My Eyes Are On You
Jacob completed the bass line this past week before the session and added some backward guitar effects, so we dove in with some cool tremelo chord sweeps, then added my Albert King wanna-be lead licks. Then we cut the vocal part including backing vocal Ooos that were a lot of fun. Then we re-cut the rhythm guitar part to make it a more choppy pattern. I really like the results.

Search Me
It's really hard to commit to ideas on this song because it is so dear to me, I don't want to mess it up. We started out by turning on the track, grabbing guitars, playing ideas, and then picking out what we liked. After I cut the bass part, we ended up doing this rotary speaker sound on the verses that we're going to double with a 12 string next time. I added some chunky electric chords over the whole tune in the John Mayer vein. Then we doubled some of the electric stuff with this tiny old guitar from the 50s that Jacob had that sounds kind of like a mandolin or a ukulele. I know you're thinking that we're crazy, but it sounds really cool. It's getting this very Beatles vibe. Next time we'll do the 12 string stuff, do the vocals, and then put in on the shelf until the keyboards day.

Tanya and Chioma came from St Louis as well as our friends, Parker and Nicole, who just moved from St Louis to Athens, GA. We had a great time hanging out with these friends and getting to know them better. It's funny how sometimes you have get out of town with someone in order to get to know them better.

I miss worshiping at NCF Chattanooga. It will always be the standard by which I judge all other experiences because it was the place where I first experienced the joy of worshiping the Lord using my music gifts. However, I came home refreshed and excited about what God is doing here in St Louis. I can't wait to share some of the new songs that we learned there, and I can't wait until the musicians on our team can host a symposium so that they can inspire, encourage, and refresh others.

For a taste of the symposium, you can hear the "Panel Discussion" from Sunday morning in which Michelle Higgins-Loftin, Renae Higgins, Randy Nabors, my dad and I share some off the cuff remarks about crossing cultures, embracing changes, getting out of the box, and keeping people ahead of vision. Listen here on Skip's podcast.

You can also here a board-mix of my song "Rejoice In The Lord" here.

Part One: Friday Night
Know your place - guitar player's role in the band
Pick your groove - Lead, Strumming, Motown, Chunky, Disco, or Riff.
Dr. Strangechords or how I learned to stop worrying and love the chart

Part Two: Sunday afternoon
Surprisingly Common Chords- 2, 9, 11, 7(#9), 7(b9), m7(b5), and dim7
Major and Minor Blues Scales featuring some cool Major Blues Licks
African Guitar Basics

Bonus for attending
Two Etudes: Anointing Fall On Me and Amazing Grace

Later this month, maybe I'll do the same clinic for our guitar players in St Louis. There's a lot of material in this clinic; maybe one day, I'll write a gospel guitar method book. Mel Bay is based out of St Louis...I'll just go knock on their door.

I have realized that pain makes me very self absorbed. In conversation with my friend Ed on Sunday, he said of his own pain that it makes him grumpy most of the day. I can relate. It's been hard to put on a happy face when playing with my daughter is a painful ordeal. The truth is that pain only exposes the sin that's already in my heart. I am self absorbed to begin with, and the pain is just bringing that sin to the surface. When I am not in pain, I can be self absorbed and friendly at the same time so that my secret idolatry is kept hidden.

Jesus I want to be like you. In the most painful moments of your life, you were compassionate. When any other man would have been pleading for mercy, you were using your last breaths to make arrangements for who would take care of your mother, to reassure the thief about his final destiny, and asking the Father to forgive your oppressors. Jesus, you are the man of sorrows acquainted with grief; make me more like you.

For thoughts on the subject of emotional pain, check out Neil's blog.

We spent the day doing bass, guitar layers, and vocals for Thorn In My Side. It was really great to get into the creative aspects of building the song. We were passing the guitar back and forth, throwing out ideas, and hitting record before we got too analytical. I was a little disappointed at first to give up the guitar playing role for the entire project, but it was kind of cool to be on the other side of the guitar and be able to listen for ideas without just falling into habits or to analyze. My jazz experience is great, but sometimes it makes me a little too nerdy about music. I can start to analyze a line thinking, "what would be hip here? Maybe a major 7 or a flat 9." Sitting on the other side of the guitar, I was more likely to hear a line in my head first. It made my ideas much more musical.

I think the final product sounds awesome! The song still needs a little percussion and organ before it can be put in the ready-for-mixing file, but it is basically done! 1 down and 11 to go.

After we stopped working on that, we began to do some of the bass and guitar layers for My Eyes Are On You. However, a long day and a lack of caffeine began to get me down. Jacob pulled the plug when I was starting to glaze over. My son woke me up at 5 in the morning, and I was really feeling it 12 hours later.

I want to get the recording back into gear by setting up a consistent time every week that we do a little work on it. It's been very hard to accomplish because I have not wanted to give up nights and weekends. That basically leaves my Monday's off and vacation days. To make matters worse, Jacob has his own schedule and sometimes it doesn't sync well with mine. I want to have a variety of possible times during the week, so that I can be more flexible when Jacob can't do a Monday. As we wrapped up yesterday, we talked about next Friday, and we were all set to go until I remembered as I was driving home that I will be in route to Tennessee on Friday, D'oh!

Joanna: Mommy, I want a snack
Sarah: No, Joanna, you already had a snack.
Joanna: Awww, Mom! That makes Jesus sad.

The email came from my friend, Nicole James, who will be in Tennessee with us for the Urban Worship Symposium at New City Fellowship. Here's an excerpt from her email:

"I was wondering if it were possible to have a session or "lecture" or something on song-writing at the symposium. You guys probably have everything set already. I just find myself regretting not seeking you and others out more on that topic while in STL. Also, do you have any recommendations on learning more about the song-writing process? Books, people, etc? How did you learn? School, dad, trial-and-error?"

Here's the main tools that I use for songwriting:
-a journal to keep fragments of ideas
-a recorder of some kind. (my recorder of choice these days is my iPod that I use a little microphone attachment with, but for years it was a hand-held tape recorder.)
-Finale notation software

I will usually start with a lyric fragment or a fragment of chord changes, then I will sing melodies to the fragments to see what I like. If something strikes me I will grab the recorder and get it on tape. Otherwise I forget about it. Sometimes that fragment gets me motivated to finish the song right then, other times, it sits for a while until I listen back to my collection of song bits and then it catches my interest again.

I use Finale in the last stage of composition to work out the precise melody, to establish a form and to revise my lyrics. Writing out the notes will sometimes make me change the lyrics to better fit the melody or to change the melody to support the lyrics better. Sometimes writing it out makes me see visually how boring the melody is, and I will change it up to have a better contour. You can download a free version of Finale called "NotePad" on their website.

Another method of composition that I sometimes use is to start with a concept or a goal like "I want to write a song for our youth group that will address the need for absolute truth found in God's word." or "I want to compose a song based on this Sunday's sermon text that has an uptempo feel." I usually go straight to Finale in those cases. That's a little more difficult, but it can be a good exercise.

After you write a song, sing it a lot in private to decide whether you like it or not. Next, share it with your husband who will tell you that it is a gold-record masterpiece (that will give you a confidence boost). Next, share it with a trusted critic who will give you honest feedback like, "the verses need to develop the idea more" or "you need to find the hook in the chorus." Finally, share it with an audience to see how it plays in performance. Not every song will immediately connect with the audience; some of the songs you write will be a little more complex and require multiple performances before they sink in.

The best advice that my dad ever gave me was that for every 30 songs that you write, you might get one keeper. This should not discourage you; it should give you motivation to write often and without self-censorship. If you think that every song that you write is going to be "one for the ages" then you will become paralyzed with unrealistic goals. It takes a lot of stirring up your creativity before you get in a good head-space to respond to the muse, so think of yourself like a painter who does pencil sketches of a landscape over and over before she even gets out the paints.

While I meditated on my parenting, I realized that this is the general way that I looked at life as a child and the way I tend to view the world today. I like to think that I can modify my behavior to be a better person. I tend to punish myself for failure (like my current "fast from the web"), and I tend to believe that my successes deserve praise or reward. When I do fail, I tend to doubt the power of the gospel and the existence of God. Besides, if the gospel really worked and God really existed shouldn't that be reflected in my behavior?

To boil it down, the basic idea is this: If I do good, then I am good. If I do bad, then I am bad.

Over and over in the gospels, Jesus Christ tried to hammer into the brains of thick-headed Pharisees like me that the heart was what mattered, not behavior. "You shall not kill" is easy enough to obey, but if I hate my neighbor in my heart then I am a sinner. So you can train a child to act nice, obedient, and cheerful, but you can not do anything to change their heart. That is why we end up with churches filled with nice little Ned Flanders evangelicals who worship God with their lips, but their hearts are far from him.

Jesus also offered an alternative to behavior modification: heart modification. Through the completed work of Christ I have been justified from my sin, and I have received the goodness of Jesus. When I fail, it doesn't change the state of my heart. The new heart that Jesus gave me has been cleansed of the sins I have committed and the sins I will commit.

In the gospel, the basic idea changes to this: Once I was bad, and I did bad. Now I am good, and I still do bad, but good has been prepared for me to do.

Here's how Paul puts it:
Therefore, as God's chosen people, holy and dearly loved, clothe yourselves with compassion, kindness, humility, gentleness and patience.
Colossians 3:12

When I was in high school, Mike Jones, who played guitar in my dad's band, gave me a beautiful Fender Stratocaster guitar. I borrowed the guitar for a summer, and after the summer ended, Mike told me that I could keep the guitar as a gift. I was a little freaked out. As a 15 year old kid, I had never received such a valuable gift from someone outside of my family. Mike explained to me that when he was a young guitar neophyte, a man in his church came up to him after a performance and said, "I want to buy you a new guitar." Mike told me that because that man had bestowed a gracious gift on him, he was going to pass that grace on to me.Mike is now the senior pastor of Hope Church Presbyterian in Tampa, FL.

As a gifted musician, Mike had received his creative skill as a gift from the Creator. Mike passed the gift on by sharing it in performance. Then this gracious man responded to Mike's creative gift by giving him a physical gift, a new guitar. Later, Mike passed on the gift to me as a response to my creative gift. A web of gifts was created that was fed by the grace of the Creator. He is the one who gives the skill to the artist. It was His grace working in the heart of the man who gave Mike his guitar.

Here's an exhortation from 1 Peter 4:10

Each one should use whatever gift he has received to serve others,
faithfully administering God's grace in its various forms.

The content of Peter's letter leading up to this exhortation is spent establishing our gift debt to Christ. Peter starts his letter talking about the gifts of "new birth into a living hope", "an inheritance that can never perish," and that we are "shielded by God's power" (1 Peter 1:3-5). These are blessings from the Lord that we did not earn. These are gifts that we can never repay the same way that you might repay a loan. That is why we respond to God's grace through passing that grace onto others.

As a musician, I have been given not only the gifts of new life in Christ; I have also been given the skills to play the guitar, to sing, to lead a band, to write a new song, to make instrumental arrangements, and to pastorally direct people through a set of worship songs. These are skills that I have learned and developed as a craft, but at their root, they have all been gifts from the Lord. Now through my service, I pay back a little bit of that gift debt every Sunday to the people who come to our church.

No, I haven't given way any guitars, so I still have a lot more gift debt to pass on.

Have you been blessed in any way by the Creator through a gracious gift from one of His children?
How has the Creator bestowed creative gifts on you?
How have you responded to you gift debts?

My daughter gets stickers throughout the day for being clean and dry because we all need a little feedback every now and again. So here's some random questions for you:

• If you are on the NCF music team, what has this year been like for you in your service?


• If you are an NCF attendee, what's the worship been like this year?


• If you are just a reader, how has the content on the blog been?

In these tables, K= kick, S= snare, H=hi-hat. Kick is played with your right foot, snare with your left hand, and hi-hat with your right hand. Practice at home on your thighs with your car keys in your right pocket.

The numbers indicate how the meter is counted. Sometimes, like in the case of 12/8 time, you don't really count 12, you would more likely count 4 with a triplet feel. The numbers in black indicate how you would count the meter.

I realize that this is very simplistic and doesn't take into account a lot of factors that make up drumming. So I apologize that the boiled down version of drumming that I have presented here is like when people claim that you can just learn 3 chords, and you'll be able to play 90% of pop music. It's not really true, but it has some truthiness to it.

In the conversation with the woman at the well, Jesus shared with us that the spiritual nature of God affects how we worship Him. Jesus said,

"God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth." -John 4:24

Jesus was answering the woman's questions about where it is appropriate to worship God: in Jerusalem at the Temple or is it o.k. to worship him somewhere else. Jesus was teaching her that God is bigger that one geographical location. He is also jealous that we worship Him alone and not fixate on a particular city, music style, mood, architecture, or whatever.

Everyone of us is a little broken and confused like the woman at the well. We want to keep God in a box (temple) where we only have to engage in an external show of religious ritual to justify ourselves while maintaining our pet sins. Jesus invites us to engage relational worship with the Spirit of Truth that passes deep into our heart and exposes our sin, purifies us, and put's a song in our mouth.

God is a Spirit. Thank you, Joanna, for reminding me of that.

I believe that there are very good things about the development of the "information superhighway." But like any good thing, the power of sin in my heart can pervert it, misuse it, and idolize it. I decided last night that I would take a break for a few weeks from my internet habits and meditate on how I can use this gift from God in ways that bring him honor. (I already saw last night that I had a ton of time to accomplish meaningful tasks without wasting my time constantly "checking").

I will have to make a few exceptions for work related use of the internet including Planning Center, Gmail, and any work purchases I might need to make online. I will also continue to write on my blog which I think is a good tool for processing thoughts and getting feedback from friends.

The main offender for me has been Facebook. It has been great to reconnect with people that I have failed to be in touch with, but I have been so engrossed by it that I think that my family life and my work has suffered as a result. So this morning, I went into my Facebook settings and made sure that I will get an email if anyone is using Facebook to try to communicate something to me because I don't want cause any friendships to suffer or miss any important information. But after today, I will be off Facebook for a few weeks. No status updates from me.

I set my birthday, August 25*, as my cut off date for the fast. Please pray for me if you can, and I encourage anyone of you to search your own hearts about what idols might need to be torn down as an act of worship to Jesus.

*notice how I snuck a birthday plug in there to remind everyone to buy me lots of presents. You can find cheap gift ideas for me on my Amazon Wish Lists; I have one for CDs and one for everything else. Unfortunately, you'll have to use the internet to get to it. :)

Appropriate Reasons

Commitments and Callings
God has called each Christian to many different tasks. Some task are given scriptural priority over others. For example, my responsibilities as a husband and father have priority over my responsibilities as ministry volunteer. If ministry stands in direct opposition to the calling that I have as a husband, I must walk away from that ministry. This takes wisdom, discernment, and a humble heart before the Lord, but scripture does not allow anyone to choose to put their marriage on the back-burner in order to fulfill some ministry calling.

Preserving Peace
This is tricky, but sometimes, you have to sacrifice your participation because it's going to be better for the progress and peace of the whole group. Maybe you have a conflict with someone on the team that stands in the way of the ministry progressing. It's tricky because there needs to be unity, forgiveness and peace between Christ's disciples. However, you're not married to a ministry; so I think it's o.k. to walk away if you have "irreconcilable differences" with someone or with the ministry's mission.

It's Not Your Gift
Maybe you had image in your mind of how cool it would be to be a worship leader, but soon after you signed up, the truth came out: you don't have the gifts to lead worship music. The church is a body of many diverse parts with different jobs. Not everyone should be in music ministry. Ask others what they think about your gifting. If they are honest friends, then they won't blow smoke; they will tell it like it is.

Refusal to Repent
This is a little scary, but sometimes people abandon the gospel and choose to reject God's law and His will in order to follow their own desires. If you refuse to repent, then get the heck out of ministry. You are a hypocrite if you don't.

Inappropriate Reasons

Avoiding Conflict
Are you leaving the ministry because you have a problem with someone else who is involved and you would rather walk away from the conflict then deal with it openly? You would be surprised about how often this is the real reason that people walk away from ministry.

Fear of Failure
Are you leaving the ministry because you can't handle failure? This is perfectionism that makes an idol of your self-image. You must perform flawlessly, or else you will die of embarrassment. This is a lie from Satan. By the way, no one is listening that closely to you! They are there to worship Jesus, not your music gift, so let it go!

It's Too Hard
Anything that is worth doing is going to require sacrifice. If you are leaving the ministry because its easier to not do ministry then you are being a sluggard. Music is hard for everyone, even gifted people. It takes practice, concentration, physical exertion, emotional vulnerability, preparation, etc. Jesus didn't turn away from the cross even though he knew just how difficult it would be.

Guilt
This one makes me really sad. It's so hard to see because it reveals that the person has not really believed the gospel. These people leave the team because they believe that they are too corrupted by sin to be able to serve. Just repent, look to the cross, be healed, and then say, "Here I am; send me."