I have this thing with songs and settings and I’m sure you do too. You hear a song and it just takes you back to a moment. For me, if I hear any song off Jack Johnson’s “On and On” album, I think of a fishing trip to eastern Oregon with my family. If I hear Mariah Carey’s “You’ll always be my baby,” I think of the spring break where I recorded that song off the radio so I could listen to it on my walkman all the way to Hells Canyon and back (the embarrassment I feel over this is making my sunburned cheeks a shade brighter).
Leading worship has provided many opportunities to associate songs with settings that have changed my life. Take, for instance, Cold Fusion ’06 where singing “Revive Us” completely stopped our pursuit of God in recognition of His pursuit of us. Or singing “Til I see you,” in a small town hall building in Melrose Scotland and seeing teenage boys weep as they experienced “the greatest love that anyone could ever know” for the first time in their lives. I can’t sing these songs without images from these experiences flashing on the projector in my head. To experience these things gives me a joy that interrupts humdrum life.
I experienced something last week that will forever change the way I hear, sing, and lead the song “Everlasting God.” I have led this song many times and have always appreciated the sense of awe it inspires in worshipers. But I have a whole new appreciation for this song after a Monday night worship service at a Teen Challenge location on the outskirts of LA.
I was there playing guitar as a part of Portland Christian Center’s youth choir tour to southern California. This was one of the performances along the way and I had looked forward to it since the first time I saw the itinerary. I just knew it was going to be a powerful experience. We began our set and just couldn’t believe how engaged these 200 men were in their worship. They didn’t know the songs but they poured their worship out to the Father like Mary pouring perfume on Jesus.
We had found out earlier in the evening that the men in the audience would know a couple of the tunes that we would share and that they absolutely loved the song “Everlasting God.” When I started the song, I heard the words as if for the first time coming from these men who have lived for years bound by addictions that destroyed their lives. They sang:
Our God, He reigns forever.
With a shout from souls who have only known shame, humiliation, and torment they proclaimed:
Our hope, our strong deliverer.
I was a wreck. Bleary eyed, I watched them lift their voices to their strong Deliver. They knew the strength of God that crushed sin on a cross and they are living proof that His power is made perfect in our weakness.
I repented to Jesus for the many times that I have taken His rescue lightly. I repented of the times that I have led His people in His Praise without a reverent fear of His strength. I repented of thinking that my addictions and sin were any less destructive than those addicted to drugs and thus Jesus’ deliverance of my soul is any less shocking.
I still can’t comprehend His goodness towards sinners. His love never fails. His grace towards me is scandalous once again and I pray that it always would be.

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