Travis Agnew 
When we were little, adults taught us to pray with our eyes closed. I suppose it had something to do with eliminating distractions or focusing on the One that we can’t see physically.
My son, Eli, has a different approach.
And I don’t plan on stopping him.
I was so encouraged yesterday hearing about the building excitement for Lift this Saturday! We are only days away. Our team is putting last minute touches on the event, and we could not be more excited!
On March 26th we will have a free worship workshop held at North Side Baptist in Greenwood, SC. Bring your whole team and get equipped on how you can lift your worship, your team expectations, and your team’s abilities. Tracks in musicians, vocalists, technicians, host teams, etc. Good for choirs, bands, and anything in between!
The day has 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. If you want to reserve your spot, you can do so here.
See below for the information on all the classes:
Within the church, a sin that can wield more damage than immorality is that of negligence. When Christians don’t confront sin within the church, unholy living can become widespread. The Apostle Paul handles this situation in a surprising way in this ignored passage (1 Corinthians 5).
Today’s service was all about being “Derailed by Negligence.” We put the whole service together dealing with how do the people of God handle sin committed by the people of God.
In addition to a video on temptation, we had a prayer time for people who we knew that were getting far away from God. Using James 5:19-20 as our prayer focus, we prayed and planned how we would lovingly confront that person.
We also used some help to start out the message today. Using a mom, coach, and sheriff, we got everyone to imagine what those environments would look like if there was no discipline. Jeff came up then and asked would a church would look like without any discipline. Powerful message. The 1st time I have ever heard a pastor preach on 1 Corinthians 5.
Today, we worshiped to:
This week’s book of the week is Wayne Grudem’s Christian Beliefs: 20 Basics Every Christian Should Know. This book is a condensed version of the condensed version of his first systematic theology textbook. The big one that I read in college is 1,290 pages, and he has a condensed version of 528 pages. This volume is down to 159.
I’ve always known Grudem had a brilliant mind. Just recently, I discovered he’s my hero as he shared a testimony concerning marriage at Family Life’s Art of Marriage conference. He is truly loving his wife the way Christ loved the church. Never imagined this great theologian as such a romantic!
So much good stuff in here. A short chapter on each belief. Lots of scripture references and study. I’ll give you 10 great lines from the first chapters to whet your appetite!
10 of the 20 Chapter Summaries:
Sometimes the best notes are the ones not played.
It is very easy for a band to get too busy while leading songs. Every musician has something to offer or else they wouldn’t be in the band.
What tends to happen is that at a turn-around in a song, every instrumentalist thinks it is their turn to contribute. Leading from the verse to the chorus, oftentimes, a band will have a drummer going on a monster roll, the guitarist bending strings like never before, the bassist sliding up to a fret that’s not even on the neck, and the keyboardist ripping and roaring down the ivories.
Vocalists can get up in the trap too when they silently compete to hear who can hold at the note the longest and the loudest.
While your group members may not be intentionally trying to steal the show, inability to understand and create powerful dynamics can ruin a song. The end product can sound more like a group of independent musicians than an actual unified band.
Here are some questions to ask:
There’s nothing like going home to me. I wish you could follow along with me my drive up the driveway after work every day. The excitement is at different levels at different days, but normally I walk into 3 people jumping around and cheering like I am the best person in the world. No matter how hard the day had been, this hysteria at 5:10 makes all things right in the world.
The other day, as I noticed Obadiah and Eli’s faces pressed against the window, banging on it with their hands, I thought they had gotten taller. Turns out, they had climbed up on the window sill anticipating my arrival. I don’t know why Eli was still peering out the window when I was standing behind him, but regardless, it was a special moment as they climbed up eager to see my truck arrive in the driveway (even if they did disobey by climbing up there).
The reason they get that excited is due to their perception of the person they are anticipating. I don’t think I’m that spectacular, but in this season of life, they do. And they show me in how they eagerly wait and celebrate my arrival.
The problem is that we aren’t that eager concerning Jesus’ return.
This week our worship team training time involved a field trip. We didn’t leave the building, but I took all of our techies, musicians, and vocalists all around the building so they could experience how all the audio, video, and lighting for our services worked.
As we are teaching our worship value excellence this month, I thought it was important that the people on the stage realized that the work of the people off the stage was just as vital to our worship services. Singers can lead a song, but without someone putting the lyrics up at the proper time, no one can worship along.
So we took a trip.
Some hymns have many stories attached to them. I am coming up with very few leads on one of my favorites as of late, “Brethren, We Have Met to Worship.”
This is what I do have:
It was penned by George Atkins in 1819 who was a Methodist pastor.
And…that’s it. So if you do have more, I would love you to share any info you find in a comment below.
We arranged it with a touch of bluegrass. Since most of the chordal arrangement focuses on a 1-5 progression, I wanted to exchange some chords to open it up a bit. At the second half of the verse, we go in a different direction with the chords, and I think it breathes some new life into the song as it opens up and builds.
I also wrote a chorus to go along with it. The song is great in itself, but I thought it needed some type of break in the middle and an additional part to it. The chorus is simple and carries the message of the song: “We have come together in the name we adore, we have come to worship Jesus Christ our Lord.”
Yesterday, I explained what “manna” meant to the congregation so that no one would be singing what they didn’t understand (“manna” is the food that God provided while the Israelites wandered in the desert – he provides, he is enough).
The only problem I had with the song was the theological implications of the end of verse 4. Here are the lyrics:
2nd week of Derailed, and what an incredible walk through 1 Corinthians so far! Getting to 1 Corinthians 3-4, we learned that Paul taught that immature believers are still selfish at their core. A believer, or a church, can get derailed when they make all the decisions based upon selfish desires.
It was great seeing the church in action today. We got to watch a great Disciple Now video recap highlighting our youth serving the community this weekend.
We also got the privilege to pray for Lander BCM students who have said yes to God’s call to go this summer! This crew is going to South Carolina to India and everywhere in between. It was so humbling watch “strangers” come up to these students and pray over them commissioning them out. Wonderful time!
Today, we worshiped to:
I had already shared my problems with David Platt’s book, Radical, a few months ago. Still having a few chapters left at that time, I finished this book this week and still have the same soul-stirring problems when I started it. Platt is so dedicated to God’s Word and his commission. I just pray it is contagious in my heart
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