I feel like every day someone asks me if I have plans to record a new album. Heaven Hear Us released in 2006. All of a sudden, it’s 2012. It’s a worthwhile question without an easy answer. Am I still a recording artist? How often do you have to make a record to still be one? :)
I think what’s true is that I am a guy in Kansas City learning for the first time what it means to make disciples that make disciples. The recording artist thing has taken a back seat to what I believe is my first call, and the first call for every follower of Jesus—to make disciples. So, I’m a worship leader —who has made records— who is making disciples and living a life on mission in Kansas City. If there is new music all those things will have to come together in it.
Every time I record an album, I assume it might be my last. Not sure why. I think because they actually cost a great deal of money, for starters. Next, I would say that there is a growing number of worship leaders out there who are writing some awesome songs for the church, giving the church plenty of songs to sing, and that has become quite the crowded market. There are so many worship leader/songwriters out there doing a way better job of providing fresh songs for the church than I ever could on a limited dime and the limited time I have between ministry and family, etc. Besides, I have never really felt like my role was to write songs for the church, though we need songwriters to do that—I appreciate and honor that work. For me, the whole cost/need thing has to add up.
In a way, I feel like it’s only necessary to put something “out there” when it feels like I am saying something potent and not just saying anything. Maybe that’s the artist coming through, or maybe the prophetic part of me … not sure. Why say something unless it feels like God is saying it, and I mean, really saying it, you know? That’s the great hope, anyhow. I’m not super prolific; never have been. I always figure that when it’s right, God will open all the right doors to make a record happen. I don’t mean that lazily, I mean I have faith for that. I work hard for that faith, and it’s always been true for me (God opening doors, that is).
I have felt for some time that, in fact, a “word” is growing in my spirit. I have something to say, though it’s not articulate at all at this point. Not in songs, that is.
I feel a spiritual tension in my life, worship, and songwriting right now. That would be why I haven’t released a CD in a while. It’s a good thing.
I have spent the last three years a bit lost and wondering again what worship is, and what it’s all about.
I’ve come to realize, once again, that worship is obviously about the excellence and supremacy of Jesus. I feel that deeply today. My life and my songs have to be true, and about the True One, before they are about anything. That’s a no-brainer.
Secondly, I feel like our confessions have to remind us of our identity in the heart of God and our place in the Kingdom story.
Thirdly—and this is what creates the greatest tension in me (I’ve always carried this)—the language of our confessions desperately needs to make sense to those who don’t subscribe to our story. I wholeheartedly believe that we, as the people of God, have lost the art of living offensively with the gospel in this post-Christian culture. We tend to posture ourselves defensively with it and it shows in our language. I mean that our songs can become a bit inbred and inaccessible to those who have not yet embraced the heart of God, which should feel strange to us, because music is such a powerful storytelling tool.
That, of course, doesn’t mean that people never receive a revelation of the love of God in worship. It happens all the time. It just means that the songs are written for the church, with the language of the church, to be sung in the church, and those revelations usually happen inside a church. I wonder if it gives us a false sense of real Kingdom movement. A worthy question would be: What about those who won’t come to our churches? In the context of relationship will they listen to spiritual music? Experiences I have had tell me that some will.
I wonder how the missional context challenges our use of language as we wander outside the walls of the church with the story of God in songs. It all deserves a good think. I’m not asking us to strive to be relevant; that’s hardly honest. I am saying that if we aren’t socially aware, our language can quickly cause the Good News to become un-understandable.
That’s a LOT of tension, and a LOT to carry. In many ways, I feel like it has me bottomed out before I can even get started writing.
Do I write a song that I KNOW will make the church just go off? That seems easy. I’m not feeling that.
Do I adopt the language of our culture so much that there is no “mystery” in the song? I’m really not into that.
Do I wait for the beautiful, excellent, supreme, missionary God who would leave the 99 to go after the one to give me the song of his heart for the skeptic? I am moved by that idea.
We know Jesus left the worship of Heaven to come seek and save the lost. It’s the burden of his heart. He used their language to convey his story. He longs to hear them worship his name. I believe there is language that can deliver on that tension, and songs that can express the overwhelming beauty of God being both wonderful in telling of the nature of God, and mysterious enough to provoke what hinders love in the cynic. At the end of the day, that song is going to simply be a prophetic song—a song that has something on it. Usually, there’s no way to tell where it came from, or how it got here. I know I don’t have that song in me—I have to go get it from God.
I am in no way talking about dumbing down God, quite the opposite, actually.
I’ve seen that happen. In fact, in the next blog post I’ll tell you the story of two of my songs—one that has gone off in the church, one that has gone off in the church AND drawn skeptics into the love of God. It’ll be a story of my last two records. My first record (Hallelujah: let the wounded hear and rejoice) has carried the greater tension I am talking about. The latest (Heaven Hear Us) is one I wrote for the church. Both are so precious to me. (P.S. Consider this advance warning: one story involves the gratuitous use of the F-word … heads up. So it is in this tension.)
God, at the end of 2011 and the beginning of 2012, is stirring my soul with Good News. I’m feeling the hope of the gospel in my own heart like I haven’t in a long while. Every day Jesus is getting bigger and bigger and better and better, all over again. I feel compelled to tell people how good he is in ways that are normal, honest, grounded, and sincere. I don’t feel obligated to talk about him. I just feel like I want to talk about him … like I have a friend in God. For the first time in a while I feel comfortable in my own skin around friends who don’t do the Christian thing. I haven’t felt that in a long while.
I am believing God, once again, for a song that’s welcomed in those friendships, and hopefully it can make it to my church, too. I’m willing to wait for it.
This was a bit of a ramble, and an update for those who are wondering where I am with recording and songwriting these days. I would love your thoughts if you care to leave them.
I would also love your prayers on this.
js
