New Yard

Over the last couple of weeks Amber and I did a major overhaul on our yard. Here are the before and afters.

BolderBoulder Pics

Wow, I am tired from the eventful day. Amber and I went to Bolder, CO. with some friends for our first "official" run. It was a 10k - 6.2 miles.
Amber's Time: 51:31
My Time: 53:44

Here are some pics:

Sunday Afterthoughts 5-24-09

Here are my thoughts from the day.

-- I'm tired. Its been awhile since I have felt exhausted on sunday, not sure if its cause I've been sick all week. But man I'm tired today.

-- Worship was powerful. God's name was declared! My team was ON today. Element you guys have a great worship team, PUT ME ASIDE, this team passionately loves Jesus, loves worship and loves to see His church worship. I am so blessed with great musicians that love Jesus so much.

-- Jeff tackled the topic of prayer today! Something we all struggle with. Not "HOW TO PRAY" but "DOES GOD HEAR ME WHEN I PRAY?" We reminisced over lunch about the sermon and what was big for us. It was cool to hear everyone. Great job Jeff.

-- Amber and I are headed out of town to run the boulderbolder 10k. Should be a good time. Our first competitive run.

Set List-
Sing Sing Sing - Chris Tomlin
Let Your Kingdom Come - Adam Cruz
Your Name - New Life Worship
I've Had Questions - Tim Hughes


Adam

sunday afterthoughts

Today we started testimonies in our worship team small group time. I asked each person to share their story of coming to know Jesus. I shared mine and Amanda shared her's. Thanks for being brave Amanda. I am looking forward to hearing everyone's story. There is so much power in our story's. I love the POWER OF GOD in both sides, the one who experienced the party rebel life, and the one who stayed strong. There isn't a boring story when you are talking about Jesus rescuing us from hell. I love you guys. Thanks for your sacrifice in developing a healthy worship team.

It has been a worship filled weekend. Friday morning, I took a few team members with me to Sheridan, WY to lead worship for a big 30 HR Famine city wide worship night. It was a really powerful time. We did an hour and a half worship set and God's name was praised in that WYO theater. We were all beet afterwards. Got home yesturday and got up this morning to continue.

I have been looking forward to today for a while. We schedule out our set lists 6 weeks in advance. I knew that song wise this was going to be a powerful sunday. Partnered with Jeff's message on God's love, it was an intense day. The altar response 3rd service was just awesome. Each service was great but 3rd, there was a presence that took us to a whole new level. Jeff told me of several stories of people who found life today. I never get sick of hearing that.

We all need to be experiencing the love of the father. Love Jeff's line "if we are not experiencing the love of God who's fault is that our's or God's?" We choose to accept the love of God. He has already offered it.

I am so tired after this full weekend. But its so worth it. Wouldn't want to be doing anything else.

Set List Sunday May 10th:
All Who Are Thirsty (just the chorus) - Brenton Brown
Open Up The Gates - PlanetShakers
The One Who Loves Me - Adam Cruz
Indescribable - Chris Tomlin
How He Loves - Kim Walker


resting,
adam

4 Things that Create a Healthy Worship Team (4)

This will be my final post on Healthy Worship Teams. Again these are just some thoughts that I have had the last few weeks about what creates a healthy worship team. You must adapt and adjust aspects of these to fit your team and model, however I think the big ideas are essential. You can read my previous 3 posts here, here, and here.

#4 - Create a Community
The trap that a lot of us can get stuck in, is to focus only on the sunday morning worship time slot and the rehearsal to get you there. This may sound a little like the last post but its different for its focus on the group as a whole. I am not saying that Sunday morning isn't important, because its the reason we have a team. Its what all the hours and hours of planning and practicing go into. However from a team perspective, there is way more. And its the behind the scenes action that creates the best platform experiences.

One of the big things for me this year was to create a "COMMUNITY OF DISCIPLESHIP". I didn't want Thursday nights and Sunday mornings to be all there was to our worship ministry or our relationships. Inside of that "COMMUNITY", I wanted to see individual growth as "WORSHIP LEADERS", stretching us in our talents, and to encourage/challenge us to a "LIFE OF WORSHIP".

Community won't happen on performance day. It happens off stage.

About 2 months ago, I felt that we needed to start a lifegroup on sunday mornings with the worship team. Now that we are doing 3 services there was some room to do that. We meet during the sermon of 1st service and talk about life. Its a chance to cast vision for where I feel God taking us, its a chance to hear each others stories as a group, to get to know each others personalities, to encourage one another. This has been a great UNIFYING experience for our team. We are just getting started and I have a lot of ideas. I have found that there needs to be time where you as a leader cast vision, teach on worship, etc. Not just lead music. We as leaders have to 1st model a life of worship privately and then teach and invite people to join the journey.

Another community thing I have seen effective is to cancel thursday nights and go have fun. Again BBQ or watch a DVD of other worship teams, change things up. I know rehearsal nights are vital and key, but you have to be willing to provide opportunities for community which will enhance your sunday mornings. Do your best to make rehearsals enjoyable and fun. If its stressfull and full of attitudes and negativity all night, your team will eventually get burned out. Bring in food, or jam on some good Jazz chords in pre-rehearsal, be creative, but have fun. Your team will feed off of you as the leader. I have seen this first hand, for the better and worse.

Again if your team is unified and together, you worship experiences will be that much better.

learning,
adam