Top 10...reasons to be excited about this Zimbabwean trip

Between the 21st June and 4th July we embark on another trip North of the Limpopo. Here's 10 reasons why this one will be incredible!

10. First-Timers

-Taking a team, the majority of who have never been out of the country, on a life-changing 2 weeks that will enlarge, challenge and shape their hearts all the more for the bigness of God’s beautiful story of redemption

9. Beit Bridge

-Coming face to face with every Limpopo River crosser’s arch nemesis. Queues, queues and more queues, it’s bureaucracy  at its best (worst?). A worthy opponent to anyone’s patience

8. The Base Church

-An NCMI church that is pioneering new God adventures in the city of Harare, the country and excitingly other nations. Great to partner with them

7. Pizza Inn

-The best pizza south of the equator hands down. Not to mention that I once was their poster child as a redheaded Peppi the Pizza Boy (but that’s a story for another day)

6. Rob Chifokoyo

-Pioneer of the organisation Dare2Serve (under the Miracle Mission umbrella) who serve orphanages, old age homes and street children as well as empowering and inspiring the church of Harare. Privilege to dream with their team and be inspired by him.

5. CD’s on endless cycles of repeat

-3 days travel there, 3 days travel back. Enough said

4. Youth Ablaze Outreaches

-5 nights in 5 outlying rural towns, wild worship, declaring the Gospel and seeing momentum launched as we head to nationwide youth camps in the near future

3. Late nights, (very) early mornings

-Mission trips are not for the feint-hearted. Sleep-ins are a thing of the past.

2. New and old friendships

-Travelling and ministering with over 60 people from Cape Town, Bloemfontein and Durban as well as numbers from Harare, Bulawayo and Mutare, this one’s the biggest yet

1. The Gospel changing lives

-no matter the cost, the leave taken, the administrative organisation, the emotional and physical output, there is nothing that can replace the joy of seeing the Gospel impacting lives and nations.

We go for the lost, the last and the least. We exist for those who are yet to believe.

Worship Leading: Song Selection (Part 3)

Third part of three blogs on the basic lenses we look through when choosing worship songs for our corporate worship times.

1. Theological

2. Congregational

3. Seasonal

-Songs that carry the life of God. It may have the funkiest bass line, or the most incredible groove, but if it is not carrying the spark of the life of God then jettison it fast. Be wary of the trap that says, “it worked in the past so it must work again and again”.

-Songs that serve the church’s season. Again we must make it a priority to work in team with our local church leaders in this regard. Learn to carry a heart for the church. David in the Psalms was a man very in tune with the seasons of God and the seasons of his own soul and those of the people he lead. We are not “ra-ra” cheerleaders. Our worship times are not therapeutic pick me up times. We lead from where the people are at, and LEAD them to where God wants them to be. Again I must mention that we don’t pander to man centredness or emotions, but we do not deny them. That is Gnostic!

Worship Leading: Song Selection (Part 2)

  1. Theological

        2. Congregational

-Songs that are not just personal favourites of ours. It is vital that we remind ourselves that leading worship means LEADING! Worship leaders have a tendency (another generalisation) to have a rebellious slant that surfaces from time to time as it becomes “their ministry” and they try to push through their agenda’s. This is unhelpful and prideful. Be involved in the community of the church, be submitted to the leadership. Have conversations with them often around the culture of worship in your local church. Ask for feedback.

-Songs that are easy to sing. On a very practical note, consider the keys you are singing in. Too low and the song hardly ever gets off the ground, too high and you alienate half the congregation. Again, remember the leading is about the people who are following you!

Don’t introduce too many new songs too quickly. Most people in our congregations only sing the songs we’re singing once a week, whilst we as worship leaders play them at practice, at home, in our cars all on top of our Sunday meetings. So we definitely will get bored of them quicker. But again we must remind ourselves that this is not about us! Our aim at a base level is to get the people singing, not primarily to get their feet tapping.

3. Seasonal

 

Worship Leading: Song selection

Here are 3 criteria/lenses that I find helpful when choosing songs for our corporate worship times.

1.       Theological

2 aspects:

-Songs that are God oriented, not “me” focused. The great error in the modern church (I’m generalising here) is getting stuck in an adolescent type phase where everything is all about me. Our Christianity becomes a roller coaster experience based on feelings, circumstances and emotions when we denigrate our worship of God to what Christian Smith (author of “Soul Searching”) calls “Christian Moralistic therapeutic deism.” Worship leaders, we are not attempting to become the soundtrack to our congregations lives! Count the number of times personal pronouns of “me”, “I” and the like crop up in the songs we are singing. Make sure we are not just adding to our prevailing culture of idolatry by presenting them with an Oprah-esque type God who can fit in their pocket.

- Songs that are New Covenant in nature. We need to keep forefront in our minds that worship did not tear the heavens open, the blood of Christ did! Worship does not take us into His presence. The blood does! It is again idolatry of the grandest nature when we elevate our worship to a status that is not biblical. So sing about what Jesus has done! Revel in His goodness. Songs that remind people that we have direct access to The Father. Christ is our mediator, not our corporate worship times!

2.       Congregational

3.       Seasonal

The other two will be outworked in the next couple of blogs.