Music Florida - Morning 1 thoughts

So I've been on the job at FBCG for two months now and how do you celebrate your 2 month anniversary at a new church.....you go to a MUSIC CONFERENCE IN FLORIDA!  Now there are lots of reasons that you do this.

1) It's in Florida...Orlando to be exact....so there's no better place to be in the month of January when you want to escape the cold weather right?

2)  You get to miss Monday morning staff meeting

3)  You get to sing choir music with a ton of worship pastors and refresh your heart and passion for worship and get some new ideas and a new direction for your ministry!

Totally an awesome week ahead right!  Plus after watching two grown women relieve themselves in the middle of Broadway on New Year's Eve (that's right....they went No.1 in the middle of the street with hundreds of complete strangers forced to watch in total disgust!)  I felt it essential that I get away and recover from this traumatic experience.

So this brings us to Florida....First thing on tap this morning are several audio seminars on mixing, sound, lighting, etc...  I woke up this morning pumped to get the day rolling!  Headed down to the lobby of the Ramada Orlando Celebration Resort and Convention Center and grabbed my $11 french toast bites and joined a few of my fellow conference goers for a quick sit down breakfast.  That's when things went totally wrong....

As the conversation went through the regular routines (what's your name, where you from, what church you at, how long ya been there, how many on roll, what's your attendance) we finally began to actually discuss some music.  One of the older gentlemen  was named Carl and Carl has been a minister of music at the same church in Decatur, GA for 28 years....that's right 28 years.  Carl began to express how he believed that all the dying churches across the South could easily save themselves if they would just get back to their roots.....aka Southern Gospel.

Now if you know me, or even if you don't, Southern Gospel music normally makes me want to permanently deafen myself....it's just not for me, and not for a lot of people if my thinking is correct....mainly it's not for most people under the age of 35.  Now I'm not saying that there aren't some people who are younger who enjoy it.....we're just talking majority here, folks.  Just like Carl was talking majority when he suggested that the solution to dying worship ministries or even stagnant worship ministries was more Southern Gospel.....I just can't help but imagining Carl at his church in Decatur prodding his musicians for "More Southern Gospel" in a very Christopher Walken-ish way (More Cowbell!)

Well it finally came my chance to talk about my thoughts on music and I mentioned that our church does two services and that I really pull a lot of our music and my inspiration from Hillsong United.  Their response?  Total silence.  They had no clue who I was talking about.  They had no clue that a church named Hillsong Church even existed.  My stomach dropped and I hung around for another minute or two and then luckily I was saved by a text message and found my escape opportunity.

Now, don't get me wrong, I'm not trying to say that I've got the market cornered on what ALL churches everywhere should be doing in worship.  I'm not saying that every church needs a rocking band on stage or has to be singing "Break Free" at 8:30 in the morning.

What concerns me though is that it seems so many churches and worship pastors are still living in 1986....I mean are there that many ministers who have quit believing in a fresh word from the Lord?.....can that not also apply to our worship style?  If the pastor at your church got up every morning Sunday and gave the exact same sermon week after week, would you think he was spending enough time in preparation?  Or what if your pastor led your church in a year long study of the book of Genesis, and upon completion, he dives you right back into the exact same study of Genesis over, and over, and over again....would your heart be excited and stirred week after week?  I hope the answer to both of those questions is a resounding, yell at the top of your lungs, NO!!

So why are so many churches views on new and modern worship still so skeptical?  I mean have these guys read the Psalms?  Have they ever happened over Psalm 33:3?  Is God not so powerful that he couldn't work through the Black Eyed Peas if he chose to?  (I'm sure we could find some way to change Boom Boom Pow into a evangelistic tool right?)  Our God will never change, but that doesn't mean the way that we reach folks shouldn't either.....less we forget that Jesus was a rebel when he started His public ministry...Of course I'm not talking James Dean Rebel stature here...but the way He spoke, the way He taught, the way He interacted with people, in fact even the type of people He interacted with was fresh, different, not the status quo........So why does our church music have to be status quo?  Well I can promise you one thing, we won't be rolling that way at FBCG, I'm just saying....

Anyways, that's my sermon for the week....I promise, that upcoming posts this week will be much lighter...until then....have a good one