Tag Archives: passion

Like You Mean It

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I’ve talked a few times about how important it is for us to give all we’ve got to God when we proclaim His truth in our worship services.  If we believe the life changing truth in the words we’re singing I think our natural response should be passionate, all out worship.

In this case I’m speaking more to people who already don’t mind singing.  I understand singing is not everyone’s favourite thing.  But I’m pretty sure everyone has gotten excited at a sporting event, or giant shoe sale, or whatever else it is people get excited about.

So, we’ve been given this awesome, God given opportunity to communicate God’s truth through singing.

And singing stirs our emotions

Singing is something the Psalms encourage us to do…like, all of us!

So, why don’t we sing like we mean it?

What’s holding us back?  Let’s lose the awkward.  Lose the excuses.

Sing! …like you mean it

 

 

The Rental and the Semi

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First things first…

This is not an account of a traffic accident.

This is a quick summary account of my vacation in Ireland earlier this month with my beautiful wife.  We’ll call this the “rental” as it wasn’t permanent and, well, we rented a car while we were there.

So Ireland is an amazing country.  You’ve already learned a bit about the Irish sport of “hurling” if you caught this post last week.  To clarify, we spent our entire two weeks in the Republic of Ireland which makes up the majority of the island.  The people there are warm and amazingly hospitable.  I’m a huge fan of history, especially European and Christian history and Ireland serves up a unique blend of both.  Being a country that was never conquered by Rome makes it pretty different from the other Western European countries I have visited.  And, after the fall of the Western Roman Empire Ireland was one of the few places where Christianity still continued to spread.  We visited some phenomenal monastic settlements and one thousand year old churches.  Castles dotted the country side and of course, that meant lots of sudden stops on the shoulder to check out random ruins.  We drank lots of coffee, ate lots of great pub food, and talked about the future and our dreams.  It was awesome.

 

Let me introduce you to the “semi”.  You’ve all come across them I’m sure.  If they’re not slamming in to you they’re tailgating you, making you feel like you’re on the edge of utter destruction.  Actually I don’t even know how I’m going to land these metaphors.  But the “semi” I’m referring to is reality.  And coming back from vacation and getting back to work is a good way to get hit with a truck load of reality.  What I encountered when I got back to work was what sounded like blown speakers in our auditorium (until we realized it was the drive-rack settings), a youth kickoff, and planning for a massive church-wide serving day just a couple weeks off.

It was a pretty crazy week.

So when you’re hit with the semi truck what do you do?

Prayer, God’s Word, rest.  We’ll be tempted to toss these things out the window with a semi staring us down but they are now even more important than when you were in rental zone.  As you plan that worship set for Sunday, don’t forget to worship.  As you gather again with your volunteers, don’t forget to pray.  As you encounter weird bugs in your sound system :) , don’t forget that it’s just stuff and the Church is the people not the program or the building.

Welcome back

Passion and Hurling

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Quick!

What’s the first thing you think of when you hear the word “hurling”?

Splashing your groceries comes to mind for me.

Well, for the entire country of the Republic of Ireland that word most likely brings up some very different ideas.

I just spent two weeks on vacation in Ireland where I received an education in hospitality, experienced amazing pub food and Guiness, toured castles, cathedrals, and amazing countryside, and learned about the game of hurling.

Hurling, is a game played on a large grass field where players use paddles to hit a ball into a goal guarded by a goalie (also issued his own paddle) or players can also score by hitting the ball through upright posts above the goal.  It’s kind of field hockey, meets ice hockey, meets aussie rules football.

We arrived in the town of Kilkenny in the south just as their team was preparing to defend the championship against their rivals Tipperary.  As we drove in we saw houses everywhere covered in black and yellow “Kilkenny Cats” colours.  I was living in Calgary during the Calgary Flames 2004 Stanley Cup run and the atmosphere in this town was just as crazy, if not crazier!  We were sucked in immediately.  Everywhere we went people were talking about it.  Before coming to Kilkenny I didn’t know a thing about Hurling.  A few days later I was sitting in front of a TV, cheering them on to the title.

Passion is contagious.  Passion is moving.  Passion is powerful.  It can bring us from feeling like we’re outsiders to feeling like we belong.  It can stir emotions in us that we didn’t know we had.  And I believe passion about truth, God’s truth, can change someone’s life.

So worship leader, musician, creative…

Are you letting your passion show?  What’s holding you back?  If you’re not passionate is there something you need to sort out?  Are you doing the right thing?  Are you doing the wrong thing?  Are you in God’s word?  Maybe it’s time to take a vacation :) .  Whatever season of life you’re in your passion on display could make a big difference for someone.

Let’s be passionate about God’s truth and doing what God has wired us up to do.

 

By the way, the Kilkenny Cats took home the McCarthy Cup!