Stepping Out

1 Chronicles 29:5 “… who then is willing to consecrate himself this day to the LORD?” (NKJV)

This is the season of the year when I listen through “Prosperity” by Randy Gage

This is a CD series on the spiritual principles that he used to transform his life from bankruptcy, dysfunctional relationships and horrendous health to being a multi-millionaire with great health and joyful relationships in his life.

Now, Randy Gage is comes from a Mind Science church, one of those pseudo-Christian movements. He is very New-Age in his mindset and he is quite dismissive of evangelical Christianity. Having said that, his explanations of spiritual laws that correspond to Scripture principles are very clear and fresh.

And he pulls no punches, calling things the way they are. And sometimes, that’s just what we need at times.

Here is something that he taught that really struck me. He had this chapter called “the Return to the Creator” law of prosperity. This is what he called tithing. And he expanded the idea to more than just money. He said that we are to tithe our Treasure (money), Time and Talent.

The first time I heard that was during the season when I was running away from worship ministry. And when Randy Gage spoke about tithing the Talent (which for me was playing for and leading worship), that made me VERY uncomfortable.

Can you imagine? How could I ever let myself be out-tithed by a New-Ager?

That is what I wanted to bring up with you today. If we expanded our concept of tithing to include Time and Talent as well as Treasure, how different would our lives be?

Or in another sense, as King David asked in the passage from 1 Chronicles quoted above, who then is willing to consecrate himself this day to the LORD?

“JJ, you don’t understand. You’ve been playing for worship for many years. It’s so much easier for you than for me to get started…”

Actually, God seems to delight in keeping me in a position where it’s not easy for me either, so I actually DO understand. Just on Sunday I was playing for worship at a church where I may be doing worship training for their worship teams.

• To start with, I was on my WEAKEST instrument, drums. Common sense would dictate that if you are going to some place new, start off with your strongest instrument so you leave a good first impression.
  
• On top of that, I was playing on Electric Drums, not the acoustic ones I was used to. Lots of my secret techniques just suddenly became impractical. Oops…
  
• I was playing with people I don’t know. I didn’t know who was gonna cover any slips I make or what I’ll have to do to cover theirs.
  
• And finally, I was already introduced to the congregation as a music/worship instructor. So the congregation’s expectations were raised higher. And thus I had even more to lose if I flopped.

So, in a sense, it NEVER gets easy. Therefore, you get to see whether you REALLY trust in God more than your skills and experience.

Now, if your music skills are not up to par yet, you of course shouldn’t be rushing off to play for service or cell group this coming week. That goes without saying.

But talk with one of the worship leaders in your church or your cell leader. Tell them of your decision to play or serve in worship and make a firm commitment to begin within the next 3-9 months.

Notice I didn’t tell you to wait till you are ready before you talk with them. Why? Because the biggest struggle many of us have is with our mindset. At our core we don’t really see ourselves as worship ministers, skilled and equipped to serve the congregation with music instruments.

So if we wait till we are ready, what will almost always happen is that something will crop up. Our kids will start acting up when we are going to practice, or our jobs will suddenly have a burst of work requiring OT, or something like that. All these events will delay us and become excuses for us to not pursue the equipping and training we need. So we end up not serving at all.

That’s why I urge you to make a firm commitment to begin serving in worship. Talk with your leaders about it (submission to authority is crucial as a worship musician) and give a definite date.

And once you do that you will tell your subconscious that you ARE committed to serving, and that it is to submit itself to you and work with you to obtain ALL the equipping and training you need.

Now on my part, I am in the midst of compiling and defining what are the music skills needed to play in an average church setting. This will be useful both to those who are interested in serving but need to know if they are skilled enough or what they need to work on, as well as to Worship leaders who are actively trying to recruit new musicians, because potential candidates would want to know what is expected of them before they subject their music skills to scrutiny.

But YOU can just email me about what skills you are gonna need at which level and I can give YOU an answer straight away. And if you are actively taking lessons from me I’ll tell you what else you’re gonna need to be ready.

And by the way, in case I haven’t mentioned it yet, after you start playing for worship, that’s when we can start moving on to the REAL training. Not that you’ve not been receiving real training from me before, but everything I share suddenly seems to take a deeper share of meaning.

Those of you who are actively serving in worship right now, whether at a cell group/small group level or for church services will understand what I mean.

Pray about the question I shared from King David “who then is willing to consecrate himself this day to the LORD?” May you be in that number, and experience the exciting and blessed journey that such a decision will bring.

Be blessed!

The Power of Encouragement

KK: “You know, JJ, you really ought to turn up for this Tuesday Group meeting I’ve been telling you about.”

JJ: “uh-huh…”

KK: “Yeah, one thing about the people there, when it comes to worship, they want the real thing. And that is what I know you can bring them.”

I was in Kenneth Koh’s car when we had this conversation. (If you are familiar with the people from the Tuesday Group, you know that this is the Kenneth who would NEVER be accused of having long, greasy hair).

At that point of time in my life, I was tired and weary, feeling quite hard-pressed on every side. I had gone 2 years in the wilderness, worn-out even at the thought of returning back to the worship scene.

The last thing I wanted to think about was any form of worship ministry whatsoever.

Did I lose my anointing during that period? Hardly. There were occasions when I led worship for a small group here and there, and ALWAYS received rave reviews. But I was settled in my thinking, comfortable with things exactly the way they were.

Hebrews 3:13 “…encourage each other daily, while it is called “Today”, lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.”

Sin – harmatia, Strong’s #266: Missing the mark.

That was what happened to me. I was hardened by the deceitfulness of sin, of falling short of what God intends. Nobody could say that I was doing anything wrong (playing in pubs, teaching classical piano, doing training here and there), but I fell short of pursuing the ministry that God called me to, to lead worship AND teach others to do the same.

So what broke the hardening of my heart? Encouragement.

Looking back, I see now how God orchestrated opportunities for me to receive encouragement. Snatches of conversations with other people, culminating in that turning point in Kenneth Koh’s car, finally broke all the hardness of heart I had when it came to worship ministry and pursuing the calling of God in my life.

As a side point, it was most likely the overwhelming flood of DIS-couragement that caused me to finally burn out two years before and leave the ministry. Hmmm….

Now, I could have chosen to not listen to Kenneth Koh at that time. I could have used all the excuses I used before to keep things exactly the way they were.

“You don’t understand.” “You don’t know what it’s like.”

I used to think that the only people who could tell me what to do were those who had gone through exactly what I had gone through. That was a deadly mistake.

Proverbs 14:10 “The heart knows its own bitterness, and a stranger does not share its joy.”

Being totally logical, the only people who will know exactly what I’ve gone through are those who have gone through ALL the experiences that have shaped me as a person, and in exactly the same way and is NOW facing the identical situation I am facing now.

Now that just ain’t gonna happen. And if by some supernatural miracle I meet such a person, all that shows is that this person isn’t any smarter than I am, or he won’t end up with exactly the same problems as I have. “If the blind leads the blind…”

Can you imagine a person undergoing a heart attack insisting that he will receive CPR ONLY from a person who has experienced a heart attack before, because only such a person will know what it’s like to have a heart attack? Does a person HAVE to undergo a heart attack before he/she knows how to administer CPR?

There was once when I was fellowshipping with this sister from Tuesday Group. And she told me that the way I spoke of my wife at that time was wrong.

If I wasn’t teachable, I could have said “you don’t understand, you don’t know what it’s like…”

And why should I listen to her? She wasn’t me, married to my wife, undergoing all the same experiences I went through. So of course she wouldn’t know what it was like.

She was no relationship expert, I mean, she wasn’t a trained psychologist or counselor.To top it all off, she herself was emotionally volatile, and had problems relating with her own mother. She didn’t even show much fruit in this area of her life. Who was she to tell me I was wrong?

But at that moment she spoke forth the wisdom of God. I could take refuge in my excuses, or I could take heed to the wisdom of God in her words. I chose to take the wisdom of God to heart.

I share the above story not to boast of how smart I am, but to show you the excuses and self-deception that can take place when a person is hardened by the deceitfulness of sin. I did the right thing that time. Only God knows how many times I flopped all the times before.

So when you take that step of obedience, seek out that sibling in Christ that God has laid in your heart and begin to encourage him/her to rise up to his/her calling and high destiny in Christ, don’t be surprised or disappointed if you don’t meet with an immediately enthusiastic response. Or you run into the same excuses I used myself.

Just recognize that your encouragement is a powerful force, and it is the weapon God has ordained to overcome the deceitfulness of falling-short. Use it, as we are taught in God’s word. Remember, in due time we will reap a harvest if we don’t give up!

Prayer time: Pray with me that I will hear God clearly as I continue to refine and tweak my marketing efforts. I am looking at a large change in my ministry, and I need wisdom to handle all the details.

Be blessed!

The Fear of Man

Vincent Kwok and I had just finished a band practice and were hungry. (not surprised, right?)

So we headed off to Plaza Singapura for food and as usual I began telling him my ah-peh stories. Somehow the topic turned to my wilderness years, the 2 years I went way out to avoid anything to do with a worship ministry.

And Vincent asked the logical question: Why did I do that?

Simply put, I was in a setting where I HAD to please everybody.
People, verily, I kiddeth thee not. And it was not unspoken rule or unstated assumption. I was explicitly told by my superior that I HAD to please everybody. He said that HE did it and therefore I could do it.

And I accepted that.

And set out to please everybody.

Needless to say, it was a dismal failure. First, I am NOT the sort of person who does that. God didn’t make me that way.

Then as I tried harder and harder to do so and failed, I prayed for God’s help. He didn’t help me. And I got unhappy with him over that. (Yeah, people, I am being very open with you here).

Looking back, it’s funny that I’d even dare to ask God to make me even more of what I am not and blame him when he didn’t. But it wasn’t funny then. And that was how I got burned out, frustrated and bitter with people and God.

Please don’t walk that path.

“The fear of man brings a snare, but whoever trusts in the LORD shall be safe.” (Proverbs 29:25, NKJV)

I wish I remembered this verse during that season. It would have greatly sustained me and kept me from being bothered by the dislike of the minority.

1 Timothy 6:9 “But those who desire to be rich fall into temptation and a snare…” (NKJV)

What I have discovered to that the fear of man is very closely linked with the love of money. It makes sense, if you stop and think about it. After all, money is powerful, but it only gives us power over other men. Try using money to bribe an attack dog to leave you alone. Doesn’t work, trust me.

So if you fear man and feel powerless to affect other people, it is very easy to fall into the love of money to try and gain influence over others. It doesn’t happen all the time, but often enough.

Likewise, if you are greedy for money, it’s very easy to feel into the fear of man, because you feel compelled to please your customers (and you start to see everyone as only a customer, rather than a sibling-in-Christ).

So how do we keep ourselves far from this snare? Trust in the LORD and you shall be safe.

If you feel that you MUST please man, and find that you are deeply affected when people dislike you, it means that you have insufficient trust in God. And you can grow to trust God not by beating yourself over the head with it, but by growing to know more about him through his word.

Psalm 9:10 “…those who know Your Name will put their trust in You, for You, LORD, have not forsaken those who seek You.” (NKJV)

“The LORD is my helper, I will not fear. What can man do to me?” (Psalm 118:6, NKJV)

Now you people know that I am not talking about being rude and offensive to other people. I am talking about what happens within you when you face rejection or when people dislike you. I am talking about what happens when you gotta address an issue and you are tempted to compromise or ignore the issue because you are afraid that people won’t like you after that. (like me talking about worship conferences and seminars)

I’m only human, of course I want people to like me. But I want them to like the REAL me, not some fake, sanitized, dismembered, politically correct semblance of me. “Any resemblance to the real JJ is purely coincidental”.

And that is why I am so frank in all my emails and conversations with you people. I am giving you the room to decide if you like the real me or not. And if you don’t, well, I’d rather you dislike the real me rather than like a fake me. Get it?

Paul said “… we were well pleased to impart to you not only the gospel of God, but also our own lives…” (1 Thessalonians 2:8, NKJV)

Why did he say that? Because the gospel of God permeated his whole life, affecting him in all he did, said and thought. Therefore it was impossible for Paul to impart the gospel without imparting the rest of his life too.

And likewise for me. I cannot divorce what I teach you about worship from the rest of my life, so it becomes such that like Paul I’ll impart worship to you together with my own life as well.

Yeah, it makes me vulnerable. Like it did for Paul. It leaves me open for rejection. Like it did for Paul. It doesn’t make business sense, because I am reducing the potential customers I can have because there’s more room for people to be offended or dislike me.

But it’s how God has made me to minister to you. It’s one of those things that I am here to do, to say things that need to be said.

Ok, I’ve gone on long enough about how I got burned out and into the wilderness. Next time I’ll share about how God brought me out. Stay tuned!

Prayer time: Looking at this issue made me realize how much I have been blessed by you, by the love and acceptance you people have shown me. I thank God for you people. You have been a blessing to me. Thank you!

Pray for me that I will continue to trust in God and be kept from the fear of man, so that I will not be tempted to compromise on the message God has entrusted to me for you. Thanks!

Conference Complacency and Seminar Shudders

I get this question ALL the time. "Do you know that (XXX) is coming to Singapore? Are you going for the seminar/workshop/clinic/worship session (XXX) is holding?"

I know this is gonna ruffle a few feathers, but in all my years of serving in the music ministry and having been sent to all these events countless times, I've NEVER been to one that was worth my time.

And what's my criteria for that? Well something is a waste of my time if it doesn't give me something tangible and concrete that I can use in ministry within the next 3 weeks. And no matter who taught in all those I attended, NO ONE has ever given me something that I could use within 3 weeks.

I can feel the temperature rising in here…
And don't get me started on all the vocal or instrumental clinics and workshops that usually follow.

What usually happens is that whoever is holding that workshop has no idea of what to teach the people, so in an attempt to say something that is appropriate for everyone, they end up with what's not useful for anyone.

And because of the low price of these instrument workshops, they usually attract a number of absolute beginners, dabblers who have not made the quality decision to be equipped in that particular instrument.

And so whoever is running that workshop feels obligated to cater to those people and give those people information they can get by going to Yahoo or Google and doing a search.

That of course makes the workshop even more irrelevant to those with a certain degree of skill, and so those with a certain degree of skill end up NOT going to such workshops. And so the proportion of dabblers attending those workshops increases, and thus the gradual and inevitable lowering of the skill level of what gets taught in those events.

Imagine the frustration I felt. I went for all these events hoping to get something that I couldn't get from the other musicians in my church and ended up with info I knew before even playing for church. What on earth was I doing there? I mean, other than wasting my time?

To all the dabblers out there, I say this: stop dabbling. Get REAL. Go join a REAL class. Pay REAL money and make a REAL commitment to equipping yourself for the music ministry. Why pay that few dollars to get what you can get free-of-charge from Yahoo? For the sake of the company and opportunity to socialize with other dabblers?

"He who walks with the wise becomes wise, but the companion of dabblers…" (Nevermind. You figure that out for yourself)

Why then do people still religiously go for such events?
Well, there are two sorts of people who go for such events. The first sort is made up of those who have made a quality decision to be equipped for ministry. They are actively going for regular classes or are being closely mentored, or both. And they attend such events to get inspiration.

I salute these people. They take concrete action AND have people monitoring their progress. These are the people who will count for the Kingdom of God.

Now, it's the second sort that will be really uncomfortable with this email by now. They attend such events simply because there is no follow-up. No accountability. If you're attending a class, the next lesson the instructor's gonna ask you "Did you practice what I showed you last time?" It's this accountability that leads to growth.

Such accountability and follow-up doesn't usually happen when it comes to worship seminars or the instrument workshop that goes along with it. So those who want to feel like they're growing but are not committed to the effort that brings about REAL growth are perfectly comfortable with such an arrangement.

Now I can't change everything that occurs in this area. And there are probably many who don't want me to.

But if YOU are a frustrated keyboardist with a certain degree of skill and training, and you still want more, and if you have genuine reasons why you can't commit to regular lessons with a good instructor (money issues, a job with shift-work) then I want to help you.

And this is my offer
I play for services at The Living Faith Church (www.thelivingfaith.org) on Monday evenings. Turn up for the worship and listen to what I play.

And if you like what I play and want to play that, email me with your questions. I'll give you a FREE email consultation with me on what I played and why. Email me at jvworship@gmail.com with your questions and I'll give you that free consultation.

Why should I do that, when I can charge you good money for the information? It's simple. If you are serious enough about being equipped for ministry that you'd turn up for a service, pay attention and ask good questions, you deserve that free email consultation, in my eyes.

If you're serious about the worship ministry, I'm serious about helping you.
Yes, there are many things that I can't explain over email. But I believe that if my playing resonates with you and you show God that you're faithful with what the little I can impart to you through my playing and my email, God will provide you the finances and open the way for you to have one-on-one lessons with me.

Of course, I'd like to expand this invitation to guitar and drums as well, but the fact is that I am not ministering with those instruments regularly, so I can't make such an offer for those instruments.

Anyway, my keyboard invitation is open to all. Whether you are currently a keyboard student of mine or not, or even if you've never had any formal lesson with me before in any instrument, you are welcome to take advantage of this offer. Just send me an email to tell me who you are, where you're from and when you'll be turning up, and we'll see what we can arrange from there, OK?

I know this is a crazy offer, and probably unwise too, from a business point of view. But well, in this case I've chosen to be a fool for Christ. (and not the first time either)

Prayer time: I am recovering well. Thanks for your prayers. Gradually getting back into the swing of life again. Pray for God's blessing to be strong upon the drum classes especially during this season, because it's about time for me to tie everything together so that the students can see the whole big picture of the skill and art of playing drums for worship. Thanks, everyone!

Be blessed!