Moving Back to Austin

Sarah and I have had an awesome year here in St Louis. We’ve met lifelong friends, and learned things that will stick with us forever. As most of you have heard by now, we’re moving back to Austin at the end of this month. We have come to this decision after extreme caution and prayer. As moving day commences, we’re becoming sadder to leave, and are growing even fonder of our friends here. Stephen and the band have been like a tightly-knit family for us, and The Journey has been an incredibly integral part of our sanctification. There’s no way we ended up here by accident, nor was it a mistake to come. We’ve been blessed, challenged, trained and blessed again.

We feel the Spirit leading us back for many reasons, but the main one (for me) is to contribute in ministry to my family back home. Some of them have been through very rough times lately, and God has positioned me to be a helper to them.

Because of my job, I’ll get to visit StL about once a month, and I hope to remain friends with you all, and visit The Journey frequently.

Please pray for us. Pray that we will not lose sight of the mission on which God has us. My biggest temptation is to go off and make this move about me. When you think of us, please pray that our lives bring glory to God, and not ourselves.

StL, thank you for welcoming us so warmly. We love you, and we’ll see ya soon.

-Wes and Sarah

Why do all modern worship guitarists play the same style?

Though I don’t subscribe to this belief, it seems to be a popular discontentment in my line of work. I have some thoughts about this argument that I feel like I should share…

First of all, as a guitarist, I can better distinguish between my favorite worship guitarists, since I have so much invested in the art form and I pay much more attention to nuance. I’m not trying to say that I’m better, or more cultured than anyone. The latter, I’m sure is almost laughable. I’m just saying I study this stuff under a microscope while most simply use it as a means for worshipping Jesus (the point of it all). So it’s hard for me to empathize with folks who say, “All you guys just sound like U2″.

This question leads to the overarching question, “For that matter, why does most popular modern worship music seem to have such a narrow range of genre?” I will agree that the style of guitar playing, as well as the musical genre, is very focused – possibly too much so. But I perceive the motive behind this to be very valid.

To begin stating my case, I’ll choose an example genre that I can most easily get away with picking on: HAIR METAL!!!!! This genre is a fast-paced sort that is electromagnetically charged to attract tight neon-colored stage costumes, the fastest guitar solos that a MIDI keyboard has ever played, and lyrics filled with womanizing and not-quite-satanic-but-really-wish-they-were limericks. Now obviously, as long as our culture has associations between the sounds and rhythms of HAIR METAL!!!!! and it’s myriad of social faux pas, we shouldn’t be putting God-fearing lyrics to the tune of “Welcome to the Jungle” in our corporate worship services. Worship shouldn’t be corporately expressed with a musical style that largely brings derogatory or tempting thoughts, by way of association, to the worshippers’ minds.

So that’s the first part of my case, but what is it about the neon spandex and the shredding MIDI guitar solos that cause this genre not to lend itself to worship? It’s the amount of showmanship, not only on the stage, but in the very music itself, that makes worship of Jesus (the point of it all) less accessible through this medium. This is where other genres, ones far less-frowned-upon than hair metal, can also become less effective in corporate worship. Subjectively, many people may have problems singing songs of praise to God in certain genres because of the rich musical complexity, showmanship or creative genius that causes them to stand in awe of the songs themselves rather than the Creator of all music. Worship guitarists, likewise, constantly wrestle with our egos to keep our playing simple, while maintaining a sound that reflects the power, presence and grandeur of God.

We shouldn’t all sound like U2, but the songs we play absolutely must be opaque enough to see Jesus through them. We don’t want our songs to be sung TO, we want our songs to be sung THROUGH.

WELCOME TO THE CHAPEL

D
Welcome to the Chapel
D
We got love and praise
D
He’s got everything we want
D
Honey, He knows our names
A
This is the place that you can find
A
Groups of communities
A
Anointing oil made of honey
A
Might attract some bees

Chorus:
F
In the Chapel
G
Welcome to the Chapel

Worship brings you to your
A
Shananananananananananana

Knees, knees

Mwah!

You better watch those BEES!

…That’s all I got.

I’ve been singing about how it’s amazing ever since I can remember, but what is it?  The church definition I’ve always rattled off is “unmerited favor”.  While that’s not wrong, more and more it strikes me as horribly deficient in conveying the magnitude, complexity, and beauty of grace.

When I examine my life, I’m faced with a growing stack of evidence proving that I am broken, along with the rest of humanity.  It doesn’t surprise me, but it is unsettling to look back and see a thread of flawed behavior throughout my experiences.  I’m lazy.  Prideful.  Selfish in more ways than I can count.  Worst of all, I’m often deluded enough to think that I’m doing just fine.  Viewing my actions and desires in light of God’s holiness and abhorrence of sin, there exists a huge chasm between my humanity and His divinity.  I can’t sound the depth of my brokenness any more than I can measure the height of His perfection.  The more I think about and examine this distance the greater it becomes.

Of course, that’s not the whole story.

God bridged that gap on the cross.

Christ embodied grace by becoming one of us, living among us, and taking our sin that separated us from Him.  That would be completely amazing all by itself, but grace doesn’t stop there.  The Holy Spirit has set up shop inside my heart, right in the middle of all the brokenness and failure.  He convicts me of sin.  He heals my hurt.  He shows me ways to truly love other people. God is working on me to make me like Him, and He manages to also work through me in the process, despite my flaws.  He takes joy in doing this, because it’s part of His character.  God defines grace; there will never be a better example than His interaction with humanity.

I wrestle with this grace because it is so extravagant, so irrationally above and beyond what I expect and deserve.  I can’t pay it back, and any attempt to earn it only insults and belittles God’s generosity in giving it.  I can’t wrap my mind around grace, or do it justice with my words, but I have experienced it, and in that I understand it somehow.  And it is pretty amazing.