Dear Theophilus Archive: April 2001

More Groove, More Spirit

Grace. Our choir this year is the product of God's amazing grace. As God grants greater insight into his gospel to each person each week through personal times or through corporate times of worship, God grants a deeper sense of worship in the hearts of his people. The choir is no greater in worship than anyone else, yet for some reason, God has given us the great privilege of being used as a blessing to our congregation in worship. By using what voices God has given to us and lifting what hearts we have to the Lord, a sweet aroma of worship is lifted to our King.

This year, more than the previous two years in which I had the privilege of serving in the choir, there has been a heightened level of excitement to worship and thus a greater resulting joy in such worship. Many factors might come into play: development of technical musical skills, a crazy music director who can not stop dancing during practice, variations in musical format. As a choir, we have enjoyed our times of practice when attempting, and at times singing, with "groove," our new catch word for the year. We have learned to channel the heart's urging and desire to worship into this driving sense of groove. At times, when we finally break through, we catch a glimpse of our director joyfully breaking out in his personalized head-banging, hip-hop dancing (or however you would describe it). Musically, I think our choir has learned a lot this year, but more than musical technicality, I think there is something greater that has really caused us to engage in worship.

I would like to think that God has given each of us greater hearts to simply exalt our King. The greatest emphasis in choir has been to take the blessings that we have received and bless God back with our songs of worship. At times we feel rushed, at times we might feel musically incapable, but we know these things do not ultimately matter. The greatest struggle for all of us is simply to bring to our God a pure heart that seeks him and him alone. We do not want to just bring the congregation a song; we do not want to just put on a show; we want to engage in spiritual ministry, encouraging our brothers and sisters as we worship God. We have been realizing that no matter how big or small the ministry might seem, ministry is ministry: Bless God. Bless his people.

In the end, as a song lyrically states, "it's not just melodies and harmonies that captures his attention, it's not just clever lines and phrases that causes him to stop and listen," but it's the heart, washed and bought by Calvary, that brings God worship that is holy and acceptable. His favorite song of all is the song of the redeemed, and so we can all join in such worship as we live our lives daily bearing witness to this joy to everyone around us. This is God's invitation to all of us as we seek to worship him daily. Praise God!