Look at Joseph, he had HUGE dreams and an even BIGGER destiny! He was thrown in a pit and sold into slavery and in jail for years before he could be released into his destiny and become second in command over all of Egypt! But he needed to go through some things to learn some things about life and God. Moses had to wander around a desert in his own life, and then all of Israel had to die through a generation for them to learn and go into their promised land. David was a shepherd and worked his butt off fighting off beasts and tending to the flock for his entire childhood, and I believe much of his teens, before he was even selected and trained by Samuel before we was made king. Jonah was eaten by a freaking whale!
There is a recurring theme in many of the stories of the great leaders of the Bible, you need to die to yourself to live for God. Now here's a personal story that just happened to illustrate this...
As I have noted in previous blogs, I have been going to TACF Central, a young adult church in the heart of Downtown Toronto since like late April, early May. A couple months ago, Brett, one of the worship leaders, and an intern at the church, asked me if I would like to play guitar with the band sometime. I was flattered to be asked. I said I'd think it over and stuff and get back to him. I did, and I did. So Brett says, "Cool man, we'll get together sometime and jam so I can get a feel for you and we'll work it out."
Well, Brett's a busy guy, and I didn't hear from him for quite a while. Eventually, like a week or two ago, he says, "we'll do it this week, I'll call you to confirm." I didn't hear from him. He sends me a message apologizing, he's been really busy (he's a full-time intern at the church). So I figure, heck, I guess it's not meant to be, oh well. So, I'm at my friend Mark and Beths' house for a get together the night before, and mark goes, "Hey man you know we're playing together tomorrow on acoustic guitar!" I was like, "Uhm, no, no one told me." It turns out I was accidentally skipped on the list to receive the worship schedule email! So, I'm like, well, okay, I'll be there.
So, I'm rushing home from Hillstreams, my morning church, on Sunday (which is far away in Markham, so far that I have to get a ride to get to the subway) because the service went a little late and everyone's sticking around and I'm waiting for someone to give me a ride. It sucks not having a car in Toronto.
I'm running about an hour late, I have to be home before 2:30 so that I can pack up my guitar and maybe grab a little lunch and have time to make rehearsal. And there is no way this is going to happen without divine intervention! So I call my dad at home and ask if he would drive me halfway to Central, luckily he said yes and the traffic was good! Praise Jesus! I get there 5 minutes late, which is no deal because most of the band was stuck in traffic. Did I mention that I was freaking out all day because I had left my wallet at Mark's house and was desperately hoping he would find it and bring it that night? He did, Thank God! So yes, we're all setting up the equipment and stuff, running super late. We didn't start sound check till like 5, sound check is normally done by 4:30 I am told. So first of all, the battery in my tuner pedal is dead, so I borrow a spare battery. I plug into my tuner, but the tuner isn't displaying anything! So I bang it around and press a couple buttons and try everything, all this time thinking that the battery in my guitar is still good because I just changed it like three weeks ago! Then I realize it's probably my guitar's battery, so I borrow more batteries! (A typical musician, I am) Then I tune and all. Now, I only knew half the songs that I was given. But I managed to pick up the other two just fine.
So, we're doing sound check and monitors, and my guitar is totally distorting! The sound guy is like "I think it's your guitar cables." I'm like "Nuh, uh! These are good quality cables, I highly doubt it's them." So maybe it's my tuner, we try bypassing the tuner, same thing, still distorting. Maybe it's the guitar they try and say, but heck no, this is a high quality guitar I say! I play it live all the time! (I didn't actually say "Nuh uh!" by the way)
So we figure out it's the XLR (microphone) cable from the direct box which I spent like five minutes just untangling! So I go and get a new XLR. Now we're fine. We're rehearsing, everyone's happy.
In a very short amount of time the number of people in the church exploded and all the sudden it was full. It made me a little nervous, I'd never played to that many people before really. It was six o'clock. GO time! So, the drummer counts us in. The first song was Happy Day by Tim Hughes, an AWESOME song if you haven't heard it. Now, I could more or less hear myself in rehearsal without about two hundred singing, screaming twentysomething worshippers, but I couldn't hear AT ALL with them. About thirty seconds into this first of the songs, I broke my D string. Yes, that's right, I broke the D string. I also didn't have any replacements. I was like, "aaaaah!"
So, I briefly thought about putting my guitar down and going to stand in the back and sulk, but then I thought, "no, as long as I'm wanted on this stage, I will stay. If the worship leaders decide they don't want a D string-less guitar, then they will tell me to put it down and go worship, but they're not, so I will play, 5 strings or nought! The worship leader, Andrew, whom I think is super awesome, keeps signalling me to play bigger and I'm like whispering, "I can't, I broke a string!" I'd lost 1/7th of my resonance!
So, I say to myself, "I can either be a bum, or I can worship God and enjoy and learn from this experience and be a part of this team of amazing musicians and lead these people into worship!"
So I did, and I had lots of fun. I went and sat at the back during the message and sulked a little as I listened, asking God, "Why? Why did I have to break that string God? WHY?" And he said, "Matt I was testing you, and you passed! Why are you so unhappy?" And of course he knew why, because dying to yourself hurts, but in the end, it's worth it. I went to Brett afterwards and asked him how I did and he said that he was impressed and that I did really well especially with a broken string! When I asked if there was anything he thought I needed work on, he just said that it's hard to get use to the (P.A.) system and that I was standing in a bad spot for that and that I did really well because people are giving me signals I don't know yet and different people are queuing me differently within the band. I was just thinking, "Yay! He says I'm good!" He's a better guitar player than I am, so I was a little flattered. Then I talked to Andrew, who is also in charge of the worship as an overseer for the entire youth network of TACF (which is the size of three small to medium churches). He is an AMAZING singer, musician, and well trained and experienced worship leader. And he had only the best to say about me!!! He said that I took direction well and worked well with the members of the band and that he really enjoyed it and was happy to have me and that I play my instrument very well. I'll be honest, I was almost in tears. I asked him if he thought there was anything he'd like to see improvement in or anything and he said, "No, not this time, there may be in future times, but I thought you did great." Then he reached around my shoulder in a side-hugish motion and said, "Are you sure you want to go to Australia?" I laughed and told him yes. He smiled and said, "Well, just know that there's always an open door for you here." I was MELTED inside a litte. I looked him straight in the eyes and said, "Thank you, really, that means a lot."
I'll never forget it, it was the worst and best time of playing of worship I've had so far. The passion in this congregation when they go for it, it's amazing, and seeing it from the front and getting to be a part of the facilitation of it was a great honour and privilege.
I love Central.
God had to really break me and teach me to let go of performance and perfection in worship so that I was free to just do it and lead people. I had to put myself in his hands and not be deterred by circumstance and just push through. He had to teach me what it's really about, and I think that's what the worship leadership at Central saw.
Afterwards at dinner at Pogue Mahones (which is Irish for "Kiss My Butt"), the local pub near Central, I met and talked to one of Central's amazing cell leaders and shared this all with her and she shared with me her vision and calling and how she's been going through death to her will also. It was a great meet! We were both blessed by each other's testimonies and likenesses. Good times!
Only when we die to ourselves, can we really, fully, live for God.
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