Travis Agnew

Travis Agnew serves as the Lead Pastor of Rocky Creek Church in Greenville, SC. His most recent book is Just (About) Married.

Critical Listening – A Tip for Unprepared Worship Teams

by

The manner in which a team member prepares for worship practice is immensely important. If members come to practice unfamiliar with the songs, the time together can easily get frustrating.

The best way to get the most out of your practice time is if you group will engage in critical listening. This is best if they do this on their own, but the process can also be done as a group.

I send out scheduling requests for our musicians at least ten days out from the Sunday they would serve. This allows ample time for preparation. In addition to getting chord sheets and lyric sheets, they also have access to listen to the songs we are going to lead.

While they have ample time to prepare, sometimes it is easy for any of us to get slack on prepartion. It is normal for any of us to resort to passive listening. Passive listening is when the music is going on in the background of the house while you are doing other things. Passive listening is when you just hear sections of the song or get distracted by one element in the song that you forget to really think about what is transpiring. Passive listening leads to unprepared musicians.

There is another way.

READ MORE

Shh…Eli Has a Secret…

by

I took this picture when we were getting our boys new shoes the other day.  We were on the way to do some ministry at North Greenville on Friday, so we took our time and spent some time together in Greenville.

These boys are growing up very fast.  Their abilities and speech are taking off week by week.  I feel like I have two little men around me.

One of the things we have been having fun with is whispering in each other’s ears if we have secrets.  I’ll lean into the boys and say I have a secret, and I will say, “I love you,” or “Daddy is so proud of you.”

Obie got the hang of it first and began to repeat some of my secrets back to me.

Then Eli got into it, but I wasn’t prepared for what he was going to tell me.

READ MORE

Confessions of a Narrow-Focused Church Member

by

I have a confession to make: I am a narrow-focused church member.  I look at all the possible changes at our church at how it would affect me and mine.  I judge the worth of programs based upon how they benefit me and my family.  If it can make me feel better, I’m all in.

Homes for Hope (What a Year!)

by

Homes for Hope was started at North Side in 2010. After a message on orphan care in December 2009, we were overwhelmed with the response of families wanting to help out. The interest was so great that Jeff Lethco told me to figure out a way to organize this so we can help people regularly.  The mission behind Homes for Hope is to make orphan care simple. If you have ever attempted to get through the paperwork attached to orphan care, you understand that sounds like an absurd statement. We can’t make orphan care easy, but we can make it simple. Our goal as a ministry is to provide logical steps in the 5 major ways to get involved.

James 1:27 commands us to care for orphans: “Pure and genuine religion in the sight of God the Father means caring for orphans and widows in their distress…” There are many ways to help rescue the 143,000,000 orphans in the world. Here’s how our church is assisting people:

READ MORE

The Armor of God (for the Church)

by

What a great day at North Side!  We concluded a 3 month tour through the Book of Ephesians today as we studied the armor of God.

While this world is full of trouble, God has not left us defenseless.  In the concluding words of Ephesians, Paul includes directions for the armor of God that is meant to defend Christians.  Covered in his protection, the Church can endure the trials of this world.

I couldn’t think of a better way to end the study than the message today.  Jeff’s words were so good and God used him immensely in my life to really think about the armor of God and how it wasn’t written to the individual but to the church as a whole.  We are to all put on that armor so we can stand firm together!

Today, we worshiped to:

READ MORE

Book of the Week: Sex, Romance, and the Glory of God

by

This week’s book of the week is C. J. Mahaney’s Sex, Romance, and the Glory of God.

This short read is full of great scriptural insights into romance within marriage.  What I love about the book is that it is not crass but it is also not fuddy-duddy.  It speaks of marriage, sex, and romance in a practical, engaging manner and gets its boldness from the Word of God.

While it is geared primarily towards men, his wife also provides some chapters at the end.  So practical and so God-glorifying.  A great reclaiming of the joy of romance for Christians living God’s way!  Great read!

Top 5 Ideas:

READ MORE

Lift Schedule

by

Details are coming together for Lift, and our team is getting more and more excited by the day!  People from Greenwood to Summerville or planning on making the trek for this Saturday worship training session, and we could not be more humbled to partner with others to lead churches in worship.

I wanted to provide you with the schedule so you can make your plans.  It’s a funnel type schedule focusing on music, tech, and host teams that work in worship settings.  We start large, go to medium size, smaller groups, and then back all together.

This workshop is for seasoned worship team members and also for those who are just curious if they have the skills needed to join.  It’s free lessons, so nothing to lose!  Not only will we have a lot of information, we are going to have a lot of fun!

Here is our promise: we are teaching principles, not models.  We don’t want you to copy what we are doing, we are going to teach principles that we have been learning that can be applied into any context.  Please list any questions you might have.  You can register here.

See below for details:

READ MORE

Caption Please: Pigeon Suit Guy vs. Bird Feeder

by

I came across this video this morning and it made my day.  The quality is bad, but it is well worth 18 seconds. The sign reads: “Warning: Due to Overfeeding Some Pigeons May Become Aggressive.” If you were reporting on this story, what would you say?  Caption please…

Why God Might Be Out to Get Your Church

by

Your church bears the name of Christ.  Most likely, your church was founded for his glory, was organized the way it is for his glory, but churches can get off track.

Our assumption is that God is for every church.  The very fact that it is called a church automatically receives God’s blessing, right?

What if I told you that God was actually against certain churches?  What if I told you that the most powerful being in the world actively opposed certain bodies?

READ MORE

+ MORE POSTS