So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering.

Romans 12:1

Seriously I think that verse kicks my butt every time.  Anyone else struggle with living their whole life as a worship?  Maybe it’s just me.  Sometimes I will do great.  But, let’s be honest.  A major part of my life is lived for me.  Painful truth.  He wants more from me than just my Sunday mornings.  More than just my Bible reading times.  More than my prayers.  More than my pre-deathdefiance promises.  He wants (and deserves) it all.  Every single ordinary thing.

You know that one song that you just love?  The one that when you hear it makes you feel like you are just so close to God?  Sometimes it’s just so easy to worship Him!  But what about that one song that you just can’t stand.  Yeah, it’s about God and Jesus and stuff, the words are real spiritual, but you just can’t worship to it.  Sometimes it’s just difficult.  The feelings aren’t there and it would just be forced, right?

So many times we spend our days just living our lives.  We just go about our normal lives and wait until Sunday provides (or doesn’t provide) that perfect opportunity for us to be able to worship God.  I know, I hear you.  The chorus after the bridge of that song is so powerful that you can’t help but worship!  That’s good but we are still leaving out a major chunk of our lives.  Paul tries to make us understand in Romans.

So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going-to-work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering.

Romans 12:1

We are told to live our everyday lives for God.  That is worship.  Not just our sing church songs-pass the offering plate-listen to a sermon-everyweek Sunday.  Worship is far more than just the time that your bulletin has listed under the “Worship” category.  Well, maybe that’s all it is for you, but it should be our lives.  We have to make the choice to worship God in all we do.  When we only worship because it feels right, we are aren’t following the Biblical instruction we are given in Romans.

Worshipping is an attitude.  It’s not based on feelings.  If our feelings were the key ingredient then there would be nothing wrong with not worshipping God when we don’t feel like it.  But according to Romans, even when we don’t feel like it we should be worshipping.  We shouldn’t worship just to our favorite song.  It’s great if a song makes you feel closer to God or gets your emotions going because of who He is or what He has done, but if that’s all our worship is, then it is shallow and not truly honoring Him.

This week I’m gonna try to worship God with my whole life and not just the convenient, mountain top, camp high or planned “worship” times.  When Sunday rolls around and your church plays that song that just aren’t feeling, remember that worship is more than a feeling.  It is a choice.  Choose to worship God for who He is and not for how you feel.

Recently we had a breakfast for married couples at Kingsfield.  As a worship leader it was a pretty standard day for me.  Set up, hang with the wife, eat some food, lead a few worship songs, listen to the speaker, hang out and tear down.  But as we were singing one of the songs I realized something.  Normally I want to do everything I can to minimize distractions and help people block out everything and everyone around them.  But this time I was seeing something else.

As I looked across the room of 25 or so couples, I saw what an amazing privilege it is to get to worship through music with your spouse!  Personally I don’t get to do this much since I’m usually in the band or involved in some way that doesn’t allow me to be with her all the time.  I love getting to worship with her when I do get the chance.  There is something about the music that makes it easy for us to just forget everything around us and focus, but sometimes it is awesome to focus with your other half.  You can be free together.  You can sing together.  You can raise your hands or kneel or sit or pray.  But however you worship God you get to do that with the love of your life!

Take advantage of these opportunities!  When you have the chance, make it happen!  Change your volunteer schedule so you can go to church together.  Forget that you have sat in that same seat for the past forever and sit together.  Stop worrying about what others think and love God together.  Make the kids sit on the other side of you.  Whatever it is you need to do, reorganize to do it!  Make a change and spend time worshipping your Savior with one of the biggest blessings you can ever have: your spouse!

What a privilege to worship with your spouse. Take advantage of it. Make it happen. Reorganize to do it.

Simon says tell us your favorite song to worship to at the moment!

Go!

We got a new Video Of The Week this week!  Aaron Keyes is a new-to-me (in the last year or so) worship leader.  Every time I have seen him lead he has done an outstanding job.  Every time I listen to him I realize a little more that my Scriptural knowledge is lacking.  I think he has a YouVersion brain implant.  That or he just really knows his stuff and love his God.  I think it’s more of the second one.  Check out this video, follow him on Twitter (@aaronkeyes) and then hit him up on iTunes and get his album Not Guilty Anymore!

When you read Luke, as Jesus is entering into Jerusalem everyone is singing His praises.  But the Pharisees freaked out and tried to stop it.

Some Pharisees from the crowd told him, “Teacher, get your disciples under control!” But he said, “If they kept quiet, the stones would do it for them, shouting praise.”

Luke 19:39-40

I have always wanted to see that.  Rocks crying out to God.  That just seems so far beyond what I can understand and imagine, yet so insanely awesome.  But they won’t.  Not yet.

The created world itself can hardly wait for what’s coming next. Everything in creation is being more or less held back. God reins it in until both creation and all the creatures are ready and can be released at the same moment into the glorious times ahead.

Romans 3:19-21

Do you see the amazing privilege that we have here?  The created world is being held back.  The entire world wants to do something that we have the choice to do.  They want to worship God.  And we have a choice.  Worship Him without being held back or live for ourselves.  Unfortunately I do the latter far too much.  I want to worship Him more.  I need to worship Him more.  (By the way, worshipping is way more than learning G, C, D and Em on the guitar and playing every worship song.  It is much more than going to church and singing two fast, one slow, one fast…or verse one and two, skip verse three and end with verse 4…just depends on what church you go to.)

I want to worship/honor/praise/trust Him…

…with my attitude.

…with my family.

…with my road rage.

…with my tweets.

…with my life.

He deserves so much more worship than I give Him.  The rocks know that.  They want to let it rip, but it’s just not their time yet.  Maybe we should start learning from them.  Maybe I am dumber than a rock.

Well we are back from vacation and back to normal life again!  After playing catch up all week, Sunday has arrived and we are looking forward to some great things this week!

• I dislocated my pinky finger on my left hand 12 days ago and I am expecting the guitar playing to be good and painful.  (Ok, that one’s not a great thing to expect but it’s true.)
• I am excited about the setlist for the day.  Awesome Is The Lord Most High, Jesus Paid It All, From The Inside Out, and Jesus Saves.  Can’t wait to worship through them all morning!
• We dug through a ton of junk yesterday (still moving in a year later) and pulled out the Christmas decorations.  I am definitely expecting those to go up today.
• I know that God is going to work in some awesome ways tomorrow through all of our volunteer team!  They seriously rock!

This is gonna be a great week.  Follow His path and expect the Lord to do some great things in your life this week too!

This past weekend, my wife and I had the privilege of going to LifeChurch.tv in Edmond, OK. Of course we loved it. Marcy Priest led and as always did an amazing job. One of my favorite things is getting to hear other people lead worship. Not only is it a nice break to just be in the middle of it all sometimes instead of leading, but it’s also a great way to hear new songs. Marcy did a song called Revelation Song recorded by Kim Walker and written by Jennie Lee Riddle. Loved it! I have no idea how I haven’t heard it before. It’s such a great song. Then throw Kim Walker in the mix and it is freakin’ outstanding! My favorite part of the song is the driving bridge (surprise surprise) that simply says “Be my Everything“. I love it. How many times do we need God to be our everything? But how many times do we actually let Him be our everything.

Read the lyrics. Go get the song. Worship your Everything.

worthy is the Lamb who was slain
holy, holy is He
sing a new song to Him who sits on
heaven’s mercy seat

holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty
Who was and is and is to come
with all creation i sing praise to the King of Kings
You are my everything and i will adore You

clothed in rainbows of living color
flashes of lightning, rolls of thunder
blessing and honor, strength and glory and power be
to You the only Wise King

holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty
Who was and is and is to come
with all creation i sing praise to the King of Kings
You are my everything and i will adore You

filled with wonder, awestruck wonder
at the mention of Your name
Jesus, Your name is Power, Breath, and Living Water
such a marvelous mystery

holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty
Who was and is and is to come
with all creation i sing praise to the King of Kings
You are my everything and i will adore You

be my Everything, be my Everything
be my Everything, be my Everything

holy, holy, holy is the Lord God Almighty
Who was and is and is to come
with all creation i sing praise to the King of Kings
You are my everything and i will adore You

As the church many times we miss the point of the music in our experiences.  I am not claiming that for all churches or that I am not guilty of this because I would be severely wrong in many cases.  But what is really the point in singing songs together while reading the words off the screen?  Do we do it because we like the songs?  Do we do it out of habit?  Do we do it because it makes us feel good?  Is it because the music is good?  Do we do it out of tradition?  What is it?  I mean if you think about it, as a friend of mine put it, it’s really a weird thing to come together and sing like that.  We really don’t do that very often outside of church.  I think that a lot of the time we just lose our focus (assuming it was directed in the right place to start with is a big jump but I hope that happens).  Our mind goes to things like the music is too loud, I don’t know this song so I will just tune out, I don’t have a good voice so I don’t sing, I don’t want people around me to hear me, etc.  But our main problem isn’t what is good or bad with the music or what we like or don’t like, but where our focus is.

When we are worried about any range of little things our focus is no longer where it should be.  We have now shifted to focusing on ourselves.  What do I want?  What do I like?  What if they hear me?  What if blah, blah, blah?  Our little world is now revolving around us and not where it should be.  If our focus is in the right direction, on God, then we stop thinking about what our neighbor thinks of our harmonizing or how we never really learned the words to this song and we starting realizing that God just wants our worship.  He wants our hearts.  When we are truly worshiping with our hearts it doesn’t matter if we know the words to the song.  It doesn’t matter if there are words to the song.  It doesn’t matter what the people next to us smell like, look like or sing like.  The ONLY thing that matters is that God knows we are just releasing everything to Him and expressing our hearts in a musical form!

My prayer for our church is that we learn that worship is more than singing songs.  I hope that we can see that this time of worship music, whether long or short, is a time for us to escape our crazy selfish lives and give all that we have to our Daddy.  I want the people there on Sundays and our staff and me and my band to see this time as a time to focus on He who created us and loves us and gives up everything for us.  It is a time to reflect on how very big our God is and how everything is done because He alone allows it.  It is a time to celebrate how awesome our God is and the things that He has done.  I pray that everyone from the grandparents to the musicians to the ushers understands that music is just a gift and a creative vessel in which we can easily glorify our God.

So sing your hearts out!  Clap and shout!  Rip up that solo!  Harmonize like the Beach Boys!  But do it all for Him.  Let’s stop singing just to sing.  Let’s really make it worship from our hearts.

One of my favorite David Crowder*Band songs is Make A Joyful Noise/I Will Not Be Silent.  I absolutely love the song.  For our trip to Israel, I am the worship leader and had to pick out a bunch of songs and print out lyrics for everyone to use so that we could all sing together.  Of course I added this song.  Well, we were sitting in a boat on the Sea Of Galilee yesterday and we started singing this song.  For some reason it hit me different than it ever has before.  Yes, I will not be silent.  Yes, I want to make a joyful noise to the Lord.  But I thought about it from a different angle this time.

The song talks about the flowers of the field, the trees of the forest, and all of creation crying out to God in worship.  Awesome!  How insane would that be?!  Well, they, like us, were created to worship God.  The only difference is that they don’t have a choice.  They exist and in doing so worship God.  But we are different.  Yes, the reason for our existence is to glorify God but we have free will.  We get to choose every second of every day whether or not we will worship Him in that second.  All the rest of creation doesn’t get that choice!

So, just think about that today.  All of creation cries out to God in worship.  They can’t help it.  They exist and therefore worship Him.  We exist too and therefore should worship God, but we have the choice and often choose not too.  If everything was created to worship Him (us included), how much more glorifying is the worship from being that have the choice to worship Him and CHOOSE to do so?!