It's been a difficult couple of weeks in the Lead Worshipper compartment of my brain lately, finding myself in a position where it has been hard to worship, hard to feel close to God, and so easy to let the enemy walk right in.
I was so fired up, in gear, ready to accelerate into God with all the torque I had in me; with two amazing lead worshippers beside me, we were going to knock on Heaven's door and have it opened, God's kingdom flooding the warehouse, flooding our hearts, and overcoming us, pushing me out of my own way. There had just been so much momentum, so much pushing into God and having Him push us with immeasurable force right back. The worship had a rhythm of its own that just seemed to mean that the first chord played was the "GO" button for people to release themselves into worship. I was excited, I was expectant. And yet it was like trying to cut wood with a pencil.
It was tough being a smaller band, but having had the most awesome time of prayer beforehand, really feeling like God gave each of us the authority to lead, the size of the band was no opposition to what God was going to do, and I was sure of it. In fact, the attention being drawn to how small the band was meant that I really felt that it was God's, it was His gig, and by no means mine. But half way through the second song of the first set, I could suddenly no longer hear the worship of my heart, but the crap playing on my guitar, how ropey my voice sounded, and how big and echoey the warehouse suddenly felt with no wall of sound to hide behind. I was so exposed and I could just feel comments like "what are you doing up here?", "this is stupid, you're lead worshipping but you're getting in God's way" etc... By the time the talk came I felt ready to cry, I just wanted to crumble under it, I felt so stupid being up there, like pride had taken God's place and condemnation and judgement had taken the place of grace.
I've been trying to understand it, trying to understand why so clearly I felt my authority being taken away. I have played with the thought for 2 weeks now, contemplating whether it was God moving me elsewhere, or if it was the enemy; but I came to the conclusion, naive or not, that whenever it's God, He gives you something else. He gives and takes away, but when it comes to His kingdom, He has a definite place for all of us. I knew then, as I do now that the enemy was right on top of me that morning, but what I don't understand is why. There are so many cliche answers like "well you were obviously doing something he didn't like, something that was good to God", and maybe that's true, but I had never felt oppression so clearly in the middle of a set before. In truth it frightened me a bit, and being away from church when I haven't been leading hasn't helped, because the other lead worshippers are on this pedestal in my head, as though it is something I can't ever quite reach. And I realize now that I need some healing, of my cynical heart, of my critical mind; states I find myself so easy to switch into when things go wrong and places the enemy is just waiting for me to resort to.
Finding God in those places is what I'm trying to do now, to find Him whether I think it's going well or not, and embracing His view of me, not my view. I don't know if worship leading is where God will want me forever, but I know this, I will always be a worshipper, and that is enough to keep me fighting the headwind, no matter how forceful it is, to know that I will not be moved standing in the footprints of God.
