Jeremy Armstrong

Jesus is my friend

there are so many great things about this video, I'll just let you enjoy it!

Lincoln Brewster Shreds...

Some of you may have seen the parody videos of amazing guitarists with the sound slightly altered. Well this one is of Lincoln Brewster and the creator has done a genius job of hacking away in beautiful garageband mediocrity (to put it nicely). Phil Sillas and I have been playing this at least once a day to get "inspired." Hope you enjoy it as much as we do.

Conference Pics

one more thing, 

I have uploaded a ton of pictures from the conference (taken by myself and our mighty art director, Mark Reid) to our Flickr site. If you are interested, take a look here.  And we don't mind if you download a couple, just keepin' it real =)

Defend the Weak

Hey guys,

A couple of people have asked about the words Matt Redman added to the song "Everlasting God" at the pre-conference. I happened to video it, so you can check it for yourself. It's at the end and it totally amplifies the message in Brenton's song. nice little addition.

Shaver Lake and the Lead Worshipers...

Where I lead worship, you can ask just about any of the members what their favorite part of any activity is, about 90 percent of the time the answer is music. Yay me. You gotta love that. And the classic part is that I’m about as hacky as they come on the guitar. The group I play for is made up of a mixture of college-aged-kids and young adults with disabilities. And if you want to see “Blessed Be Your Name” sung the way God intended it, come on out for a visit some Monday night.

This past week I had a couple days away from the magazine business and headed up to Shaver lake (which is in the middle of California) with my group. And there is this one guy who is a pretty good friend of mine. He calls into question the popular use of the term lead worshiper. Actually, because of the nature of my group, I’ve always kinda had a problem with that one. It just seems so arrogant. To stand in front of a group and say that I am the lead worshiper. I just have such a hard time swallowing that. Especially when I look around and see so many more people who are leading me—kids in wheel chairs, kids with Down Syndrome, able-bodied young people with arms around the core members. Any of these people might be the lead worshipers. Maybe the ones sitting in silence the most.

Of course, I believe that there is a truth to the fact that, as the leader, what you focus on, is what the congregation will focus on. If you are standing like a nimrod, pointing to your ear because your in-ear isn’t working, or if you completely stop playing and because your D string broke on your Tayolor guitar, well you know what everyone else will be focused on. In the same way, if you are focused on God… well you get it.

But, still I cant say I’m the lead worshiper.

I see it as a kind of worshiping with one eye open. You HAVE to be aware of your surroundings when you are leading people. Because you are not the only one who draws attention to and from God in a service of worship. One of your roles is to help keep those distractions to a minimum, you do this in rehearsals, practice, sound checks, so much so that you are able to freely worship in a service—you are the worship leader. So because of that, we can’t just space out. Our role as the leader is to also keep in touch with the lead worshipers. See where they are headed, be in touch with them. Let them help us discern the spirit of the moment.

Any way, I asked my friend who uses a wheelchair to get up and lead with me for one of the songs during a service at camp because he doesn’t get “on stage” that often (no ramp). The rest of the week all he could ask anyone was, “Remember when I was leading?” In my mind my response was, “Of course I remember. How could I forget: you lead me every week.”

 

How Great...

Every now and then you get those moments. The ones you weren’t expecting. In fact I find that those moments come most often when you expect the opposite. You walk into church frustrated that everyone exists and is anywhere near you and you look for a seat on the edge so you can duck out after you have spent enough time with these other human beings who are nothing like you. Your face shows what your guts are feeling: there is no way I’m going to have a connection with the Almighty this morning; God probably isn’t even up at this ungodly hour. That’s why they call it ungodly. Then with out any type of warning and quietly, like a fish in a stream, you catch a glimpse. You feel a heartbeat.

Well tonight wasn’t that extreme as far as attitudes go, but… you know… it was close. I mean I’m totally loving this conference, but you know… I’m also working. Its not bad, its not painful, its just part of my job (I know cry me a river Mr. Magazine editor, working at a worship conference). Anyway. I went out to take pictures of the Gateway worship team, and within seconds was caught up in the flow of worship that was just emanating from the body of people. And let me say this now, worship leaders know how to worship in music. It is a beautiful experience even to sit to the side and watch so many people responding in song with such force and abandon.

Then after the amazing experience with Gateway, Don Moen, who is such a leader for all of us in this industry, returns to the stage (he hosted the night) to apologize for a comment he made about Chris Tomlin previously (something about singing in the key of “C”). Of course Tomlin was in the congregation to hear the quip (he taught a songwriting class today). But they settled their differences in front of everyone =) and the night transitioned to Lincoln Brewster’s set with Don, Chris and Lincoln leading “How Great Is Our God.”

No blogging video tonight, no MP3s, just a little note saying that sometimes God’s biggest miracle is when he decides to snap us out of a poor mood and remind us who truly is powerful.

-jeremy

Pre-Conference

So I guess I overestimated my technological prowess. I say this because I've spent the last hour and a half trying to load a simple video on Youtube (something I actually have successful experience in) and have failed miserably. Oh well, it's nice to get constant reminder of your limitations on an hourly basis. =)

So in the meantime, I'm trying this. It is an audio file of one of the panel questions for worship leaders. The conversation is between Matt Redman and Pastor Scotty Smith about the "service of worship" and "worship service."

Other Bloggers Welcome

Hey Everyone,

If you are planning on coming to the National Worship Leader Conference and blogging your experience, e-mail me, and ill add you to our page. (don't worry about that image, Strongbad will not be there).

Getting Going

So here is the first post on the "officious" Worship Leader blog. I'm sure that it will go through some transformations, but if you are seeing this, you will always be able to say, "I saw the first rough attempt." A mighty claim, to be sure.

Of course, we kind of like the rough nature of the blogging beast, so it might not change all that much. Because one of the main functions of Slake will be to talk together, like normal people (normal people who also happen to have a shared interest in quick little snapshots into the devotional arts and find some value in keeping the conversation going).

Anyway, I'll be blogging in the upcoming week while I'm in Austin at the National Worship Leader Conference (July 21-24). And as i have a low tolerance for anything dull, you can rest assured that the posts will be multi-media (not mulit-media, which is one of my favorite spelling errors that made it into the magazine, and I can only assume is any form of media that is business up front and party in the back).

oh, and this is me.

rest assured again (if you weren't already completely lounging in your assurance), I don't usually look this cool. I got my hair cut today and this was the last of about 37 pictures I just took with my iPhone.

Alright, check back soon, as this is only the beginning.

-Jeremy
(Managing Editor of Worship Leader magazine)