Creative Worship

Allaso Ranch...a place for Life Change

Last Night...

Early morning post.  Just dropped Carlos and his wife off at the airport.  He came and worshiped with us  last night at the Closer To The Start DVD recording.  Thanks for coming out Carlos and Heather!

Last night blew my mind.  The Church amazes me every time.  I wished you could have heard how loud the audience was as they worshiped Jesus.  We put God's work in our lives and in the world on display light night!  From top to bottom last night was the greatest energy filled night I have ever experienced in the 10 years I have been here at Fellowship Church.  Ed spoke about the call of the Church and the vision God has given our church.  God's presence was STRONG.

I have so much more to say about last night and so much more to show you.  Pics and videos to come today, so check back!  I gotta get some coffee.

Coffee with Ed

This is a message we shot with Ed for a weekend experience.  We saw many come to Christ through this crystal clear message of salvation.  It's a little long for a blog, but a great outreach tool.  Pass it around.

Delicious - Coffee and Conversation from Fellowship Church on Vimeo.

Gentlemen...

I recently sat in a room with a group of leaders in which we were asked, "Gentlemen, what books are you currently reading?" As you can imagine just about every leadership book, marketing book, church growth book, missional book, blah, blah, blah, was mentioned. The next question silenced the room: "Gentlemen, what about your marriage?"

What about your marriage? What are you doing to invest in the loudest sermon you will ever preach? What are you doing to invest in the most important earthly relationship in your life? Fellas- let's not miss it here!

Join us for the Creative Marriage Retreat.

Your church will be healthier and so will your marriage. Come relax and refresh. We would love to see you there!

Authority Issuses (Part 1)

"We have to get under what God has placed over us, so we can get over what God wants to place under us."

This was a quote from a series our Pastor (Ed Young) did called, "Authority Issues." This series has had major impact in my life and leadership. I would recommend every person who serves under anyone in leadership to get a copy. You can find it at CreativePastors.com

So what does it look like "to get UNDER what God has placed over you?" Here are a quick few thoughts (more to come in a future post) that God taught me through this series:

1. Begin to value being "Under" more than being "Over"-
Don't be so anxious to be at the top in leadership. There is probably a reason that your Pastor is the
Pastor and you are not. There is a great joy and freedom in embracing your "underness" (I think I
just made up a word) A very wise man in my life once told me, "Pace-let the game come to you.
God will place you according to your faithfulness to Him and according to the gifts he has given you."

2. Pray for and support with your whole heart those who are "Over" you.
The Church needs more "armor bearers." Look for someone to serve, and start by looking up to
those whom God has placed over you. Notice I said "serve" and not "kiss up to." There is a big
difference in serving and kissing up.

3. Quit looking for the next thing in leadership and give God your best where He has placed
you.
How can we give God our best when we so often aren't content where He has placed us. Often times
our lack of contentment is actually a reflection of "Authority Issues" with God. Trust Him and go full
on with what He has placed in your hands.

Shoot me a comment and let's start some dialogue on this topic!

One Toe In...

I am sticking my toe into the blog world! Welcome to my blog, a place where I hope to enforce the truth that the Church is the hope of the world. I have been a little hesitant to step in because the pace of ministry keeps me so focused and going non-stop (can anyone feel me?) that I worried I wouldn't be able to keep this deal up. But I think I am ready to at least go toe deep.

I serve as the Worship Pastor at Fellowship Church and through this blog I plan to begin some dialogue as to what is shaping the Worship Culture at FC. I say, "what's shaping", because we recognize that we haven't arrived.

We recently had our C3 Conference and had the great privilege of hosting leaders from 48 states, 6 continents, and over 540 churches. I was blown away to hear all that God is doing in the Church throughout the world. During the conference we led a breakout on what is shaping the Worship Culture at FC. We talked about 3 major themes that I plan creating as categories for in this blog.

CREATIVITY- We believe creativity is best done collaboratively. In this category I will post about our creative process, elements we develop each week, clips of video segments we produce, and interviews and discussions with our Worship Leaders, Post Production Team, Audio/Media Team, and Staging Team, as well as some guests.

AUTHORITY- We believe there is power under authority. Our Pastor, Ed Young, did a series a few years ago that revolutionized my life and my leadership. It was called "AUTHORITY ISSUES." The most strategic thing any Worship Pastor/Leader or for that matter any staff member can do to see God's power and anointing unleashed in their ministry is to get under and stay under the authority of your Pastor.

PROXIMITY- We believe that our proximity to God's heart and our effectiveness to lead go hand-in-hand. The most critical element to leading in the ministry is making sure our own relationship with Jesus is growing. In this category I will post conversations I have with other leaders as well as things I am learning in in my own life that help me keep this priority one.

CREATIVITY- AUTHORITY- PROXIMITY - three areas that continue to shape our Worship Culture, and what I'll be blogging about.

The toe is in.... it feels pretty good.