It's been awhile, folks, since I posted anything. As I have said before, this is my music blog and will remain a music blog. I know that there are others on the internet (and in the world, that other sphere where people live) who love worship music as I do and love to talk about it. So it is my choice to have a blog simply about worship music.
Worship music for me has evolved into something that still involves playing a guitar and singing songs in small groups or driving 18 hours to Kansas City to listen to the most amazing group of worshipers on the planet, the International House of Prayer, founder Mike Bickle. The Song of the Lord is a living and active thing, just like His word is, and if you allow it to move in you, you'll go places with Jesus.
I've always loved music, being an avid Beatles fan (Yes, dear husband in heaven, I loved the Beatles way before I met you), and was a disc jockey for 5 years. I met my husband while I was working at our college radio station. He was the guy who called and asked for me to play "Cold, Cold, Cold," by Little Feat.
My stint in radio only  caused me to drift away from the God I loved, however, because the cosmos  is ruled by the prince of the air. The prince of the air does not glorify God.
When I returned to my first love, I began to search for songs to express what God was saying to me. Songs have always been a way for God to reach deep inside me and fix what was wrong.
When I first drifted away from the Lord, He used a Billy Joel song to "fix" what was wrong inside of me. I was all alone at work in the studio doing my night shift. I had arrived at a point of despair, and desperation in my walk with Jesus. He'd never left me. But I had left Him...somewhere back there where I decided I needed to "forge my own destiny". What a joke. He is my Destiny. So, in that mental state, I had put on Billy Joel's song, "I Like you just the way you are". Suddenly, while I was just sitting there thinking, "Wow, what am I doing here, why am I so lonely, and why do I feel so empty inside? How did I get this way? Does God still love me anymore?" I felt the goose bumps actually before I realized what I was hearing, but it wasn't Billy Joel singing anymore. It was God singing to me, and me alone in that control room that night. "I love you just the way you are".Yet I knew that God wasn't saying that He loved my sin. He was saying that I was someone He died for. Someone He cared about deeply. He hadn't given up on me. He LOVED me. What a powerful love He is!
One of the greatest and most prolific producers of songs that are not just for singing was The Vineyard movement> They were songs that talked about God's tenderness and waiting on the Lord. They really meant it when they talked about waiting on the Lord.
 I had a friend who LOVED Vineyard music. He had a worship blog where he shared songs with people, songs he had written, which I have never done. I've never written a song. I found it amazing at the time, that he actually made an impact on people living on the other side of the world with his songs. I  remember when he first got started and his web site began to get thousands of hits. He started getting emails from a guy in Germany that had a worship web site and he asked my friend to write an article about worship. I know that did a lot for my friend's self esteem.
I am actually not a worship musician, ie., part of a worship team at a church. I was for a short spell at one church that I attended for ten years, and then God slowly weaned me from the idea that I needed to be on stage, After I left that church, I went to another church where the worship team was part of the pastor's family, and God grew them musically while I was there. There were some awesome times there, but that church closed, because of various circumstances, and now I am in a small home group. I am the self appointed worship leader right now, but when someone else steps up to the plate who is actually a trained musician, I can see my role changing. For now, I enjoy the challenge of putting a song set together and making power point slides for songs when I decide a recording is better than me playing.
I like the magic of people singing along who are enjoying the song and the One we are worshiping.
I'm still not relaxed enough to allow much to happen spiritually during a song like they do at say, IHOP, where they can sing "Mary had a little lamb" five thousand times, and you finally get it about the thousandth time of singing it/ That happens when the Holy Spirit is singing it with you.
My spiritual musical roots started with scripture songs, like "Seek ye first". Wow.. That was a magical song when we first began to sing that in little home gatherings with young and old alike. Some of the young people in our home fellowship in New Jersey, decided to run down to the beach and watch the sun rise while singing worship songs like this one. Everyone who had a guitar had to learn how to play at least this song.
At the beach, I just remember it being kind of cold and thinking, "I hope I'm spiritual enough to stay out here on this cold beach" : )
I learned to do something called "positioning myself before God" to allow Him to strengthen me to be able to wait on the Lord. The words to that song, "Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His righteousness, can still have their effect on me, and I am still seeking the kingdom of God. I think I've found it sometimes, and then some horrible thing happens in my life that sets me back ten steps, and i have to start seeking again. I'm speaking of miraculous things now. Listen to Susy Yarai sing "He's Alive" and you'll get an inkling about what that means. Google it on You Tube...you. : )
 I know that I hear that same heart cry from others in churches and from those that actually saw miraculous things happen in the earlier Jesus movement of the 60s. I hate to hear about stuff that God did in the past. I want to see Him doing stuff like that in the present...because that's where I live.!
Playing worship songs and facilitating group gatherings with songs that connect the people in a room with a Holy God ... just makes me happy! That's all!
 I know there's more than this in my walk with Jesus,which is why I know that God "wants to sing a new song", in different spiritual seasons, where He will actually shepherd believers into New Moves of the Holy Spirit. This is also a reason to sing and play. Singing and playing worship songs while waiting on the Holy Spirit adds a new dimension to worship. All of a sudden, the music comes ALIVE.  People weep or laugh and things  happen to people that are supernatural.
Now, it's 2012 and God is singing new songs. They sound a little Jewish. Are you ready for this?