Why Look to David?

One thing I have learned the HARD way - don't head over to any worship forums for a 'quick' look just before bedtime. The questions and thoughts I get can have me so excited I can't sleep!

One recent example is this question Peter Goh brought up on Worship the Rock. He pointed out that many Christian leaders teach worship from the Old Testament models of worship, such as Levitical worship or David's materials instead of looking at the New Testament. In John 4:23 Jesus revealed that there would be a massive change in the nature of worship "... a time is coming and has now come (NIV)" so why look at the older models of worship if God doesn't think they are good enough?

John 4:23 (NIV) - Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks.

To start we first need to look at what it means to worship in spirit and in truth. I wrote about it in detail before but to quickly sum up, to worship in spirit is to relate to God on the basis of our relationship with him through our new birth (John 3:5-6) rather than what we can achieve out of our flesh (Phil 3:3). And to worship in truth is to realize that there is nothing for which we can claim any credit or glory for, since every good we have done, including our worship, all came from God and was done through God in the first place (John 3:21).

This is a simple definition of spirit and truth, looking at John 3 and letting Scripture interpret Scripture. We can also say that to worship in spirit and truth is to relate to God based on the new covenant. And the new covenant means that all our sins are forgiven (Heb 8:12) and therefore we have a very good reason for total confidence and boldness in approaching God (Heb 10:19-22). Therefore praising God is a very natural fruit of such revelation (Heb 13:15).

The contemporary worship scene is more influenced by the Davidic model than the Levitical model (many people aren't keen to go back to sacrificing animals) so for now let's just consider: Why Look At David? I'll give a couple of reasons.

Firstly, David had an understanding of God that far exceeded what the Scriptures available to him revealed. We can see him as being very much a new covenant worshipper in the following areas:

1) He saw himself as a son of God - He will call out to me, 'You are my Father, my God, the Rock my Savior.' (Psalm 89:26, NIV)

2) He knew he needed the forgiveness of God and that God was willing to forgive - Then I acknowledged my sin to you and did not cover up my iniquity. I said, "I will confess my transgressions to the LORD "-- and you forgave the guilt of my sin. (Psalm 32:5, NIV)

3) He knew that he had nothing in and of himself to offer God, and that whatever he had came from God in the first place - Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand (1 Chron 29:14, NIV).

People can argue over whether David was worshipping God in spirit and in truth. But what is obvious to us is that David, because of the faith he displayed in worshipping God, shows us very clearly how we ought to relate to God as new covenant believers. David was so confident in God that he believed his songs were more precious to God than even the animal sacrifices required by the Levitical priesthood.

I will praise God's name in song and glorify him with thanksgiving. This will please the LORD more than an ox, more than a bull with its horns and hoofs. (Psalm 69:30-31, NIV)

How many of us have THAT level of confidence when we sing to God? Or do we come to God with trepidation, not believing in the fullness of the finished work of Christ? Remember, without faith it is impossible to please God (Heb 11:6). David definitely had the faith that pleased God. We would do well to learn from him.

Secondly, the New Testament points us towards the Davidic model of worship. We know that the whole of Scripture is God-breathed by his Spirit (2 Tim 3:16) and yet there are three specific parts of Scripture explicitly tied to the Spirit of God. They are

1) The Words of Jesus (the words in red) - The Spirit gives life; the flesh counts for nothing. The words I have spoken to you are spirit and they are life. (John 6:63, NIV);

2) Old Testament prophecies - For prophecy never had its origin in the will of man, but men spoke from God as they were carried along by the Holy Spirit.(2 Pet 1:21, NIV); AND

3) The Psalms - be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs (Eph 5:18-19, NKJV).

And God considers the Psalms, the fruit of the Davidic model of worship, so important, that we are admonished twice (Eph 5:18-19, Col 3:16) to feed on them, to talk to God and each other about them. And we have a direct endorsement of the Davidic model given us in Acts 15:16, when James declared that the Gentiles (non-Jews) turning to Jesus is a fulfilment of Old Testament prophecy announcing God's intention to rebuild David's tabernacle (Amos 9:11-12). If God likes the David model of worship so much that he wants to restore it, and even ties the salvation of non-Jews to its restoration, it must be something VERY important to God.

And that means it ought to be important to us also.

Disclaimer: I'll be the first to admit that there are problems with the way some people look at the David model of worship. I personally disagree with using the Davidic model of worship to justify a song-and-dance routine that is based on professional worshippers rather than the entire body of Christ. And that's because of 1 Peter 2:9 which teaches us that ALL of us are royal priests, called to declare God's praises.

But even though there are people who misunderstand the Davidic model of worship, there will always be something useful for us to glean from it (as from ALL Scripture, 2 Tim 3:16). And I believe that we will understand the Davidic Model more and more in the future, as we continue to humble ourselves before God and ask that he open our eyes that we may see wonderful things in His law (Psalm 119:18).

May God himself teach us from His word and make us fruitful in His service!

P.S. if you are not yet on my Invisible Worship Musician mailing list, get over to my page and get in now! I'm going to hold a special sale to celebrate my upcoming California ministry trip. Stay tuned!

Worship Musicians and Vampires

I have a confession to make.

I've read the Twilight Series, the series of vampire-themed novels by Stephenie Meyer.

For those of you who want to understand the appeal of this series without having to plough through four thick novels, this series is essentially Cinderella writ large. Ordinary girl attracts the devotion of a fascinating male with immense physical powers, loads of money, a rich history and the kind of good looks we attribute to Greek gods. And then she herself undergoes that same transformation to rise up to his status, to become his equal, just as Cinderella became royalty through her marriage with the prince.

There, now I've saved you the hassle of reading four thick books. You now have more time to read the Bible and all my emails!

One interesting thought that occurred to me as I read through the books: many worship musicians are similar to the vampires in that series of novels. We have three areas of similarity:

1) Heightened Sensitivity

First, just as the vampires in the series have heightened physical senses, we worship musicians also have a very much higher level of sensitivity to sound, pitch and tempo. The vampires in that series can hear a human heart beating from across the road ("no big deal, JJ! I can hear coins dropped in the NEXT room!"). Musicians are likewise more sensitive to musical nuances than the average layperson.

This can range from being able to tell if someone is singing a little out-of-tune or is playing the snare drum a millisecond delayed on the 2^nd and 4^th counts, to the subtle different in electric guitar effects. When I was a piano newbie I didn't understand why people insisted on me using the correct sustain pedal technique. Later on I found to my surprise that I could hear, while conducting a group class, the sound of ONE student using the wrong pedalling technique. It was just so obvious to me after years of hearing it done right.

Being more sensitive to all these musical nuances is great when you are trying to tune up and refine your own musical skills, or the skills of your students. It often causes frustration, however, when it applies to relating with non-musicians. Ever been in a small group worship setting when you, the worship leader, are the ONLY person in the room singing in tune? Some musicians cannot listen past the discordant sounds to hear how the people are singing their hearts out to God and encountering God in worship. All many musicians notice is how everyone else is out-of-tune when trying to hit the high C# note. This can lead to much frustration in the hearts of impatient musicians.

Remember, in a worship setting all music technique (singing in pitch, instrument skill) is meaningful only to the extent it helps the people sing out their praises to God. Serving the people is the end objective. NEVER let the music distract you from serving the congregation, and never let it cause you to despise the people!

2) The Temptation to Prey on People

Second, even though the primary vampire family in the series chose not to feed on human blood, they acknowledged that feeding on humans is the natural inclination. We worship musicians may not literally be feeding on the congregation's blood, but we have to fight the inclination to prey on them in other ways, especially for approval and applause.

Beware, especially, the mindset that the congregation owes it to us to appreciate our music. They don't. They don't understand or care about how much effort we put in to ensure we fit our diminished licks into the dominant seventh (flatted ninth) chords, or to recreate the exact horn and orchestral arrangements that we heard from some massive Christian concert. And they are most likely going to lose focus and stop paying attention during the worship if we insist on putting in 64 bars of electric guitar solos every two songs or so.

This calls for understanding and restraint. We need to understand that if we serve the congregation well they are not going to notice the little things we do for them. Only God does, therefore we should look to HIM for our reward and approval, not men. And we need to restrain musical displays at all times, doing only what would serve the people, not draw attention to us and distract them from God.

3) The Need for Deliberate Effort to Understand

Third, the vampire family has to put in conscious, deliberate effort to act like humans because they wish to stay among them. Bella, the protagonist of the story, has to remember a whole list of things to do after she has become a vampire and her dad unknowingly comes to visit. She's got to remember to breathe, to blink, to fidget, to cross and uncross her legs and remember to go to the bathroom once in a while.

We worship musicians have to remember the same thing. I was in the office with Jeff (the guy who did the music notation for my book Invisible Worship Musician) a few days back and he was commenting that he did not want to get involved with teaching laypeople about the lifestyle of worship, because we musicians view the entire matter in a very different way from the congregation.

For example, many musicians cannot comprehend singing along to a 'worship' CD, while for an average layperson in church that is quite an acceptable option. We musicians feel scandalized that people can connect with God without the intervention of us anointed, Spirit-filled, God-appointed worship ministers! But in a practical sense we are replaceable by CDs, MIDI software or Youtube videos.

So if we want to serve God's people even more effectively than a CD, MIDI file or Youtube video, we need to understand the congregation and how they see music. And we use our music to serve them. Sometimes that means playing in a boring way, because we don't want to be a distraction. Sometimes that means more work, when we change or tweak a song so that it works better for the people.

Warning!

And at all times we have to beware the deception of music = worship. In the very first worship band I joined my church called us worship musicians the modern-day Levites, saying that we were tasked to bring people into the presence of God through worship. But this statement never sat well with me, because it raised the question: what does me being a great musician have to do with worship? Does understanding one automatically mean I understand the other? Or will I have to about worship the same way every other believer does, through the Bible illuminated by God's Holy Spirit?

To say that a musician is gifted in worship ministry is like saying that someone who speaks Japanese is gifted in interior design. If you meet a few people who speak Japanese and have studied ikebana (Japanese flower arranging) and use those insights in decorating a house tastefully, that does not mean that the next Japanese-speaker you meet has the same skills and opportunities. Likewise for musicians. For a musician to be effective in worship ministry, this musician needs to be taught the specific skills of worship music and to deliberately use those skills to support the praises of a congregation.

Being skilled in music does not necessarily mean that someone is able to serve well in worship ministry! It takes more than that. It takes an understanding of what the people need and a willingness to use music to serve that need. That is the true heart of a worship minister. May God work in our hearts and grant us the insights and skills we need to serve his people!

P.S. If you are a worship leader or musician, and haven't checked out my Invisible Worship Musician yet, what are you waiting for? In that book I share in detail the understanding, concepts and skills you need to be an effective worship leader and musician. Get your copy today!

P.P.S . Continue to pray for my California trip. More and more of the details are falling in place and I am very excited! Stay tuned for the exact dates and location, they will be released soon!

Me? Going California?

Hi, everyone!

Really need your prayers! I'm heading to California (Yosemite area) in the second week of August to speak at a Worship Ministry conference. It's my first ministry trip out of Singapore, so you can guess I'm really excited about it. Do uphold me in prayer, especially over:

1. Me - pray that God will prepare me and speak to me about the work he wants me to do in this trip. I desire to be used by God to impact lives for this conference.

2. The Organizer - Pastor Allyn Bell will be handling all the logistics, promotion and all that kind of stuff. Pray that he will receive wisdom and strength from God as he labors to birth forth this event.

3. The participants - Pray that God will bring the right people to this event so that they will be blessed by it.

If you are going to be in the Yosemite area during the second week of August, do let me know! I'd love the opportunity to meet up with you. And if you'd like to be there for the conference, contact me and I'll link you up with Pastor Allyn, so he can send you the info and details you'll need.

Be blessed!

Writing Spree And New Articles

I've been on a bit of a writing spree the past week.

You see, my church has been seriously emphasizing on the ministry of small groups this season, and that has triggered off my thoughts on worship ministry from the small groups point-of-view. So I've written about

1) The Right Expectations for Small Group Worship;

2) Choosing Songs for Small Group Worship; AND

3) Essential Skills for Small Group Musicians.

These new articles have been put up on my site's articles page.

I've also been busy setting up a blog as a communications channel for my church's small group leaders and members. Over the next few weeks I'll be loading up more materials and content on it. Do take a look at it and give me your feedback and suggestions!

Be blessed!

Worship vs. Worship Leading

Worship vs. Worship Leading

What’s the balance between worship and worship leading?

This very important question is answered in the following short (less than 3 min) video by Sam Middlebrook.

Sam Middlebrook is the worship pastor of Christ the King Community Church (Bellingham, Washington) with ten years of full-time ministry experience and is the founder of developingworship.com. He’s not some wannabe theorist with a bunch of clichés and no fruit; he has experience and results to back up what he teaches. Anyone can have occasional flashes of brilliance and be used by God once in a while. Sam consistently imparts wisdom and insights in his sharing and teaching.

Enjoy the video!

A Pastor Fell...

And I am grieved, so grieved.

What happened was that I was in my pastor’s office with my pastor and another brother-in-Christ. I don’t remember how the conversation went that way, but they suddenly mentioned that the pastor I knew turned away from Christ and decided to embrace Judaism. For a moment I couldn’t accept it. There must be other pastors in Singapore with the same name, right? It must have been one of the others, right? It can’t be the same pastor I knew so long ago, right?

Wrong.

One of the memories of that pastor I remember vividly even to this day came from a church meeting more than 16 years ago. The altar call for that meeting was for people suffering from migraine. I did not really believe I would be healed if I went up for prayer, but I was desperate enough to try anything (Yeah, that happens). When I went up for prayer it was that pastor who anointed me with oil, prayed for me simply and authoritatively in the name of Jesus. And the migraine went away and stayed away for more than ten YEARS.

Now I find that he left the Lord and decided to go for Judaism instead. How could this have happened?

This is how it started. Years back the One New Man movement started in Singapore. Based on Ephesians 2:14-18, it had the noblest of intentions – to make the Christians in Singapore aware of the Jewish roots of our faith and to work towards reuniting Jewish and Gentile (non-Jew) believers in Jesus.

Very soon, I started seeing disturbing attitudes within that movement. It was one thing for them to teach on the significance of the Jewish feasts (great!), it was quite another to have people condemning and mocking churches that ignored the Jewish feasts while paying attention to evangelism. It was enlightening for me to see the Passover supper re-enacted the way Jesus did it on the night he was betrayed. It was worrying to see people denouncing their home churches as being deceived and corrupted by pagan influences because their home churches didn’t do it exactly that way.

I don’t know enough of the people in the movement to decide if the movement was of God or not. But I did see some people given a lot of new knowledge and they got heady with it. Suddenly they felt as if they were the only ones who knew the TRUTH ™ and were therefore superior to the rest of the body of Christ who did not agree with them. In the midst of all the new information they received, they forgot that knowledge puffs up but love builds up (1 Cor 8:1). The new knowledge became the source of significance for some of those involved with the movement, and so it was reasonable for them to continue pursuing more and more of it.

And as a result they were eventually led astray from a pure and sincere devotion to Christ (2 Cor 11:3). Whether it ends with massive theological errors or with gross moral failings, there will NEVER be good fruit coming from pursuing knowledge out of a desire for a sense of significance or superiority.

And why am I sharing with you about this?

Because I don’t want to be responsible for this myself. I am working to bring about a reformation in the way people see and practice worship ministry. Like the One New Man movement, what I am teaching is based on the Scriptures; on top of that it works a lot better, gives better results and with less effort, than the conventional teachings from Praise and Worship Inc.

When people start seeing how well my paradigm fits together and how effective in worship ministry they suddenly become, it’s too easy for them to get all puffed up with the knowledge I impart. Hey, I have to keep a constant guard against that myself!

Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ. From him the whole body, joined and held together by every supporting ligament, grows and builds itself up in love, as each part does its work. (Eph 4:15-16, NIV)

I’ve said this before in my book and I’ll say it again. In order for the entire body of Christ to be built up, every part HAS to do its work. Every part has to have unity in the faith and in the knowledge of the Son of God in order that we may be built up together. And that not only means that MY part is important (you just can’t make it without me) but YOUR part is important also.

In other words, I just can’t make it without YOU.

Once you take that attitude towards people who disagree with you, humility comes very easily. For me I have a long list of parts of the Body of Christ who irritate me no end. And usually what they have in common is a smug sense of superiority over the rest of us, because they think have some secret insider knowledge that we don’t have, and we are all backsliden, paganized, deceived by the devil or whatever, because we don’t agree with them.

I have to look at those people and tell myself “I need them. I can’t make it without them! That’s what the Bible says!” It’s not difficult, just impossible. That’s why I need God to help me do it. That really helps to keep me humble!

Who is weak, and I do not feel weak? Who is led into sin, and I do not inwardly burn? (2 Cor 11:29, NIV)

That verse pretty much sums up my heart right now as I think about that pastor. Before I head off to continue praying through the matter (until I am back at peace again) I’d like to share with you one parting thought.

When the One New Man movement started in Singapore, the people who first embraced it were mainly from the worship ministry. I guess it is the nature of our ministry to constantly desire to know more and more about the God we worship. And what the movement offered, a deeper insight into the Old Testament, was exactly what many worship ministry people want (and need).

But some of those involved found themselves caught up with the trappings of Jewish-style worship (minor chord progressions, shofars and singing songs that were partially in Hebrew) and they were distracted from worshiping in Spirit and in Truth (John 4:23-24). They started assuming that their worship is more pleasing to God because they were singing in Hebrew, rather than depending on Jesus, our Great High Priest, to make their sacrifices of praise acceptable (Heb 13:15).

And when those trappings were not easily accepted by the average Singaporean congregation, it is easy for the worship ministry people to think that those people are not ‘true’ worshippers because they do not worship God the ‘right’ way. Continuing to do things the ‘right’ way became more important than ministering to the congregation, to serving the people God bought with his own blood.

The fault DOES NOT lie with the One New Man movement. It wasn’t studying Old Testament worship that caused all these problems, it was because of certain attitudes hidden within the hearts of SOME of the people involved, and those attitudes eventually bore bad fruit. And this can happen with ANY worship movement.

So always guard your heart. Remember that worship ministry is to serve God’s people. We rise to our highest when we humble ourselves to be a blessing to the children of God (Mark 10:43-45).

That’s about it for now. Do keep me in prayer, that God will help me and comfort me in my grief. Be blessed!

Holding Back

I usually don’t get depressed reading my Bible, but these days have been different.

As I mentioned some time back, I’ve started on another Bible-on-a-year trip. At the moment I have just finished 2 Chronicles. This time through this part of the Bible I paid special attention to the prayers of David. I found myself crying when I read this:

“O LORD, God of our fathers Abraham, Isaac and Israel, keep this desire in the hearts of your people forever, and keep their hearts loyal to you. And give my son Solomon the wholehearted devotion to keep your commands, requirements and decrees and to do everything to build the palatial structure for which I have provided." (1 Chr 29:18-19, NIV)

Did David ask for the wrong thing? No, as a parent I’d pray the same for my sons. I’d beg God to keep their hearts devoted to him. But we know that in the end Solomon fell into idolatry.

As Solomon grew old, his wives turned his heart after other gods, and his heart was not fully devoted to the LORD his God, as the heart of David his father had been. He followed Ashtoreth the goddess of the Sidonians, and Molech the detestable god of the Ammonites. So Solomon did evil in the eyes of the LORD; he did not follow the LORD completely, as David his father had done. (1 Kings 11:4-6, NIV)

And because I knew that, it made all the accounts of Solomon’s early reign and his great start all the more bittersweet. It’s kinda like watching the early days of Anakin Skywalker in Star Wars. You know that, in spite of all the good things he did earlier, he was going to fall away, and he was going to become Darth Vedar.

This time through the Bible, however, I think I found the beginning of Solomon’s fall, the mistake he made that led him down the slippery slope and caused everything to end so badly.

Solomon brought Pharaoh's daughter up from the City of David to the palace he had built for her, for he said, "My wife must not live in the palace of David king of Israel, because the places the ark of the LORD has entered are holy." (2 Chr 8:11, NIV)

Solomon’s first foreign wife was the daughter of Pharaoh (from Egypt). Very early in his reign, he made the decision to keep her away from the presence of the LORD. Think about it, he wouldn’t even let her enter David’s palace just because the ark of the God USED to be there?

I personally believe this decision that his wife would be kept out-of-bounds to God, so to speak, that caused this aspect of his life to spiral out of control.

King Solomon, however, loved many foreign women besides Pharaoh's daughter—Moabites, Ammonites, Edomites, Sidonians and Hittites. They were from nations about which the LORD had told the Israelites, "You must not intermarry with them, because they will surely turn your hearts after their gods." Nevertheless, Solomon held fast to them in love. He had seven hundred wives of royal birth and three hundred concubines, and his wives led him astray. (1 Kings 11:1-3, NIV)

We usually read the account of Jesus feeding the five thousand with five loaves and two fish, and we learn from it that whatever we offer to God gets multiplied to make an impact for his kingdom. But the converse is also true. If we leave one aspect of our lives apart from God’s rule and blessing, that part of our lives starts to grow, to multiply and fester, and eventually it has the potential to derail our lives and mess things up for us big-time.

It was not the problem of a foreign wife that was the root of the problem. If we look at the matter in detail, we’ll see that David had a foreign wife too, the daughter of the king of Geshur (1 Chr 3:2). And so did Joseph, in fact, he married the daughter of the priest of On. That’s like a Christian prophet marrying the daughter of the Dalai Lama (if he ever had one, of course). But that did not cause those two men to backslide. They saw God as heavily involved with ALL they did. In fact, David even brought God into his domestic squabbles, as we see from the following incident involving one of his wives.

When David returned home to bless his household, Michal daughter of Saul came out to meet him and said, "How the king of Israel has distinguished himself today, disrobing in the sight of the slave girls of his servants as any vulgar fellow would!" David said to Michal, "It was before the LORD, who chose me rather than your father or anyone from his house when he appointed me ruler over the LORD's people Israel—I will celebrate before the LORD. I will become even more undignified than this, and I will be humiliated in my own eyes. But by these slave girls you spoke of, I will be held in honor." (2 Sam 6:20-22, NIV)

By the way, I personally think the last line about the slave girls was David’s way of hitting Michal below the belt. I can understand his anger, but it was still mean, in my opinion. Let’s not idealize everything a man of God does, OK? Having said that, however, the fact remains that despite his mistakes, David saw God as vitally involved with all he did.

Unlike Solomon.

And hence the lesson I took from this and want to share with you.

It is too easy to divide up our lives into compartments, our family, work, leisure, ministry and other spiritual stuff and see them all as separate. And when we see them as separate, the temptation of thinking that God belongs to and should only be involved with the more spiritual stuff (such as our prayer times, Sunday services and church ministries) is strong.

If we ever give in to that temptation, we are courting trouble the way Solomon did. God desires to leave his mark, to show his hand in EVERY area of our lives.

May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. (1 The 5:23, NIV)

And this is the key to seeing if you have been holding back areas of your life from God - Prayer. If there is any area of your life you have not been submitting to God in prayer, this is an area you have declared out-of-bounds to God. Whether you do that because you think it is too trivial to bring to God or because you are harboring rebellion in that area does not matter. What matters now is the fact that what you hold back from God poses a grave danger to your walk with God.

Prayer is also the key to bringing any area of your life back to God’s rule. Whatever the area may be, begin by praying to God about it again. I pray to God about many aspects of my life, even how I do push-ups. And just a couple of nights ago I had a late night conversation with a dear brother-in-Christ who showed me yet another area I have been holding back from God. When he did so I realized that I have not been praying about that aspect of my life. So I had to commit that area of my life back to God again.

Anyway, that’s it for this sharing. Pray for me that I can organize my time well this season. I’ve been very busy, but there are still more matters I’d like to share with you. Be blessed!

Birthday Thoughts

I celebrated my birthday a couple of weeks back.

I usually don't, because I don't feel comfortable with people making a fuss over me. Most of the time my birthday is forgotten, because Jessiah's (my firstborn) birthday is less than a week before mine, so he gets all the attention. And I'm cool with it.

(He was supposed to be born on my birthday; I guess he was too impatient to wait another week!)

So how did I spend my birthday? I started off with worship, of course.

1. Thy Loving Kindness (D-E major)
2. My Life is in You, Lord (G major)
3. Through it all (G-A Major)
4. How Great is Our God (A major).

Then I continued with an ordinary day at work. It's a blessing to be happy and satisfied stuffing envelopes and pasting stamps on my birthday (that's NOT my usual routine, but it just had to be done by that day). Finally the day ended off with meeting the wife for a movie (17 Again). Yup, that was pretty much it.

In my university days I had a forbid fascination with cults. And my favorite cult in those days was the Jehovah's Witnesses. They were a textbook study of standard cult psychology and got me interested in studying Christian doctrine in detail. What fascinated me was how carefully they used their differences with standard Christian doctrine both for branding and for making their members feel superior to rank-and-file Christians, that they had some secret insider knowledge. Very Nicolaitan, right?

And one of their pet 'doctrines' was that birthdays were pagan celebrations, that the two times birthdays were described in the Bible bad things happened, and so genuine servants of Jehovah (what they CLAIM to be) should have nothing to do with birthday celebrations, whether their own or someone else's.

I was exposed to all these ideas in my undergrad days, so later on, when some Christians I knew suddenly started telling me that Christmas was a pagan festival and that Christians should ONLY observe Jewish feasts, I just smiled and left the matter at that. I already saw how similar ideas (in fact, for the JW exactly the same idea, Christmas) were used, and saw the fruits firsthand. I'll pass, thanks!

Birthdays can, in fact they ought, to be used for remembering God. In Psalm 139:13-14, we read "For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother's womb. I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made; your works are wonderful, I know that full well." But in the course of day to day life it's easy to forget to thank God for creating us in the first place. Birthdays provide an excellent platform for remembering and celebrating that.

The JW do have a point though (you never thought I'd ever say that, right?). They assert that birthdays take glory away from God and put it on the individual. And I have seen people who behave as if birthdays were their day of glory, that they should be allowed to do whatever they like on their respective birthdays. Such people who act in the spirit of Pharaoh (who executed a prisoner on that day, Gen 40:22) and Herod, who on his birthday had John the Baptist executed. Some people act as if their birthday celebrations gave them the right to treat other people badly or to demand that their whims and fancies be met, regardless of how much trouble they cause the people around them.

I personally believe that birthdays give us the opportunity to express who is the most important person in our lives. If we are self-centered, how we celebrate our birthdays will reveal that. If we live for Christ, how we celebrate our birthdays will reflect that too. I still remember the birthday party of one of my good friends. A few years ago he said "It's MY birthday, I want to spend it worshiping Jesus, so you all HAVE to join me!"

Please don't get me wrong. I am not saying that how I celebrated my birthday is the best way or the correct way. I am just sharing some thoughts and memories triggered by my own birthday, OK?

So in closing I'd say I am quite OK with how my birthday went this year. Of course there are still some items on my birthday wish list that I'd like to have, such as :

1) A working computer, my previous one zonked out (a laptop would be nice)

2) A video cam, I have still have lots more vids I'd like to record and put up

3) Training DVDs, both music and Budo

But in spite of not having all those things I am still content. I enjoyed myself on my birthday this year and for that I thank God. Many information marketing people on the Internet use their birthdays as an excuse for some special sale or promotion of their products. I don't think there is anything wrong with that, but I did not do that this year. Why? Because I have only ONE product at this point of time, I think it's weird to hold a birthday celebration sale just for that!

Yup, so that's it for this email. No special offer, no special promotion, just a simple sharing of my thoughts and musings. Be blessed!

When My Son was Hospitalized

If you have been following me on Twitter (@junjiehuang) or on FaceBook (as Junjie Huang), you'll know that my elder boy recently came down with some gastro-something viral thingy and had to be hospitalized. It was not an easy decision, but when he had high fever and kept vomiting out everything, even the fever medicine and water, we had no choice. He had to be put on a drip, so he had to be warded.

It was an interesting experience, to say the least. There was one young boy (at the most 2 years old) who was clamoring to go home. And his mum kept telling him that they were going home soon, just after the doctor checks him one more time. Come on, the kid was already in hospital clothes, the doctors had already made their final rounds for the day, it was after 9pm at night... she was lying through her teeth there! What's gonna happen to her when the kid grows older and he refuses to trust her because she has lied to him too many times before?

And there was this other kid, even younger than the previous one. He was initially quiet when he saw me in the ward, but by the next day he was taking my kids' toys and loudly shouting "MINE!" when any of my kids wanted to get them back. The mother would quietly take them away from him and return them to my kids when he was distracted with something else. But what message was she sending to that boy about respecting other people's property? That he was the centre of the world and the rightful owner of ALL he surveyed?

Of course, Jessiah wasn't totally perfect too. I must admit I was disappointed at his total abject fear of having the needle stuck into his hand so the nurses could insert the drip. I guess at that moment it was a little too late for me to teach him pain disassociation and calming techniques, right? It did not feel good to me, pinning him down with my arms, holding his arm and hand in place for the nurse to insert the drip, knowing that it WAS going to hurt because his hand was so tense from fear. What happened to all the breathing and calming techniques I taught him before?

"JJ, you're expecting too much from a 7 year old kid!" Yeah, maybe you're right!

If you have been following my emails and blog posts for a while you'll see that my two boys trigger off a lot of my thoughts, ideas and posts. I think about my kids a lot, especially in the context of spiritual matters. Recently as I spent a lot more time on Deuteronomy, I realized that God has our children very much on his heart also. Many times in Deuteronomy we are admonished to teach our children, to impart godly wisdom and teaching to them. For example:

Only be careful, and watch yourselves closely so that you do not forget the things your eyes have seen or let them slip from your heart as long as you live. Teach them to your children and to their children after them. Remember the day you stood before the LORD your God at Horeb, when he said to me, "Assemble the people before me to hear my words so that they may learn to revere me as long as they live in the land and may teach them to their children." (Deuteronomy 4:9-10, NIV)

God has children very much on his heart. And he wants us to prioritize teaching them. We are to make the most of every opportunity to teach them, using whatever is in my environment and daily schedule as a context for training them in the fear of the Lord. Consider this:

"Hear, O Israel : The LORD our God, the LORD is one. Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength. These commandments that I give you today are to be upon your hearts. Impress them on your children. Talk about them when you sit at home and when you walk along the road, when you lie down and when you get up." (Deuteronomy 6:4-7, NIV)

In other words, get obsessed with God and keep talking about him to your kids!

Raising up kids is tough. And it's gonna get tougher and tougher as the days go by. This is one thing that we MUST work at together, as a community of God and as the Body of Christ. There are three main groups of people on my heart as I write this message.

1) Parents with growing kids

Don't isolate yourself from the rest of the Body of Christ. It is a bad move in general, but it is extremely devastating when it comes to parenting. No matter how strong you are or how wise you are, you will need help. So get help!

Work in partnership with other parents. Trade tips, help mind each others' kids once in a while, just look for ways to sow practical help into the lives of other parents and be humble enough to accept the help offered by other parents too.

For example, my current ministry means that I am VERY busy on Sundays after the service. As long as my pastor isn't done, I'm not done! If he doesn't get to eat, I don't get to eat! All that is fine, except that if I have to manage my kids by myself they're not going to have a decent lunch until quite late in the day. And I don't like that. Thank God for the other parents at my church, people who know me and my kids and are willing to help feed them while I handle lots of other stuff!

2) Parents with grown kids

If you have already been there and done that, help us younger parents. Share your advice, wisdom and experience. Don't let us make all the same mistakes you did. And do encourage us. We can read all the parenting books, even excellent ones by writers full of the wisdom of God, but it just doesn't compare to you coming alongside us and telling us "this is a passing phase, your kids will grow out of this and they'll be fine!"

I know this may not be easy. Especially if you are trying to help people like me. There's just something about me, when it comes to raising my kids people tend to think I know what I am doing. That's the impression I tend to give other people. I don't. Most of the time, when I look so confident and certain on the outside, I am desperately praying for God's wisdom on the inside. When it comes to my kids I really appreciate wisdom from people who have walked the path before. And I am sure other younger parents are like me, they appreciate your help too. So please help us!

3) You're too young to have your own kids

As long as you are old enough to walk and hold something in your hand you are old enough to learn how to help manage children. Start small. If you are an only child or you never helped your parents manage younger siblings before, go volunteer in your church nursery. An extra pair of willing hands will always be appreciated. Give the parents in your church a hand, help them lift a pram up a staircase, help them carry a bag (milk bottles, powder, diapers and all that can get heavy, trust me, I know!). Do all these little things to get yourself in contact with children, to get familiar with them, and to make yourself useful with them.

Jesus said "And if you have not been trustworthy with someone else's property, who will give you property of your own?" (Luke 16:12, NIV) Show yourself trustworthy with other people's kids. The experience will prove invaluable when you have children of your own!

You may be wondering, I am a Worship Trainer, why am I talking so much about children? For one thing, God's Word wants us to care about children, to be forward looking in planning and caring for the next generation. And that's good enough a reason for many people.

But for me there is also another reason. As a worship minister I pay a lot of attention to the life of King David, the most prominent worshipper in the Bible. And one thing that really struck me about David is this: he was one lousy father. Think about it, Ammon was a selfish kid who raped his half-sister, Absalom was a bloodthirsty and violent coward (rare combination, I know), even Solomon eventually turned away from the LORD to worship other gods.

This is sobering when I look at my own two boys. What kind of people will they become? The Bible says we are to train the child in the way he should go, and when he grows old he will not depart from it (Proverbs 22:6). And this tells me that David COULD have prevented his sons from becoming like this. But he didn't.

I don't want that to be said of my life. And that is why I think so much about my sons, especially when it comes to spiritual matters. I feel very keenly the responsibilities the LORD has entrusted to me in this area. So that is why it colours a lot of what I share with you.

Anyway, that's what I'd like to share with you this time. Be blessed!

Watch and Be Blessed!

If you have been following my posts and emails long enough you'll see that I almost never share with you material from other people. I use my own stuff, thank you very much. But here is a video that has blessed me every time I watch it, and I'd like to share this video with you.

This video comes from Todd Vaters, and has been listed by Faith Visuals in their Top 10 New Easter Videos list I pray that this video will bless you as much as it has blessed me!

Serve as unto the Lord

But who am I, and who are my people, that we should be able to give as generously as this? Everything comes from you, and we have given you only what comes from your hand. (1 Chronicles 29:14, NIV)

Who knows? He may turn and have pity and leave behind a blessing-- grain offerings and drink offerings for the LORD your God. (Joel 2:14, NIV)

What do the two verses above have in common? The idea that whatever we offer God came from him in the first place. We aren't really giving him anything, we are only returning to him a part of it.

Putting it simply, we are ALWAYS getting the better part of the deal.

That's something we need to keep in mind when we actually SERVE God's people. In 1 Peter 4:11, it says "If anyone serves, he should do it with the strength God provides" (NIV). And we are told that because we are serving God, HE is the one who will reward us (Col 3:24). Not men.

And that is an area that has stumbled many who step forward to serve God. They subconsciously believe that because they are serving certain people, their reward will come from these people. Of course, we can cover this up with spiritual jargon, and say that everything we do is unto the Lord. But the acid test is when people let us down. What then?

Let me share with you my personal experience, in case you think I have my act together all the time.

One of the ways I earn a living is by giving personal lessons in worship music. And I have learned the hard way NEVER to serve at a place where I already have students serving. Because these students will stop taking lessons with me soon after that. And my income suffers.

The first time this happened was with a church where I had TWO students serving on the worship team. They lost a core musician and they were scrambling to fix the vacuum. So two of the more proactive people heard about me, checked out my teaching and decided to take lessons from me.

Problem was, no matter how quickly they learned they were not gonna be able to fix the music vacuum straight away. So I was invited to play piano for them, help them out for one of their services and all that. Being a sucker for a sob story, I agreed. The idealist in me thought "This is a GREAT way to teach them, they'll see me actually do what I tell them to do, and in front of their own eyes they'll see it work!"

That was what happened. They saw that I actually did what I told them to do. Some parts where I have told them not to play they saw me actually put my hands behind my back. (Something most church pianists don't have the guts to do, I noticed). They saw how well the congregation responded to all the subtle changes I explained (and now demonstrated) to them.

And they stopped taking lessons.

In retrospect I understand why this happens. People usually do things (like take worship music lessons) to get rid of pain. When I started serving in that church I immediately took away a huge source of their pain, the pain that comes from having rudderless musicians playing junk for a church service. So by stepping forth to serve I shot myself in the foot by taking away their motivation to take lessons from me.

I do understand that life is unpredictable and things crop up. And that was what happened to one of them. But the other one gave me loads of hyper-lame excuses. Let me give you a sample:

1) "I am not called to play music instruments" - show me from the Bible where there is such thing...

2) "I want to check my motivations and the condition of my heart" - I could tell you what was in this person's heart - laziness! Check out the other excuses and you'll see what I mean.

3) "I don't have time to practice" - which sounds really funny because soon after this person said:

4) "I'm busy with classical piano lessons, because that would help with worship piano" - Look, either you've got time or you don't. And if you don't have time and you want to learn worship music, then learn worship piano playing directly! It's like someone claiming she wants to learn Japanese but is too busy to take Japanese lessons because she's learning Mandarin to help her with her Japanese.

This person also metaphorically slapped me in the face. One day, during band practice, this person openly approached another pianist and asked this pianist to teach this person's kid. Well, at that time this pianist was a student and didn't have any teaching experience, and she knew that I had loads of experience teaching both adults and children, so she asked "Why don't you ask JJ?" The reply was "What JJ teaches is very complicated..."

OK, that was going a tad bit too far. I usually watch my manners when speaking to people in positions of leadership, but this time I spoke up and said "If you can say that, you obviously haven't been listening!" This person quietly moved on to do other stuff while the rest of the musicians and back-up vocalists waited in uncomfortable silence for the band practice to begin...

Yeah, that was what I put up with, in addition to the financial hardship that came from losing two students and giving up prime teaching time for the sake of serving. Would you believe that in the end I stopped playing for that group, not because of financial hardship, but only because of my family? My son was acting up, my wife suspected that it was because he needed even more time with me, so she appealed to me to give priority to my kid. And I did.

Not that I am such a dedicated and devoted servant of God. I think it's just because I got into the habit of turning up, that's all. Sometimes that's all God really needs from us to serve him powerfully...

I buried this season in my subconscious and tried to forget all about it. Until this happened again and again. Even with students who have been faithfully taking lessons from me for years and risen in prominence in their churches because of their growing effectiveness in the worship ministry. (Which shows you, by the way, that it's not because of my lousy people skills. If that was the problem, why would these students continue taking lessons from me for so long?)

Once I start serving WITH them, they stop lessons very soon after that. And my income suffers.

And so I have to battle bitterness and resentment. Hey look, I don't get paid to serve God with them. I do it because of the opportunity to sow more into my students' lives. The time I give up for serving could have been used to bring in more money for my family, but I forego income willingly for that purpose (that makes me a lousy businessman, I know). And so I feel betrayed when my students stop taking lessons from me. It's like them not respecting my time after I start giving them even more free lessons.

So I have two choices: give in to bitterness or really serve as unto the Lord. If I expect that people would respect my serving and so I would see SOME form of concrete appreciation from them (like continuing to take ridiculously under-priced lessons from me) I WILL be disappointed.

It is better to take refuge in the LORD than to trust in man. (Psalm 118:8, NIV)

BUT if I see my reward as coming from the Lord, in HIS good time, in the way and manner that HE chooses, my heart will be able to rest in him. Seriously, what did it cost GOD for me to serve him? It cost him his son, who died to make me fit to serve God. And even whatever I use to serve God came from him in the first place, right?

For who makes you different from anyone else? What do you have that you did not receive? And if you did receive it, why do you boast as though you did not? (1 Cor 4:7 NIV)

So, as Jesus said before, "Freely you have received, freely give." (Mat 10:8, NIV) This does not mean to refuse monetary compensation, because in the same passage Jesus said "The worker is worth his keep" (Mat 10:10, NIV). But at the root of it all, serve as unto the Lord. And expect your reward to come from him.

Does that mean that I am now going start serving at whatever place I am invited to serve at, even if I have students there? No way! My first priority is to provide for my family (1 Tim 5:8), and that means getting more students AND keeping the students I now have. That's my bread and butter, I have to guard it wisely.

It DOES mean that I have to walk in forgiveness continually, just as Christ has forgiven me. It means that before I do anything for ministry I now count the cost. Can I afford to bear the financial consequences of serving in a particular way? And not expect anyone to come along and help me bear the burden? If so I go ahead. If not, I decline the opportunity to serve.

Conclusion: after the most recent time I lost a student after serving, I was very offended and frustrated, as you can imagine. I kept wrestling with the offence. Every time my anger arose I kept telling God "I'm gonna serve because it's you, not for any other reason. In the end you gave me everything, I am only returning part of what you gave me in the first place." And within a few weeks God opened for me a door to minister in a place and a way that I didn't believe I ever have, and even sooner than I expected. I honestly feel like Joseph taken from the prison to Pharaoh's court, a huge change overnight.

I can't share the details now (this post has gone on long enough!) but suffice it to say that I finally feel as if I am better utilized for God's Kingdom. More of my giftings and abilities are called into play. I am even busier than before, and yet there is this sense of peace and rest that pervades everything I do. I really can't explain it, but I am certainly enjoying it!

All my struggles and frustrations honestly look so small, compared to what I am enjoy in my life and ministry now. The Lord has rewarded me, and I am grateful.And that's what I'd like to share with you today.

If you serve, whether in the Worship Ministry directly (as I still do) or indirectly, or even in some other form of ministry, you can tell if you are serving as unto the Lord or unto men. Just watch what happens when people offend you or despise you. If you struggle to continue, some part of you is still serving as unto men.

If so, my dear sibling-in-Christ, don't let the offences and your disappointment cause you to give up. Your reward is on the way. Our God remembers everything you do for him and his Word declares:

Therefore, my dear brothers, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain. (1 Cor 15:58, NIV)

Be blessed!

Preacher and Worship Leader

This is a topic someone brought up via email (thanks, Allyn!). This phenomenon doesn't happen very often, but often enough – having the pastor (preacher) as the worship leader too. It's not very surprising if you stop and think about it, many of the skill sets overlap. Planning for songs or sermons, leading a worship team, ministry team or a congregation, communicating clearly with people on a larger scale than a typical one-on-one conversation – the skills seem to just carry over from one form of ministry to another.

In fact, there are a number of pastors in Singapore who have performing experience, started serving God as worship leaders and eventually became preachers. And when I get online and nose around, this appears in other countries too. People go from leading the worship for a Bible study meeting, to leading the Bible study for the meeting, to preaching. What I personally suspect is that

1) Worshiping Jesus, the Living Word of God, intensifies the hunger to meet him in the Written Word;

2) The fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom (Psalm 111:10) so as worship leaders worship Jesus more they grow in the wisdom of God. And start to share it.

3) When these worship leaders show themselves faithful in doing a little for a few people, God entrusts them with the responsibility of doing more for more of his people (Luke 12:42-44, 16:10).

There are also cases of people who have been active in the performing arts before they believe in Jesus or receive their assignment to full-time ministry. Singers, songwriters, musicians, magicians, actors and actresses have made the switch before. So they switch their focus from performing for their own glory to performing behind the pulpit, and for the glory of God.

So if you are a worship leader and the preacher at the same time, here's some things to take note of:

1) Create a platform for others to minister.

If you are in a small church or one that is just starting off, you may have to do everything yourself at the beginning. And that's fine. You are probably the sort used to handling everything by yourself anyway. We musicians can be such control freaks, right?

But as you do so, remember that your task as a pastor is to prepare God's people for works of service, so that the body of Christ may be built up (Ephesians 4:12). And that means creating the platform for people to step up and serve. In his book Sticky Church, Larry Osborne says "I learned long ago that no one steps up until there's a vacuum that needs to be filled." You may enjoy leading worship, but in the long run Ephesians 4:12 means that you may have to let go of taking that role all the time and begin sharing it with someone else.

2) People are still going to follow your lead, so…

Even when you let someone else lead the worship, remember that the eyes of the congregation will still be on you. Which means:

• When your apprentice worship leader is leading the worship, raise your hands really high, sing out loud and follow his or her lead. If you don't you are sending the people the message that it is OK for them to not follow the leading of your worship leader. That will hamstring his or her ministry from the get-go. It's bad if the people see you standing there listlessly when someone else leads worship. It's even worse if they see you peering over your sermon notes and scribbling in them, or waving an usher over to you to whisper frantic last minute instructors during the worship.

I understand if you have a lot of things to manage even up to the moment you step up to the pulpit and start preaching God's Word. Such things happen in small churches. I highly recommend that you hand these things over to a volunteer, or if you can't do that, settle them where the congregation can't see you, where you won't be a distraction to them.

• How you lead worship may not be the best way to lead worship, even if it works for you. You may have some mannerisms, tricks or preferences for leading worship. And the congregation sings their hearts out when you lead worship, so you think you're doing fine.

But the litmus test comes when your apprentice does what YOU do. Does it work for them? If not, don't do it. First, your congregation will prefer how you do things (or they would have left your church a long time ago) and if your leader tries the same things and falls flat you have diminished your leader in the eyes of the congregation. Second, even if your leader ever checks out how I lead worship and I have the glory of God coming with enough power to raise the dead, your leader will still prefer to do things your way (even if it doesn't work). So you will hamstring me in my teaching ministry too. (Yeah, it's a selfish reason. At least I am honest!)

Maybe an example will help: There's this pastor in Singapore, (former worship leader, by the way) who likes to sing through the verse and chorus of a song ONCE. Then he exhorts, preaches or prophesies as the choir (yup, it's a large church) oohs and aahs in the background. Then at the right moment he rallies everybody for a rousing final chorus.

Now that works for him because, in the natural realm he has loads of charisma to spare AND an intuitive grasp of the music (exhort for 16 bars before it's time for the chorus again), and in the spiritual realm he has a strong prophetic gifting. That means that when he talks, things happen, the people are strengthened, encouraged and comforted (1 Cor 14:3). So it's all fine and dandy for him.

Problem comes when a musician comes along, sees what that pastor does and decides to do the same thing. All he has in common with that pastor is the ability to count out 16 bars before going into the chorus again. Charisma and prophetic ability? Nah. And this musician takes things a step further than the pastor. The pastor does it for ONE song and it works, so he tries exactly the same thing, but for FOUR or FIVE songs in a row. Exactly the same structure and template, everything.

Do I even need to tell you what happens next?

3) Performance experience helps you speak powerfully into a performer's life.

Even though worship music and performance music are two different genres of music, usually it's the performers who will have the guts to take up the challenge of the worship ministry. That makes sense, since they already have dealt with the stage fright issue to a large degree.

And if they step up and begin serving God along with you, the proximity and close contact with you will give you a powerful and precious opportunity to mentor these people and sow into their lives directly. Make full use of that opportunity!

Moreover, if you have performing experience, it lends more weight to your words when you speak into a performer's life. In case you don't know, skilled musicians and performers usually have up-sized egos. And they usually don't have a lot of patience for non-musicians or non-performers telling them what to do. Either that or they will dismiss it with "what do they know about life as a musician anyway?"

But if you have performing experience, things become different. When you talk to them about being a light for Christ even as they sing and play in pubs, and you can look them in the eye and say "You can do it. I did it, and the same Jesus who lives in me lives in you!" they will be moved. They will start to think that there is hope for them to grow likewise in serving Christ. Your experience allows you to say to them "follow me, as I follow Christ!"

It doesn't sound pleasant, talking about winning the respect of performers this way. But sometimes it just has to be done. Here's my personal experience: when I conduct a workshop for playing piano in worship, one thing I emphasize over and over again is freeing up the sound space for the rest of the band to be heard and for the congregation to sing more freely. And that means playing in a careful, bare-bones fashion.

Now if there is a performance-crazy pianist listening to this, one who spends hours and hours drilling post-modernist avant-garde bebop jazz riffs, shows off those riffs while playing for worship and thinks he's doing all this to the glory of God, what's he gonna think? "Does JJ tell me to leave out the good stuff because HE can't play it?"

So part of my explanation HAS to include a brief demo of overplaying, crazy flamboyant overplaying, to show people that: yes, I CAN do it, but no, I choose NOT to do it, so I serve the congregation better.

And, more importantly, when you do this you are showing this person how to mentor and guide other worship leaders later on. What you do can multiply and be duplicated, as Paul described in 2 Tim 2:2. The best example of this will be John Wimber and Carl Tuttle . Give yourself some time, head over to Carl Tuttle's website and read his sharing on the years John Wimber worked with him. There are many, many powerful lessons to learn from that.

OK, that's about it for this post. Be blessed!