The Holy Spirit

What a great, unexpected, turn-at-every-moment day with North Side!  As we were gathering for soundcheck this morning, the power went out completely out in the worship center.  With flashlights going and people scrambling, it appears that all the AC units in Greenwood on non-stop decided to take out our air and electricity at 8:40 Sunday morning.

So, what is a worship pastor to do?  I got the right people working on getting it back on, and I gathered the worship team in the commons area outside the worship center.  I told them we would either do things acoustic in the dark or out in that open area with no AVL or we would try to setup up shop in the gym.  But in the moment, we just gathered round some acoustic instruments and began to worship.  I have actually planned for a more acoustic service later this month to worship like our family is over in Africa, and thought maybe God wanted it earlier.  In our prayers, we didn’t pray for the power to come back on, we just wanted to be obedient in however God wanted to teach us this morning.

At about 9:20 when people were gathering to go inside the doors, our team was singing “I’m sorry, Lord, for the thing I’ve made it, when it’s all about you, all about you, Jesus,” and then the lights came on.  We went into the room with people finding their seats, plugged in our instruments, got a camera feed up so we could watch our baptisms, and started the service on time.

I say this a lot, but today is one of those days I don’t think anyone truly understands how serious I am about this: our worship team is amazing.  They are incredibly flexible, no one was running frantic, no one seemed frazzled, no one was rude to one another, we just each did our part and God decided that we should have power back at that time.  And as everyone came prepared, the services went off great without anyone able to see anything that would have said there was no run-through that morning.  I am honored to work with such great people.

Today, we worshiped to:

With no soundcheck or run through, the band, choir, and tech team did a fantastic job this morning!  Loved watching our church worship today.  While we have never sang “Psalm 117” on a Sunday, so many of you were singing along from the first bar.   That either means it’s that catchy or many of you are enjoying your new “Enter His Gates” album – either way – thanks!

While Jeff preached a fantastic message today, I was so honored that we could pray over him before he preached today.  Today is his birthday, and we had a different man in each service thank God for the man of God that Jeff is.  And before he got to preach, we prayed over him.  A man that prays over so many needs to be prayed for as well.  Powerful words of testimonies about what God has done through him.  Happy Birthday to him, Amanda, Tonya Allen, Janet Montjoy, and any other North Sider’s out there with this popular birthday!

And our Africa Team does appreciate the prayers prayed on our behalf in our commissioning today.  What a full day of the Spirit’s movement.  Loved it!