Jenn’s Worship Journey
[Some time ago I mentioned posting my IWS work here, but I never followed through with it. The next series of blogs will be assignments from my MWS501 class, Biblical Foundations of Worship. This assignment was a pre-class "get to know you" posting on our class message board. Check out IWS at www.iwsfla.org.]
Music has always been able to connect with me and connect me with God. I would say that I love music, but I have been around people who truly love music and now realize that I have more of a crush on it. Oddly enough, though music was my initial attraction to worship, until recently it was also my biggest barrier in pursuing further involvement with worship ministry.
I grew up in a Presbyterian (PCA) congregation that did a tremendous job of selecting songs with deep, rich content. Even though I was a youngster, I recognized that I was learning and expressing truths of the faith through song. The only I thing I felt our church was lacking was a physical or emotional response to the intellectual truths we proclaimed. My dad would make jokes on the way home from church about how boring we were; he used to sing, “We lift our voices, but not our hands. We keep our lives to ourselves, we’re Presbyterians…”
When I was 12, my parents and I moved to Belize, Central America, as missionaries. There were two churches in the village we lived in, a Pentecostal church and a Catholic church. Picking what we deemed to be the lesser of two evils (I’m kidding), we began attending the Pentecostal church. The freedom and energy with which these people sang and worshipped was astounded me. While I thought it was a bit extreme at times, it opened my eyes to a whole new world. I was instantly enthralled by their expression and for a good while failed to realize that this fervency I was experiencing was often not out of a desire to respond to God but rather a frenzied attempt to get God to respond to us.
Somewhere down the road I sought a marriage of these two church experiences. I wanted to sing songs full of rich doctrine, and I wanted to respond to God with freedom and passion. In the depths of my heart a desire to lead others in worship was also awakening, but I was terrified. Although I loved music and had sung on various teams, I did not have the gifting or talent to lead anyone vocally or on the instruments I tinkered around with. I had some experience leading a worship dance team, but had no formal dance training and didn’t feel this quite fulfilled the longing I had anyway.
Since I was unequipped to lead others musically, I canned the idea and tried to see what else I could do. I decided to be a missionary and went to Japan for a year. While I was in Japan, I decided I needed more training to minister to people, and I returned to the US to study counseling at Trinity College of Florida. I knew deep down that I needed to be studying worship, but to be in the worship track you had to audition and there was no way I would make it, so why try and fail?
That first semester at Trinity I established myself concretely as a counseling major with a heart for missions. Then somehow it slipped out that I owned a set of congas and had played for my church back home. The chapel worship leader approached to see if I would play a song with the team. I agreed and met for the rehearsal. After I got there, I was informed that the professor over worship studies would listen in to give the official okay of whether I could play in chapel or not. After rehearsal, the professor called me over and started asking all sorts of questions about my faith, musical background and future plans. Then he asked me to sing Amazing Grace with him. At the end of the song, he turned around and told me I had just completed my audition for the worship track and that I could switch majors the following semester without messing up my graduation date. I went back to my room and cried for about an hour before calling my parents and then the registrar.
The worship professor from Trinity (who is also the worship pastor at my church and an IWS alumnus) jokes that I have been “baptized in music” these past three years. While I have grown musically, I have also had my view of worship blown out of the water and see that while I may not have much to add to congregational worship musically, God has given me other gifts that He wants to use for His Body. My heart is to further understand the theology, history and philosophy of worship and to use this knowledge to plan and implement services that reflect a more holistic approach to worship. I also have a desire to promote physical expression (gesture, posture, dance) and the arts as a means of responding to God in worship.
Over the past two years I have been shaped greatly by observing the Church Calendar and celebrating the Eucharist weekly at my non-denominational Reformed church (both things I figured I would give a try for a year or so, but didn’t want to get too involved in for fear that they would become rote and lose meaning). I have read books and encountered fellow seekers that continue to challenge my presuppositions about God, the Bible, and what it means to be a Christian. I have begun a journey from an often legalistic, individualistic and works-based faith to a faith based on grace experienced and received in the community of God’s people. It has been a long journey, and I am thankful that it is one I will continue to traverse with you all at IWS and for many years to come.
Music has always been able to connect with me and connect me with God. I would say that I love music, but I have been around people who truly love music and now realize that I have more of a crush on it. Oddly enough, though music was my initial attraction to worship, until recently it was also my biggest barrier in pursuing further involvement with worship ministry.
I grew up in a Presbyterian (PCA) congregation that did a tremendous job of selecting songs with deep, rich content. Even though I was a youngster, I recognized that I was learning and expressing truths of the faith through song. The only I thing I felt our church was lacking was a physical or emotional response to the intellectual truths we proclaimed. My dad would make jokes on the way home from church about how boring we were; he used to sing, “We lift our voices, but not our hands. We keep our lives to ourselves, we’re Presbyterians…”
When I was 12, my parents and I moved to Belize, Central America, as missionaries. There were two churches in the village we lived in, a Pentecostal church and a Catholic church. Picking what we deemed to be the lesser of two evils (I’m kidding), we began attending the Pentecostal church. The freedom and energy with which these people sang and worshipped was astounded me. While I thought it was a bit extreme at times, it opened my eyes to a whole new world. I was instantly enthralled by their expression and for a good while failed to realize that this fervency I was experiencing was often not out of a desire to respond to God but rather a frenzied attempt to get God to respond to us.
Somewhere down the road I sought a marriage of these two church experiences. I wanted to sing songs full of rich doctrine, and I wanted to respond to God with freedom and passion. In the depths of my heart a desire to lead others in worship was also awakening, but I was terrified. Although I loved music and had sung on various teams, I did not have the gifting or talent to lead anyone vocally or on the instruments I tinkered around with. I had some experience leading a worship dance team, but had no formal dance training and didn’t feel this quite fulfilled the longing I had anyway.
Since I was unequipped to lead others musically, I canned the idea and tried to see what else I could do. I decided to be a missionary and went to Japan for a year. While I was in Japan, I decided I needed more training to minister to people, and I returned to the US to study counseling at Trinity College of Florida. I knew deep down that I needed to be studying worship, but to be in the worship track you had to audition and there was no way I would make it, so why try and fail?
That first semester at Trinity I established myself concretely as a counseling major with a heart for missions. Then somehow it slipped out that I owned a set of congas and had played for my church back home. The chapel worship leader approached to see if I would play a song with the team. I agreed and met for the rehearsal. After I got there, I was informed that the professor over worship studies would listen in to give the official okay of whether I could play in chapel or not. After rehearsal, the professor called me over and started asking all sorts of questions about my faith, musical background and future plans. Then he asked me to sing Amazing Grace with him. At the end of the song, he turned around and told me I had just completed my audition for the worship track and that I could switch majors the following semester without messing up my graduation date. I went back to my room and cried for about an hour before calling my parents and then the registrar.
The worship professor from Trinity (who is also the worship pastor at my church and an IWS alumnus) jokes that I have been “baptized in music” these past three years. While I have grown musically, I have also had my view of worship blown out of the water and see that while I may not have much to add to congregational worship musically, God has given me other gifts that He wants to use for His Body. My heart is to further understand the theology, history and philosophy of worship and to use this knowledge to plan and implement services that reflect a more holistic approach to worship. I also have a desire to promote physical expression (gesture, posture, dance) and the arts as a means of responding to God in worship.
Over the past two years I have been shaped greatly by observing the Church Calendar and celebrating the Eucharist weekly at my non-denominational Reformed church (both things I figured I would give a try for a year or so, but didn’t want to get too involved in for fear that they would become rote and lose meaning). I have read books and encountered fellow seekers that continue to challenge my presuppositions about God, the Bible, and what it means to be a Christian. I have begun a journey from an often legalistic, individualistic and works-based faith to a faith based on grace experienced and received in the community of God’s people. It has been a long journey, and I am thankful that it is one I will continue to traverse with you all at IWS and for many years to come.
posted by Jenn at 13:29
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