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Reflections on Turning 60

By on February 10, 2015 in —Family, —Mentoring Leaders

I’ve had more than one conversation with a 20 or 30 something worship leader who was concerned about growing old. Will I have a job? Will people still want me to lead? Will I be out of touch? Last month I turned 60. I guess that puts me in the “old” category, although in my mind I still think I’m 28. I thought it might encourage a younger leader if I shared some of the things I’ve learned in 30 years of ministry that have shaped me, changed me, and given me faith for the future. Consider this a follow-up to the post I wrote five years ago on being a 55 year old worship leader. Five lessons learned 1. Direct your desires. God tells …

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What We Did Last Sunday – Feb. 7, 2016

By on February 10, 2016 in —Leading a Congregation, —Liturgy, —My Church

People have asked me for a while to occasionally post the order of a Sunday service at Sovereign Grace Church of Louisville, my home church. There’s no perfect liturgy, but it can be helpful to hear how others are seeking to lead meetings that are theologically informed, gospel-rich, and spiritually transforming. So here’s what we did in our gathering this past Sunday. The italicized words are transitional comments. CALL TO WORSHIP We typically play instrumental music for 1-2 minutes to draw people in, and then one of the pastors gives the call to worship.  This past Sunday I read from 1 Chronicles 29:11: “Yours, O Lord, is …

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Singing the Psalms in Worship, Pt. 2

By on March 27, 2007 in —Choosing Songs

Do the words we sing in worship matter to God? More than most of us realize. What we sing teaches us, shapes us, molds us, and affects us. So it might seem wise to only sing God’s Word, specifically the Psalms, back to him. But, while there is much we can learn from the Psalms for congregational worship, I believe God wants us to sing more than the Psalms when we meet on Sundays. I posted on this topic last week, and a couple folks left gracious comments that offered a different perspective. I started to leave a response in the comments section, but it got so long I thought I’d make it into a new post. We can’t start this discussion by …

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Monday Devotions – Kids, Kings, and Creeping Things

By on May 15, 2006 in Devotions

Praise the Lord from the earth, you great sea creatures and all deeps,     fire and hail, snow and mist, stormy wind fulfilling his word! Mountains and all hills, fruit trees and all cedars! Beasts and all livestock, creeping things and flying birds! Kings of the earth and all peoples, princes and all rulers of the earth! Young men and maidens together, old men and children! Let them praise the name of the Lord, for his name alone is exalted;     his majesty is above earth and heaven. He has raised up a horn for his people, praise for all his saints,     for the people of Israel who are …

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What Does a Worship Leader Do? In Closing…

By on March 2, 2006 in —Leading a Congregation, —Worship and the Pastor

I was going to entitle this post “Final Thoughts,” but that’s probably not going to happen. One of the reasons I started this blog was to explore this role in an ongoing way. But this does mark the end of the series on the role of the corporate worship leader. Really. If you’re a musician who is responsible to lead others in praising God, I pray you’ve been served by this series. I’m grateful for those of you who have taken the time to post an encouraging comment, expand upon my thoughts, or ask questions. We need to continually ask ourselves if what we’re doing is lining up with Scripture. On most Wednesday mornings I have the joy …

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Grace Has Come – So Has Our New Album

By on August 9, 2013 in —Choosing Songs, —Sovereign Grace Music, —Worship and Scripture

I’m overjoyed to report that last week (Aug. 1) we released Grace Has Come: Songs from the Book of Romans. I knew when we started this project that it would be a daunting task. It was. There just isn’t any way of adequately communicating the glorious truths in the book of Romans. But we had to try. I thank God that a lot of great songs for congregational worship have been written recently, like Not in Me and Man of Sorrows. More people are trying to write songs that are theologically driven, gospel aware, fresh, and singable. With Grace Has Come we let a book of the Bible drive the whole album. This is by no means an exhaustive musical …

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On Musicians and Reading Books, Pt. 3

By on January 12, 2006 in —Books, —Musicians & Vocalists

Today I’m sharing two more reasons why Christian musicians aren’t known for dropping hundreds of dollars on theology books. 3. Studying God takes time. This is similar to the point I made yesterday about the study of theology being hard. We live in the age of instant everything. I still remember when there was no internet (much less wireless connections), e-mail didn’t exist, you had to wait a week to get your camera film developed, and microwave ovens were a novelty. My, how things have changed. We want to know God NOW. We want to have life-changing 15 minute devotional times, are drawn to the “One-Minute Bible,” and get anxious …

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Reflections on the 2017 Shepherds’ Conference

By on March 15, 2017 in —Leading a Congregation, —Other Events

Last April a friend of mine at Grace Community Church texted me to say John MacArthur was going to invite me to lead the music for some of the main sessions at the 2017 Shepherds’ Conference. I thought he was kidding. There are a few reasons why this particular invite was unexpected. For one, I’m a pastor with Sovereign Grace Churches. John has at various times made clear in his preaching that we have a few theological differences. Also, the music at Grace Community Church, where John has served as the pastor for more than four decades, is primarily hymns led by highly skilled choirs, orchestras, and an organ. On a typical Sunday morning …

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Songs to Sing in a Pandemic

Songs to Sing in a Pandemic

By on March 20, 2020 in —Leading a Congregation, —Songs of Lament

I originally posted this on my church’s blog, but wanted to share it here as well. In his excellent article, “Anxiety, Waiting and the Coronavirus,” Alasdair Groves reminds us of the unique kind of trial the current worldwide pandemic presents to us. We’re tempted to experience a “particular strain of anxiety that comes when we are waiting for a threat that is gliding toward us, its fin visible above the surface.”  In other words, we know something bad is coming. We just don’t know what or when.  To be sure, many are already experiencing the effects of the virus. Financial disaster. Loss of income. Loss of …

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Should We Worship Jesus as the Beautiful One?

By on July 20, 2007 in —Choosing Songs

Joshua is interested in teaching his church the song, “Beautiful One,” by Tim Hughes. He wrote: As I began to think about it, I couldn’t come up with a scripture verse that refers to Jesus as ‘beautiful.’ I did a word search in the NIV and the NASB for beautiful, but it seems to always refer to other things than God. Can beautiful be a substitute word for splendor or glorious or majestic? Is it better to use only Biblical words to describe Jesus? In another part of his e-mail Joshua pointed out that other songs contain the word “beautiful,” like “O Lord You’re Beautiful” by Keith Green, “I Stand in Awe” by Mark Altrogge (You are beautiful beyond …

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Worship Leaders - Five Things to Remember About Skill

Worship Leaders – Five Things to Remember About Skill

By on April 24, 2007 in —Musicians & Vocalists

I’m in the midst of rewriting my book for Crossway. Things didn’t go quite as smoothly as I hoped last week. But my good friend, Jeff Purswell, saw I wasn’t doing well and offered to pray for me. I realized I’ve only been thinking of what I have to do and haven’t been focused on what God can do. That changes everything. I’m happy to report my attitude is much better this week. In any case, I don’t have much time for blogging. So I thought I’d post an excerpt from an unedited chapter. It may not even make it in the final version of the book, but I thought it might be helpful. It’s from the first section on “What Matters.” Just wanting to …

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Two Days in Pittsburgh

By on October 11, 2006 in —Other Events

Back in 1991, I had the privilege of leading a Integrity Music Hosanna! project called ‘Chosen Treasure.” It was a great experience, and helped promote the songs of Sovereign Grace songwriters more than anything we had ever done. Since then, Sovereign Grace Ministries has had different interactions with the folks at Integrity. I spent the last two days at the their Seminars4Worship Event in Pittsburgh, PA, held at Northway Christian Community Church. I met some great folks there who were eager to learn more about how they could serve their churches more effectively. On Monday I did a seminar based on Col. 3:12-17 on”How Music Works in Worship.” …

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Reflections on My Trip to the UK

By on October 7, 2016 in —Leading a Congregation, —My Travels, —Other Events

Recently I had the privilege of traveling to the UK with my good friends CJ Mahaney and Jeff Purswell to participate in “Two Conferences, One Hope.” The first day was an event for pastors, called “Entrusted with the Gospel.” On Friday we offered a “True Worshipers” conference for anyone involved in planning or leading music in the church. This was the fourth time in two and a half years that Sovereign Grace has partnered with Grace Church Bristol and Sovereign Grace UK., both led by Nathan Smith. When we first came in 2014, people warned us that Brits can sometimes be concerned about the motives of Americans who come across the …

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How Exciting Should Our Sunday Meetings Be?

By on June 16, 2015 in —Emotions and Worship, —Expressiveness, —Leading a Congregation, —Worship and the Church

Not too long ago a friend who leads the music in his church mentioned to me that his pastor wanted their meetings to be more exciting. Webster’s says exciting means “causing great enthusiasm and eagerness.” Certainly, nothing should cause greater enthusiasm and eagerness than meeting with the church to recount what God has done to save us from his wrath through the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus. All our sins are forgiven! We have been adopted into God’s family! Jesus has triumphed over sin, death, and hell! We are new creations! We are part of God’s  unstoppable, unchangeable, unrelenting plan to have a people on earth who …

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10 Reasons You Should Come to the WorshipGod19 Conference

By on March 25, 2019 in —Arranging, —Leading a Congregation, —Musicians & Vocalists, —Songwriting, —Sound and Tech, —Sovereign Grace Music, —Training a Team, —Vocalists, —Worship and Christ, —WorshipGod Conferences

Back in 2006, Sovereign Grace Music hosted our first WorshipGod conference in Maryland. Since then, we’ve led conferences in Kentucky, Texas, Florida, California, Pennsylvania, and the UK. By my count, this year will be our 20th. Each time we prepare for another one, I ask myself the same question: Do we really need another worship conference? Obviously, I think the answer is yes. Which is why we’ll be gathering in Louisville, KY, July 31-Aug. 3 for WorshipGod19 – The Glorious Christ: Music is great. Jesus is greater. There are a number of worship conferences you can choose from these days. They range from massive productions …

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