Category Archives: Community

The Exchange

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This week I want to use this post to speak to my church family at FAC

I love my church.  It’s been about 2 months now that I’ve been back on staff at FAC and I have never felt so certain that I am in the right place in ministry.

I get excited when I think about our church because I know that God is up to something big.  He is working on the deep places of our hearts.  He is calling us into closer relationship with Himself, and I believe we are starting to respond to His call with more and more faith and anticipation.

enter The Exchange

The Exchange is a new church experience that will be launching on October 14th.  It was birthed out of a desire to reach an even wider span of Calgary’s diverse community with the truth and hope of the Gospel.

Our purpose is to build lives that honour God.

  • We will be committed to upholding the authority of God’s Word
  • We will be committed to building Biblical Community
  • We will be committed to Biblical Discipleship

We are not reinventing the wheel.  We are not out to create a flashy new church service to be consumed.  We are not a rebellion against traditional or even contemporary church models.

God has gifted each of us in unique ways and He has given us influence so that we can make Him famous.  We’ll be a place of community.  We’ll be a place of the arts.  We’ll be a place for broken people.  We’ll be a place of acceptance.

So why the name The Exchange?

We believe that Jesus changed everything when He Exchanged his throne for our freedom. Everything we do and everything that we are is because of The Exchange.  (Philippians 2)

Every initiative and every aspect of our ministry will be filtered through our core values of Biblical Authority, Biblical Community, and Biblical Discipleship.

What is this service going to look like/feel like/sound like?

That depends on how you want to get involved and what areas you’re passionate in.  We’re building this together.  Our goal is to foster a collaborative community in which people feel driven to use the gifts God has given them to serve together.

Who provides leadership to this service?

Pastor Brad Young and yours truly (Caleb Delamont) will be providing leadership for The Exchange.  There will also be some key leadership positions that will need to be filled along the way.  Maybe one of those positions will be for you?

 

We are essentially planting a church within a church.  This is as exciting as it is daunting but we know that God sized dreams rarely seem like simple tasks.

Come hear more about The Exchange

Sunday, September 2nd 

6:30pm in the Harvest Rooms at First Alliance Church (12345 40 St. SE, Calgary)

 

Consumed

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Sometimes I get pretty scared about doing ministry. In my life I’ve regularly attended church on 2 continents and since I was a kid I can remember people talking about what they ‘like’ and ‘don’t like’ about church. I wonder if we’ll ever be able to escape our checklist mindset of church.

I recently attended a prayer gathering that coincided with the end of Ramadan. I don’t know much about Ramadan but I believe it’s a fairly significant period of fasting and praying observed by Muslims around the world. The purpose of this gathering was to pray for Muslims everywhere. I was there to lead a short worship time. Throughout the night we heard a number of testimonies from mostly former Muslims who had found new life in Jesus.

They were powerful stories, and they made me feel a bit uneasy.

One man told of how he ran for days through treacherous terrain attempting to escape his country because he was afraid that this time the authorities wouldn’t stop at torture and imprisonment. He made it out, but not everyone from his group did.

Another man spoke passionately about wanting to return to his country to share the Gospel with his people. They had a group ready to go, but Christians there are being slaughtered and it would not be safe for them to go at this time.

(Side note, please pray for the Muslim world. They need Jesus and the believers there need encouragement. www.30-days.net)

So we serve the same Jesus, right?

It sure looks pretty different here.

The thing is I don’t necessarily think that we have a bunch of disingenuous Christians here. If we do that’s not really for me to judge (though I do all the time which as a reminder to myself and you is probably a sin). I for one know a lot of extremely passionate Jesus followers and I truly believe they would go anywhere and do anything for God.

But personally, I just can’t shake this checklist mentality from how I approach church. I have my worship leader checklist. I have my service flow checklist. I have my audio mix, visuals, greeters, ushers, checklists. I don’t mean to, and sometimes it’s not really there but that would be a rare case. I suck, I feel brutal, but it’s the truth.

In October we are launching a new service at my church. I’m the Creative Pastor for this new service. I feel the pressure of not just my own, but hundreds of people’s personal checklists. Will it be cool enough? Will it be just the thing that the 20 year old is looking for to get back into attending church? Will it be innovative enough? Will it “work”?

Ugh…

We’re too comfortable here in North America, yet this is where we are and that’s not a mistake. I’m not calling for tougher times for Christians or less technology and distraction in church. As with anything that has to do with following Jesus the important thing here is the posture and focus of our hearts.

When we’re thinking about ourselves we come in with a checklist.

When we are fully focused on Jesus and His Kingdom the checklist is gone.

Once again the bible says it much better than I could…

The very credentials these people are waving around as something special, I’m tearing up and throwing out with the trash—along with everything else I used to take credit for. And why? Because of Christ. Yes, all the things I once thought were so important are gone from my life. Compared to the high privilege of knowing Christ Jesus as my Master, firsthand, everything I once thought I had going for me is insignificant—dog dung. I’ve dumped it all in the trash so that I could embrace Christ and be embraced by him. I didn’t want some petty, inferior brand of righteousness that comes from keeping a list of rules when I could get the robust kind that comes from trusting Christ—God’s righteousness. Philippians 3:7-9 (MSG)

 

Create in me a clean heart, O God,
and renew a rightspirit within me. Psalm 51:10 (ESV)

 

Will we go on “Consuming” or will we ask Jesus to “Consume” us?

 

There’s Always Someone Better

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(if you can’t see the above video watch it HERE)

an iPhone

iMovie

and a song from my iTunes library

On its own this video is very unremarkable.  The frame is all wrong.  The quality is poor.  I’m filming with the phone sticking out of my shirt pocket as I drive.

A professional or even someone who makes videos as a hobby would have captured, edited, and produced something much better than I did.  But if I had contracted someone to make this video then it wouldn’t have been mine.  It wouldn’t have been my story.

There will always be someone better than you.  Everywhere I go I find better worship leaders, better musicians, and better artists than myself.  This isn’t self deprecation, it’s just  the truth and I’m ok with it.  But imagine if I allowed that to affect me so much that I stopped creating my art?  Stopped leading worship?  Or stopped telling my story?  I would be in danger of hiding God from others.  If God’s fingerprints are all over my life (which I believe they are, and yours too) and I neglect to share my story or my art with the world then what witness would I have?

Tell the God story that is in you

Tell it to everyone and anyone that will listen

Tell it with your personality, with your gifts

Tell it through your actions, tell it through your words

Tell it through your songs, your paintings, your photos, your videos, your anything and everything

Because His fingerprints are on you, and He has given you a story to tell

 

My story that goes along with this video is from August 12, 2012 and I will never forget that night now for as long as I live.  My family threw me a belated birthday party.  What started out as pulling out photo albums to compare my Dad’s gray hair level to mine at age 27 (I have more gray hair) turned into my brothers, my Dad and I telling our wives the stories that went along with the pictures in those albums.

Pictures of me as a chubby 1 year old in Germany – The story of a young family following the call of God to a country they didn’t know to serve people and tell them the God story.

Pictures of 2 small premature babies in incubators – The story of my twin brothers, clinging to new life, sustained by the one who created them, covered in the prayers of hundreds if not thousands.  A new brother reaches in to touch them, the beginning of an amazing friendship.  They are the miracle babies.  The babies who survived in a body that was simultaneously battling cancer.  The babies that gave a stranger, a mother in Sweden, hope for her own unborn twins coming into the world with the same odds against them.  They were with me to tell the story.

Pictures of me imitating my Dad as he plays the bass – The story of a boy who would grow up to tell the God story through music.  The story of a father who in the midst of the chaos and the uncertainty of a wife with cancer and two premature babies clinging to life took the time to be with his eldest son and share with him a moment of joy.  A God moment.

Pictures of a 3 year old me grinning from ear to ear wearing Mom’s wig – The story of a boy who loved his mother with all his heart.  The story of a mother who was strong for her family.  The story of a God who sustained life in a brittle body for much longer than any doctor would have believed possible so that she could build into her sons what it means to trust God in any circumstance.  The story that continues today where Mom is in heaven and I am here with a story to tell.

The video is what I captured on our way home from that night.  Lights in the sky.  Lights on the road.  Lights in the buildings.  Lights that to me in that very moment reminded me that the God story is all around us.

 

God has given you a story to tell.  You will be faced with moments in your life when you want to shy away from it.  You will feel like you should maybe just leave it to the “professionals” or the “experts”.  But it is your story.

There is a God story inside of you that needs to be told.

 

what is your story?

This Is Worship Victoria

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Saturday, April 21st, 2012 is going to be an amazing day.  It’s the culmination and celebration of something that I never thought I would be a part of.  Over the past year I have been part of an idea called Worship Victoria.  We are about to release our first album, but it’s so much more than a worship compilation CD.  It’s the start of something that I believe will change the face of the local church in Victoria, BC forever.  

Today I want to share the story of Worship Victoria with you.

____________________________

(from the Worship Victoria website)

Worship Victoria was formed out of community, with worship leaders from different churches across our city spending time together. Over hash browns and morning coffee we would chat about our roles, challenges, lives as leaders, and our interests, passions, and discoveries as worshippers and musicians. On one of those mornings, Fraser Campbell brought to the table the idea of a city compilation album. Our churches were already singing original songs, and the prospect of compiling music from worship leaders and writers around Victoria was instantly exciting.

Thus began the long journey of creating a worship album that represented the churches and worship communities of Victoria. From early on in the process it was apparent that a theme was developing – a collection of songs was being formed that, whether through sacred liturgy or charismatic celebration, spoke of our need to see God move in our City. “Kingdom Come” would eventually become the title of the album.

The leaders of the project decided early on that all proceeds from the project should go towards a cause that aids in the advancement of God’s Kingdom. The Church of Victoria has long admired the faithful work of Rob Trepanier and has seen the positive impact of Sanctuary Youth Centre; partnering with Sanctuary was a natural fit for this project. These songs echo the heart of Sanctuary’s ministry: to see the lost found, the hurting healed and the broken restored in Christ. His kingdom come and His will be done on Earth, in our time, and in our city.

This is the prayer of Worship Victoria.

______________________________

If you’re wondering how you’ll be able to get the CD online it might be a while before we figure out how that will work.  Since this is a fundraiser for the Sanctuary Youth Centre we want to try our best to make sure all the funds go directly to them without too much administrative hassle.  But if you’d like a CD then leave a comment and we’ll try to figure something out.

 

For More on Worship Victoria check out…

 

Blank

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It’s no one’s fault really.  It was bound to happen.

My mind is drawing a blank.

I have nothing to say.  No steps to better guitar tone.  No strategies for recruiting.  I don’t have any wisdom to offer on dealing with tricky volunteers.  I have lots of stuff that I could talk about, the real behind the scenes stuff of being a worship pastor, but if I were to go into that it would probably not be very honouring to those I serve with.  I’m always aware that everything I say reflects on my church family so this will always be somewhat filtered.  It’s just the right thing to do.  So, I’m still left with a blank.

I enjoy blogging as an opportunity for me to create something.  It’s such a strange creature though.  I click that blue “publish” button, head over to Hoot Suite, write a few words that should make you want to read my post, and wait for the “hits” to roll in.  I don’t really understand why.  Recognition probably.  A desire to be seen as influential.  ”Wouldn’t it be great if my blog got noticed.”  ”I wish I had as many subscribers as __________.”

ugh…

All those thoughts have been there from the start.  I would say that honestly my intentions are right.  My goal is to have a place to write down thoughts and in doing so become a better communicator.  The blog itself serves as a bit of a ministry tools and ideas filing system.  It’s been pretty cool to see other worship leaders resonate with some of the things I write.  Sometimes we’re just looking for someone to say the thing that we’re all thinking and when that someone says it we grab on.  It’s cool that once in a while that happens here.  I lose sight of the goal sometimes.  I get distracted by my own egotistical wishes.  Don’t we all?

 

I’m not quitting.  At least not yet.

But I would like to say to all of you that I’m quitting the game.  You are not a statistic to me. You are not an ego boost.  You are not a means to get me more recognition.  All my hope does not depend on you commenting, hitting the ‘like’ button or tweeting my posts.

You are why I chose this as a career.  Your heart matters.  Your ideas matter.  Your faith journey, all the ups and all the downs, it matters.  I love to see people pursuing God together.  I love to see young worship leaders start to grow in confidence as they discover the gifts God has given them and the joy in using them to serve the local church.  I love seeing disenfranchised creatives begin to feel welcomed again into the church, with all their mess, and find a place to make something beautiful that honours God.  I love to see leaders step up into leadership roles, recognizing that they don’t have it all together, but they have a passion to do something great with their lives and it draws others around them.

You matter.  I don’t know how you got here but thanks for reading.

Not sure what else to say.

I’m drawing a blank…