It’s time again – time to rediscover the worship that has God at its center.

If He’s not at the heart of our gathering together, then what is our liturgy all about? The last thing we all need is just another meeting – God included. Just as He was longing for something beyond sacrifice and burnt offerings in times past, God’s desire today is for worship that is centered more on relationship than liturgy.

As we draw near to God, He draws near to us (see James. 4:8). Reclaiming the trust that was lost in Eden is at the heart of this encounter. Therefore, when Christ came into the world, He said: “Sacrifices and offerings, burnt offerings and sin offerings you did not desire, nor were you pleased with them” (although the law required them to be made).

Then he said, “Here I am, I have come to do your will” (Heb. 10:5, 8-9). The worship God seeks relies completely on His initiative, knowing that the only true expression of worship is through the abandonment of all our agendas for His, as we trust in His sovereign power and unlimited grace. It is from this heart posture that true liturgy flows, that music and the arts find their highest calling and that the light of a worshiping community shines as a beacon of hope to a suffering and searching world.

Reflection Questions (from Don Williams):

What are the common pitfalls, contemporary threats and church pressures we face in contemporary worship?

What triggers true worship and where is its center?

Why is theology central to understanding worship?

How do we step into the “reality of who God is” in worship?

What would innocence and simplicity in worship look like?

We hope that you enjoy! Discover Vineyard Worship!

 As a leader on the national stage for worship, what do you feel God is doing in worship right now in the nation? Do you feel any trends or movements that you see happening across the board?

I sense that the next generation has some authentic and “indigenous” sound that we’re not sure what it is yet, or what form it will take. The music they are listening to is very different, so will it change the landscape of mainstream worship as we know it? I’m not sure, but I’m excited to see where it’s going.

Here’s where I want to see worship in our nation go—I want to see it increasingly be about presence (and in some cases return to presence, or even start there for the very first time). I want to see the manifest presence of God, the desire and pursuit of his presence, be the thing. The central desire should be to bring an authentic offering of the heart.

Also, I feel that worship needs to be more about a group of people relating to God together, than about style or anything else. I’m in a church where there are lots of styles represented, but the goal is the same—the desire for God to come and to draw near and to draw on the hunger of his people. Praise ushers him in, it brings heaven to earth, and I’m excited about groups of people who allow space and time for that.  I worry about the restrictions we put around worship. Take time restrictions for example. No relationship functions like that. There are ebbs and flows. So I’m excited about seeing the program become secondary to the presence.

What are you really passionate about right now when it comes to worship and what you communicate to people about worship?

I am so passionate about leading people into their destinies as worshippers.  It’s like the old Catechism, “Man’s chief end is to glorify God, and to enjoy him forever.” When we worship, do we feel and experience the presence of God? Do we feel his delight and his pleasure as we receive the revelation of who he is that comes when his presence enters the room? That’s a part of our destiny. I want to see that aspect grown in our churches. I worry that people don’t understand what worship is for, or how to engage in it. With all my heart I long to see a group of people that are learning to respond to God in faith—and by faith I mean action. When people learn how to respond extravagantly no matter what their circumstances are, it moves the heart of God! If there is something I’m hungry to see is people who understand what it means to respond in faith—“this is who You are, and this his how I’m going to respond to You.”

I want to see America in particular revitalized in worship. I think it is [the worship experience] bigger than it’s ever been, but I think there’s something missing still.  Experience creates an appetite. So many people don’t have an appetite simply because they have never had an experience. I can remember times where I’ve been totally undone by the presence of God and I wonder, what if I had never experienced that? Especially for youth! They need to experience the presence of God. I once made a whole curriculum for teens just about experiencing God, because I wanted them to each encounter God in a real way. They need to experience God or the world will really throw them off course. The root isn’t going to be how much you’ve learned about usually, but have you experienced Jesus? And worship is such a powerful way to do that.

To read the whole article visit the Red Point Magazine website.

At A Cause To LIve For we grabbed James Rankin who, with his wife Jen, planted the Cardiff Vineyard Uk in 2008. James gives us some useful insight into worship from a Church Planters point of view, which you may find useful if you are planning to plant, or if you have the challenging role of leading worship in a church plant.

Look out for more resources , which are on the way, to help you build your team and develop as a leader.

We hope that you enjoy! Discover Vineyard Worship!

• Program your floorboard presets so that “Long Ambient Swells” is right next to “Triple Rectifier Power Chords.” Make sure you’re wearing your biggest boots.

• Jump with excitement on a wobbly stage, just to find the center of gravity in your amp stack.

• Wrong Notes, Pt. 1: Whenever you make a mistake, follow it with accusing glances at your equipment, or other band members.

• Wrong Notes, Pt. 2: Whenever you make a mistake, do it again, like it was exactly what you meant to play in the first place. When you get the strange looks from your band mates, insist that it’s jazz and that they simply “don’t understand.”

• Wrong Notes, Pt. 3: Wait until your delay effect is set to maximum before you make your worst mistake of any given set, thereby prolonging the experience.

• Alternate tunings add a great dimension to some songs, especially when the intro of the following song is down to you, and you don’t know how to play it in that tuning.

• Forget that your lead is securely wrapped onto your strap, and around the amp handle on the other end. Go and speak to the keyboard player on the other side of the stage, with hilarious consequences (the dramatic effect is enhanced if you have an amp with reverb springs).

• There’s another guitarist listening! Perfect opportunity to use that new trick you just learned – you know, the one with sweep-picking and whammy bar madness. Everyone will appreciate that.

• Configure your wireless unit so that it broadcasts on the same frequency as the Pastor’s microphone.

• Make sure your lead slips underneath the bass drum so that it gets cut in half (yep, that really happened!)

• Where available, plug your guitar into the “headphones” socket.

• You want maximum impact on the first chorus… sit out through the first verse and then hit that massive power chord! (with your capo in the wrong position).

Jesse is a professional musician and a worship leader at the Kingdom Vineyard in East Fife, Scotland, having recently left London where he grew up. He has played guitar on several Vineyard Records UK productions, such as New Songs Vol.1, New Songs Vol. 2 and Great Big God 3. 

Graham is a friend of the Vineyard’s. He was appointed Archbishops’ Missioner and Leader of the Fresh Expressions team on 1st May 2009.  He is married to Jackie and they have two daughters, Catherine and Sarah. His special concerns are the engagement of the Gospel with contemporary culture, youth ministry and the theology of renewal.  He has been chairman of the Greenbelt Festival and is currently chairman of the Soul Survivor Trust.  He also chaired the working party which wrote the Mission-shaped Church report on church planting and fresh expressions of church.

Five Qualifications for a Worship Leader.

If I’m looking for a worship leader and asking, “Shall we take this person on?” or “Should this person start leading worship?” there are five qualifications that I look for in the person.

Number one, I look for heart attitude. That is followed secondly, and pretty closely, by heart attitude. Then, after that, we just check that their heart’s okay. Number four, I ask, “How are they doing heart-wise?” Number five, and last of the five I suppose, would be the question, “Is their heart right before God and other people?” Then, only after that, I check for musical ability and all that comes with that. Musical ability is quite important, but it’s not as important as those first five.

Honestly, having done this for a while and being involved in worship pastorally, I’ve been burned – frankly – by picking people based on their gifting. Someone with a lot of gifting, and lacking a good heart and a right heart – for God, for worship, for people – is a dangerous person. He’s not a neutral person; that person’s a dangerous person. Gifting without heart is a recipe for trouble, particularly for those leading worship.

First of all, the person I look for has got to be a worshiper. If they don’t know how to worship on their own, then they can’t lead people. We’ve made a distinction that you have two kinds of worship leaders: there’s the worship leader musician and the worship leader pastor. I think there is a place for the worship leader musician, but generally I think the worship leader pastor is a much better model.

I hesitate slightly saying that because I don’t want to rule out the other level completely, but the person’s got to have a heart for God, a heart for the people and a heart for music – and I think it has to be in that order – it’s important to have all three.

It’s well worth finding some time to listen to this passionate and thought provoking talk on worship from Mark Ch14 by Simon Ponsonby, recorded at the 2010 Vineyard National Worship Leaders Retreat for the UK & Ireland,

Simon Ponsonby is a friend of the Vineyard. He left the meat industry to become an evangelist, then trained for ordination at Trinity College, Bristol. He holds a BA & MLitt in Theology and served a curacy in Bradford, before becoming Oxford Pastorate Chaplain in 1998. Simon took up the position of Pastor of Theology at St Aldates in 2005, a role that combines teaching, travelling and writing. He is the author of ‘More’. He is married to Tiffany and has two boys, Joel and Nat.

Main image  used by kind permission, © Emily Mineo, www.emilymineo.com

What are some things you’d like to encourage young worship leaders to do?

1) Love people. Know that your worship leading gift is like any other gift—annoying without love. The depth of your worship culture is inextricably attached to your love for the people you are leading. People who are not responding the way you’d like are not an obstacle to your success. People who are going for it in worship are not proof of your success.

It’s an amazing thing when you wake up thinking of how you can love your community more deeply. You feel their specific hurts and their specific joys. It’s not an abstract thing. You know them. You know their stories. And you know what God is doing in them. In the end, you start to see that everybody who draws near to God becomes more whole. That’s all that you want—to see the people you love becoming whole.

This is the source of our calling. We have personally become enamored with the Lord and can’t stand the thought that anyone would attach their hearts to anything else. We lead worship because we can’t help it.

2) Find mentors. The best mentors are mature worship leaders who are finishing well (their church and worship culture looks like what you hope yours will some day). Ask them to mentor you. Ask a million questions. Learn what the mind of a mature worship leader looks like. I’d be a hot mess if it weren’t for people guiding me. We all need people who are beyond us. Someday we turn around and do the same for those who follow us.

3) Be a lifelong learner. Never stop. Structure time for growth at your instrument. There’s nothing that the world needs less than a lazy work ethic masked in spirituality. We need you to steward the gift that you were given. We need you to be excellent at what you are doing. We need you to inspire us. Since there are no shortcuts, we need you to work. Hard.

4) Worship when nobody is around. Your private worship life is what you are bringing us into when you stand in front of us. The more ways that you meet with God, the more you’ll know when He is present during our worship times together. You’ll stay in moments when God is moving in our hearts and you’ll simply move on when it’s time to move on.  You’ll be leading worship. Your authenticity is the best thing that you bring to us.

5) Some of you need to write songs for us to sing. I want to sing your songs in my church. But I want to sing about God as He really is. So, read the scriptures. Study theology. Read what people have written about the scriptures. God will become so much bigger than He’s ever been. Your songs will be filled with awe.

Study songwriting. Study songwriters. Study music itself. The God of the universe deserves the best music.

To read the whole article visit the Red Point Magazine website.

For booking and full details contact: Steve Parsons 01284 765874 or steve@wsvc.org.uk

Location: Belsey Bridge Conference Centre, Ditchingham, Bungay, Suffolk, NR35 2DZ

Cost: £105 per person (full board)

(Winston S Churchill, Radio Broadcast, 9th February 1941)

When Winston Churchill made this offer, Great Britain was in the middle of a great war, deep in a dark crisis. Hitler remained undefeated. Europe was either already occupied by Nazi Germany, or very much under threat. And the prime minister knew his nation needed help from abroad. He sought foreign “tools” – airplanes, ammunition and ultimately armies – to “finish the job” of allied victory. The bible makes it very clear that we live in times of warfare. We live in-between this “present evil age” (as the apostle Paul terms it) and the one to come. Even more than that, Christians believe this future age isn’t just at odds with the present times (we will one day be at peace, though we certainly aren’t now!) but at war with them. We don’t just live in the tension between the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan. We live in the conflict. The devil has been defeated by Jesus, but not yet destroyed. And his evil work is quite apparent, isn’t it? As U2 asks us, “Have you seen the news today? / I can’t close my eyes and make it go away!”

But just as Churchill says, “Give us the tools”, in his letter to the church in Corinth, Paul encourages Christians to “eagerly desire spiritual gifts,” our spiritual tools for ministry. In his first letter to the Corinthians, Paul explains that in these “end times” before “perfection comes” (chapter 13), before Christ “has put all his enemies under his feet” (chapter 15), God gives gifts to the community of Christians. Why? So that we can build each other up in the faith (edification) and reach out to the world (evangelism), doing the kingdom ministry of Jesus. Not only are these gifts from the Spirit. According to the scriptures, the Spirit himself is a gift! At the last supper, Jesus tells his nervous disciples, though he’ll soon be leaving the world, he “will not leave (them) as orphans.” In his place, the Father will give another “Counsellor” who will replace Jesus’ physical presence with them. During the battle

Jesus left us to fight, he didn’t leave us stranded. He gave us his Holy Spirit to help finish the job.

God’s Empowering Presence

But to start with, what is the Holy Spirit? Who is this third person of the triune God? How can we describe him? The bible presents the Holy Spirit as “God’s Empowering Presence.” Consider three things.

Firstly, the Holy Spirit is a person! Sometimes that’s hard to see. We understand the frustration of the student who said: “God the Father makes perfectly good sense to me; and God the Son I can quite understand; but the Holy Spirit is a grey oblong blur!” Gordon Fee talks about a Sunday school teacher who tried to describe what the Spirit was like. She was blowing on a piece of paper and letting it fly away. “The Spirit is like that,” she said to the children, “like the wind. Very real in its effects but invisible to us.” At which point a six-year old boy blurted out, “But I want the wind to be un-invisible!” What a profound theological moment. How often do we feel this way about God as Spirit? I also want the Holy Spirit to be un-invisible! And because he isn’t, we tend to think of him in impersonal terms. Listen to our images. Dove. Wind. Fire. Water. Oil. No wonder we find it hard to personalize him! It’s different with God and Jesus. The images the Old Testament uses to describe God – as father, as king, as shepherd – let us catch a glimpse of his true personality. And since this personality was “made flesh” in Jesus, when we talk about God’s character, we’re not stabbing in the dark! “We have seen his glory!” John reminds us. Well, it’s the same with the Spirit. When He is called “the Spirit of Christ,” we see he is fully personal. For in the New Testament he can be grieved, quenched, and followed. When Paul blesses the Corinthians he says, “May the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with you”, (II Corinthians 13:14).

So the Holy Spirit is a person. But, secondly, he is also none other than the personal presence of God himself with his people. When in anger God tells Moses, “My presence will not go with you,” Moses cries out to God, “What else will distinguish me and your people from all other people on the face of the earth?” The Israelites are “A People of the Presence.” Without God’s spirit, they are nothing. His presence rests on their anointed leaders. His presence inspires prophetic utterance, sustaining dialogue with the living God and directing their future. His presence fills the tabernacle in the wilderness and later Solomon’s Temple in Jerusalem. When Jerusalem falls to the Babylonians, Ezekiel sees God’s manifest glory depart from the Temple. This is the ultimate tragedy. Until Jesus comes five hundred years later, the Israelites are no longer a people distinguished by the presence of the living God.

Thirdly, the Holy Spirit also means the empowering presence of God. In the Old Testament, the Spirit is not only the power behind creation, he also endows mere humans with extraordinary powers. In the Book of Judges, we’re told, “the Spirit of the Lord came upon Samson with power.” He is given a physical strength that surpasses all others. Even after his seduction by Delilah, after losing his strength and being delivered into the hands of enemy, he prays “O Sovereign Lord, remember me, O God, please strengthen me just once more.” And the Holy Spirit does! He empowers him to crumble the pillars of the Philistine temple with his own bare hands. So the Israelites were not left on their own as far as their relationship with God is concerned. They weren’t left to “slug it out in the trenches.” God’s presence miraculously empowered them until they rejected him for the idols and alliances of this evil age.

The Gift of the Spirit

In the Old Testament, God’s empowering presence is particular. The Spirit’s activity is limited to particular people at particular times. But we also find promises in the Old Testament that God will do something new. He promises, of course, a messiah who will “save the people from their sins.” But he also promises that, in the end times, he will dwell with his people by his Spirit. Listen to the prophet Joel:

In the last days, God says, I will pour out my Spirit on all people. Yours sons and your daughters will prophesy, Your young men will see visions, Your old men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophesy.

In the past, hearing God was the particular privilege of a few great men and women. And his presence can only be experienced at a particular place, the temple. But here Joel prophesies that God’s empowering presence will no longer be reserved for a few people. It will be for everyone. God will pour out his Spirit regardless of sex (“both men and women”) and regardless of age (“old men…young men.”)

Yet all these promises remain unfulfilled for 300 years. But then Jesus arrives on the scene. And he makes the astounding declaration that, in him, God’s empowering presence had come back to his people. Even further, he says that he will leave his empowering presence on earth. As Jesus ministers in the power of the Spirit, so he promises his disciples will do the same. And then, after Jesus has ascended into heaven, while the disciples are hiding and waiting and praying,

Suddenly a sound like the blowing of a violent wind came from heaven and filled the whole house where they were sitting. They saw what seemed to be tongues of fire that separated and came to rest on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit.

Next, the apostle Peter preaches in Jerusalem, boldly quoting Joel’s prophecy. He announces that God has kept his promise. He has now given his empowering presence to all people. And since that great outpouring, we now live in the age of the Spirit. God’s empowering presence is no longer just for some people. It is for you and me. As Gordon Fee says, Christians are “Spirit-People.”

For New Life

The Spirit, then, has been poured out “on all people.” But what for? Firstly, it’s for new life. For many people, Christian behaviour is a rather straightforward affair. They read the ‘Sermon on the Mount’ as a new form of law. They read Paul’s various commandments as fresh statutes. Then they try their best to abide by them. “Make sure you don’t forget to love your enemies,” we remind ourselves, “in your anger do not sin.” But this simply turns Christians ethics into codes of conduct, into a set of rules which requires only outward obedience. And that ignores the fulfilment of another great Old Testament promise:

I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh, I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

In other words, the new law is internal rather than external. If you go on a long hike, you start off carrying your provisions on your back. They weigh you down and slow you up. But when you have eaten them, not only has the weight gone but you also have a new energy inside of you! In the new covenant, the law is no longer a weight on the outside. It is a source of energy from inside. But how was this going to happen? How would God energize us from inside? Well, Jesus tells us in John 3 that when we accept him by faith alone, we are given a new heart. And he describes this as being “born of the Spirit.” That’s why Paul tells us that this new way of behaving, this freedom from the power of sin, begins with a renewed mind. Because as we become Christians, the Spirit changes our minds. He replaces old intentions with new ones. He gives us new desires. And therefore, the marks of this new life – love and peace and joy – are not things we can achieve by our own effort. They are the fruit of the Spirit. They are evidence that God has empowered us “to follow my decrees.” That he has written his law on our hearts.

For Service

Secondly, the Holy Spirit empowers us to act as God’s servants in this world. When Jesus began his public ministry in Nazareth, he opened the scroll of Isaiah in the synagogue and read aloud:

The Spirit of the Lord is on me, because he has anointed me to preach good news to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners and recovery of sight for the blind.

Jesus claimed that his empowered ministry had been prophesied by Isaiah. This is his agenda: in the power of the Spirit, to evangelise the poor, deliver the captives, heal the sick. Here is his kingdom overcoming the kingdom of Satan. And this is the ministry he hands on to his disciples. Therefore, we can say that “the Spirit of the Lord is on (us) / Because he has anointed (us) / To preach good news to the poor.” I don’t know about you, but I sometimes feel a sense of utter helplessness when confronted with the world’s problems. We know we have little to offer those whose lives are in a mess. But with the Spirit of God, we do indeed have something to give. It is he who empowers us to bind up broken hearts, cast out demons and heal the sick. It is his presence that goes with us into the office, into our universities, into our homes, into this world.

For Each Other

Finally, the Holy Spirit is poured out to edify the church. In 1 Corinthians the Apostle Paul encourages Christians, “Since you are eager for spiritual gifts, try to excel in gifts that build up the church.” The list of these gifts is not exhaustive, but they generally fall into three categories. Firstly, gifts of the word: inspired utterances, including messages of wisdom, prophecy, the discernment of spirits. They also include gifts of teaching and evangelism. Secondly, gifts of divine intervention such as the gift of faith, working miracles, and gifts of healing. Thirdly, gifts of service, including giving and serving for “acts of guidance” and “helpful deeds.”

Such gifts are our tools which the Spirit gives so that we, in Churchill’s phrase, can “finish the job.” They are not given statically so that we possess them like an identity badge. Rather they are given dynamically, in the situation, when the community gathers in worship, so that we can be released to evangelise. Last year a group of Christians in Belfast, convinced that God heals today, set up a chair in the nearest high-street and offered to lay hands on whoever sat in it! As they did, the Spirit released the gifts of healing. Many were cured on the spot.

A.W. Tozer says that for the New Testament, it is not “the Spirit and power,” but “the Spirit as power.” Pray for the Spirit to fill you. Gather in worship and receive his gifts to be built up. And then go for it. Seek Jesus’ kingdom ministry: evangelize the poor, deliver the demonised, heal the sick, overturn Satan’s dark rule. Jesus’ agenda for ministry has not changed. And nor has his power.