Stimulus Time! Woohoo!!! June 21, 2008

Y’all already know that I love tax rebate time. But we just got our stimulus check today. OMGosh! We have a very big family, so we got a nice, fat check. Can you tell I’m happy?

Of course, we’ve already designated what most of it is for. We’ve got to fix my stupid van, buy a vacuum cleaner & new dryer, and put some away for our vacation. We will play with a bit of it, but most of that play will be in Gulf Shores while on vacation. Fun!

We took the kids to ChuckECheese today for Beau’s 5th birthday. Hard to believe my sweet boy is already 5. He only asked for two things for his birthday….a party at ChuckECheese and a racecar with a train taped to the top of it. I love 5 year olds! We all had a great time playing today, but now we’re all exhausted. So not much more to say. Hope you all have a wonderful rest of your day! I’ll write more tomorrow. G’night.

Uh Oh….New Hobby June 20, 2008

I recently bought a shirt that I absolutely love but couldn’t find jewelry to match (girly thing to say, huh?), so I decided to make the jewelry myself. Not sure yet if that was a fabulous decision or a big mistake. In my quest for a single piece of jewelry, I ended up with a whole new hobby….like I needed another. lol

So here’s the necklace I made…..

I really like it and it matches perfectly. I had a ton of fun making it, so of course I had to make another. That led to this…..

I’ve made about 15 other necklaces, but figured it might be overkill to put all of them on here at once.

And did I mention that I’m married to the sweetest man on the planet? Seriously, he’s amazing. He supports every single thing I do 100%. However, considering I have a whole room filled with scrapbooking supplies, I didn’t think he’d be too happy about this new little hobby of mine. Well, he surprised me with this….

He went to the bead store two days in a row and bought me a ton of fun stuff! Only some of it is pictured here since I’ve already used a lot in jewelry pieces. Isn’t he the sweetest?!

So that’s what I’ve been doing the last few days. Now be honest, would you wear this jewelry? I don’t want to keep making it if it’s not any good. So be honest….I can take it.

Were They Reached? June 17, 2008

A couple of weeks ago I read this over at Los’ blog. And then a few days ago I read this. I’ve been mulling over this in my head for a couple of weeks and thought I’d share some of my thoughts with y’all. I may be dead wrong or I might be right on target. Who knows? These are just my rambling thoughts.

I’m not leading worship anywhere anymore, so this may not even apply to me. But I’m always evaluating myself, making sure I’m not doing things for the wrong reasons or out of emotion, etc. And these posts by Carlos really made me reflect on my time as a worship leader.

Even when I was on the road, singing secular music (totally for the money), I always said “If you can’t sing with passion, don’t bother singing at all. You need to really know what you’re singing about before you open your mouth.” Well if that applied to secular music, then imagine how much more it applies to leading worship.

Every week I prepared for worship by first checking my heart. It could not be about me. Yes, I prepared vocally, but my primary focus was the spiritual preparation.

So when I stepped onto that platform, my heart was all for Him. Every note I sang was filled with passion for Him. But how did that convey to the congregation? I don’t know. How did the first time visitor see it? How did the lost person sitting way in the back see it? Did they see it as something they wanted to join in authentically? To make a real connection with the Father? Or did they see it as “Becky in Concert”?

I’m afraid my passion was often viewed as “Becky’s trying to put on a show.” I hope I’m wrong. I really, really hope I’m wrong. But I’m also realistic. I’m a very loud vocalist who is best at powerhouse songs. So when one of those songs was on the set list, I sang it to the best of my ability (because He deserves no less) and with all my heart. But nobody can see my heart. They only see the girl on the stage singing loud and moving around a lot (I do move around a lot when I worship….I just can’t sit still).

I wanted so much to engage the congregation…to invite them in to worship with me. I would talk to them about this amazing Love, about how awesome He is. But I don’t know if I ever really got through. How can I know? Just like they couldn’t see my heart, I couldn’t see theirs.

Did someone out there see authentic worship and want to experience it too, without knowing how? Did I, in some small way, help them to connect with Him? Or did I just confuse them more? Did someone out there get the impression that I was putting on a show and get turned off completely? What could I have done differently? What could I have done better to help them enter into His presence?

How many people left empty because I didn’t do enough?

I guess if Carlos, who is a fantastic worship leader, asks himself similar questions, then I’m not so bad. But I can’t help but feel like I could have done more, done better, done something.

Lord, if anyone was reached while I was leading worship, it was all You. But I am so grateful for the chance to have been a part of it. Thank You. Thank You so much. And I know You have a plan for me, I just don’t know what that plan is. But however You want to use me, I’m all Yours. I’ll do it with all my heart. But I need You to help me. I’m so weak and so unable to do anything on my own. Please help me. And please show me where to go and what to do. I feel so lost right now. I can’t even take the next step without Your help.

Major Changes June 15, 2008

I know I haven’t written in a while, and I’m very sorry for that. Rodney and I have been doing a lot of “soul-searching” and have invested a lot of our time in prayer and conversation. We have decided to make some changes. One major change is that we will be leaving Heart of Worship.

Anyone who’s read this blog for any length of time knows that I love Heart of Worship. That has not changed. So for any of the HOW family that is reading this, please know that we love you very, very much. We may not attend the same church location anymore, but we are still part of the family of God. Our hearts are tied together in His love and we will stay that way always. You are precious to us. We love you deeply.

Rodney and my dad went fishing today (Happy Father’s Day!) so the kids and I visited a church without him. We went to Christian Challenge in Pineville. I had met the pastor, Nathan, through this blog and was very pleased to meet him and his wife in person today. She is the sweetest lady! And Nathan was just as nice in person as he seemed in his emails.

I was very happy to see that they use contemporary music in their praise & worship. And the kids worshiped with us! It was the first time we’d corporately worshiped with our whole family and I loved it! After the music service, the kids went to their classes (which they all loved) and then they came back in at the end of the service. The preaching was excellent. Nathan is a teacher at heart, I think. I left with new knowlege and motivation. Loved that!

Everyone was really nice. Lots of hugs from people I hadn’t seen in a long time and even people I’d never met before today. They seem to be a very genuine family and that means a lot. I have to admit though….about half-way through the service, I started crying. I looked around and realized that they are a family, but they’re not the family I’ve known & loved for these past few years. As welcomed as I felt, I still missed my family at HOW. I guess that’s the hard part about change.

When I came home, I told Rodney all about the service, from beginning to end. He said he’d like to visit there, so we’ll be going back next Sunday. I’m looking forward to it. So to my new friends at Christian Challenge, thank you for making us feel so welcome! We’ll see y’all next Sunday.