ten is here.

1. Submission to the Leader

2. A Lifestyle of Prayer

3. Preparation

4. A Lifestyle of Obedience

5. Excellence

6. A Lifestyle of Personal Worship

7. Humility

Todays Key:

8. Vision

Vision is a word we throw around a lot. I always hear people quoting Proverbs 29:18, we have all heard the importance of vision, I just don’t hear much vision casting going on.

Vision is what you see, the end result of what your doing. It’s not  a goal or an elevator speech. It can be very long and drawn out. It all depends on what you “see”. The best example I know of is the Hillsong vision, “The Church I See“. Don Cousins asks the question this way. “What will it look like when your done?”.

Every time we stand in front of our people we should be casting vision. What is your vision for the ministry entrusted to you? It needs to be big enough for people to come under and have their own vision flourish. (yes those entrusted to you have their own vision and yours needs to be big enough for theirs to fit into). What is your vision for the service this morning. What is your vision for the event were working on? What are you expecting God to do in this rehearsal?

Lets stop talking about vision and start casting it.

Blessings,

Number nine is here.

1. Submission to the Leader

2. A Lifestyle of Prayer

3. Preparation

4. A Lifestyle of Obedience

5. Excellence

Todays Key:

6. A Lifestyle of Personal Worship

Your personal worship time is where it all begins. It is in these times God brings you into the fullness of your calling and speaks to you things too wonderful which you do not know.

Only when we go to the mountain do we have anything of real value to give to the congregation. We cannot take people to a place we have not been.

There are times when I have known exactly what God wants to say to His people. There are other times when He is silent and I have learned when this happens often He is saying “what do you have to offer me this wee”. Either way He is faithful and will meet me where I am and at the same time meet with His people. I am constantly amazed by Him.

Don’t ever allow busyness to take the place of personal worship.

Number seven is here.

1. Submission to the Leader

2. A Lifestyle of Prayer

3. Preparation

4. A Lifestyle of Obedience

Todays Key:

5. Excellence

This is a big one.

I often hear people saying things like “that’s good enough” or “It doesn’t have to be perfect”. We have to be very careful with that attitude. We must always remember we are representing the Kingdom and God always gives us His best. We should offer Him no less than our best.

Excellence does not mean perfection and means something different in every context. What is excellent for your church could be completely different at the church down the road.

It means representing the Kingdom as well as possible with what you have. Offering our best is an act of worship in itself. Everything we do should be well thought out, well prepared, so we will represent the God we serve in the best possible way.

This could go several different ways. I would love to hear your thoughts and experiences with this idea.

More reading here.

Number six is here.

1. Submission to the Leader

2. Lifestyle of Prayer

Todays key:

3. Preparation

In almost 25 years of leading worship the complaint I hear most is “I hate it when I come to rehearsal and the leader isn’t ready!”.

What they are talking about is being prepared administratively which is huge but not the only preparation I’m talking about.

First administrative.

When our team arrives at rehearsal everything shoul be ready to go. Charts prepared, recordings available, what ever you need to rehearse. We should have already worked through the set and know where were going. What the transitions are who is starting each song, what happens in the song etc. etc.

Second spiritual.

When I started in sales I was told:

Sales is 90% people skills and 10% product knowledge and you have to know 100% of the 10%

The same is true with spiritual preparation It’s 90% spiritual and 10% practical and you have to know 100% of the 10%. Make sure you are prayed up, that you have heard from God about what He wants to do in the service. Pray for your team, the music, the transitions, the scripture, what you should say. Pray for the congregation, the pastor, the MC, MD, don’t leave anything to chance.

If you only have time to do one of these two things prepare spiritually but don’t make it a habit of only leaving time for number two.

Blessings,

Number four is here.