Bloom
Where You Are Planted
As a new worship leader, I felt an unusual call to remain at my church for about two years and not visit other churches as some of my friends were doing at the time. It seemed as though every weekend someone was telling me of a place to go to hear this worship minister or that worship minister, to hear this choir or that singer, or to see how they worshiped over here at this church. I would hear constantly how the Spirit of God was moving at the church across town. God was moving at our church, but somehow I wanted more for our congregation.
Sometimes I would feel that God had His favorites in churches, and I really wanted to go. I just did not have a release to visit and see ‘the mighty workings of God' in the other churches. In hindsight, I've learned that God wanted me to not glean from the other churches at that time, but that I needed to depend on Him to birth something indigenous, local and original, for our congregation.
It was not easy finding the right niche for our church. At first we tried every style we could and patterned ourselves after this group or mainstream praise and worship artist. If that did not work, we tried throwing in a country song, a rock-n-roll feel, a Gospel song here and there - you name it we tried it. I felt because of the cultural diversity of the congregation, we needed to sing songs from all styles just to walk on everybody's street, if you know what I mean. Believe me, the journey of listening to different music styles is a labor of love in itself and it did something in me. It is a necessary thing to do as a worship leader because you want make it as easy as possible for your people to connect with God through music. I learned a valuable lesson because I really do like all styles of music now. I've been set free!
Within my time of "musical attitude adjustment," I was so tired of all the music I was listening to and I wanted music to sing to Him alone. He gave me a chorus...that's it, just a chorus without any verses. I believe I had that song for about one month, when He told me to give it to the church. Selfish me wanted a song that only I could sing to the Lord, but He told me to take it public. Little to my surprise, the verses came and an "indigenous" song was birthed in our church, and the congregation learned the song very quickly. Through this act of obedience we have birthed many "indigenous" songs. More and more, I began to introduce songs over the years and these songs have proven to be the songs the congregation holds on to.
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This is the debut album by EXW friend Paul Langford. Paul is a Chicago based singer, arranger, keyboardist, producer and conductor. Paul has a career that spans 14 years. Paul's work includes arranging for groups like GLAD, Voices of Liberty, VoiceTrek, The Chicago based "Caroling Party" and Day of Discovery Singers. His arranging has appeared on recordings side by side with greats like Gene Puerling and David Maddux, and he has sung with Don Shelton, Bonnie Herman and Bob Bowker, among others.