As a worship leader, there are times when leading that I am attempting to put together songs and an atmosphere in a way that if everything goes well the people I am leading worship for will be open to God’s movement. Then there are times where it’s obvious that I’m just the musical accompaniment for a much larger God-movement that was put into place before I ever even thought about how I would be involved in the event. (yes, I know we can have a theological debate on whether God actually put both types of events into motion (He did) and whether both types of events were meant for his greater purposes (they are), but that’s not really what this blog is about). This past weekend at New Vision was the latter.
The Wednesday before the retreat was the loudest I had ever heard a group of students sing. It was obvious that God was going to do something this weekend… we just had to be open and ready for His movement.
Friday night (the first night of the retreat) was the loudest I had ever heard a group of students sing. From the first to the last chord and all the way through the message the students were tuned in to what God had to teach them. We were taught by Chad Norris all weekend about how God’s kingdom was to come HERE on EARTH as it is in heaven. Our relationship with God is not just about one day being with him in heaven, but it’s about walking with him NOW and allowing the Holy Spirit to work through us.
Saturday morning was the loudest I had ever heard a group of students sing (sensing a pattern here?). Imagine an opera singer with their huge lung support combined with a metal singer who knows how to scream. Now, after combining that somehow imagine that it’s on pitch, sounds awesome, and is multiplied by 150 people. That’s pretty much what the room sounded like. It was obvious that God was up to something and they we all got to be a part of it together.
Saturday night before the message was the loudest I had ever heard a group of students sing. We started off with a cover of a Taylor Swift song (there may or may not be pictures of me in a blonde wig floating around) that the students loved. Then we went into worship. Even in their semi-formal attire (we had an awesome semi-formal steak dinner before the service… steak, potatoes, jazz trio, the whole 9 yards) the New Vision High Schoolers were worshiping with everything they had. It was awesome.
Saturday night after the message IS the loudest I’ve ever heard a group of students sing. After the message from Chad, we came up to play a song. That song led into another song. It led into another song. The on-key-awesome-sounding-opera/metal-singing-times-150 had now started to sound like it was amplified. God was all over this moment. The one song we kind of had planned ended up leading into about 30 minutes of unrehearsed, loud, unrestrained worship. We had a moment within worship when all of there students were literally on their faces crying out to God to allow them to be used to further His Kingdom. A few minutes after, we had a moment within a song when simultaneously every hand in the room went up in praise. The only other time I have seen something like this happen has been when someone specifically urged a group to raise their hands in worship. That was not the case this time. This was definitely a God moment that I just got to be a part of!
I can’t really describe what all went on this weekend, other than to say that God was all over this youth group and I was blessed to be a part of that movement. Now I’m praying that God will use this youth group to impact Murfreesboro and Smyrna in a way that is very obvious that it’s a God-movement and the New Vision HSM just has the opportunity to be a part of it. I’m really looking to forward to seeing what God does Wednesday night and hearing stories from our students about how He is using them to impact our community!