Leading Worship!

Last weekend was our annual May Daze staff conference. Once a year, all 200+ midwest Cru staff get together for a long weekend. I've only been staff with Cru for 3 years, but already I am experiencing the wonderful, tight-knit family present in this group of people. I was so very encouraged to hear at this conference what God is doing in the lives of college students around the world - and to just spend time hanging out and reflecting on my year with people who understand what it's like to be a missionary.

As a member of the region's operations team, I get the chance to serve our staff at a lot of conferences, assisting in setting up, running and packing up after events. I love being a part of the behind-the-scenes experience of a conference, and it's fun to do it with such great people that love our staff and love operations.

This year, however, I got the chance to do something totally out of my comfort zone - lead worship for these 200+ people! I've lead worship in various capacities before (Cru, Vespers, Church, small conferences) - but never such a large crowd, and never in front of this crowd that normally sees me behind the scenes. I connect very deeply to God through music, and place a very high value on creating an environment where people can easily enter into and meet with the Lord. I have never felt very confident as a musician, but I've always loved singing.

Leading this weekend scared me (...a lot...) but I knew this opportunity would be a huge chance for me to grow in some significant ways in my walk with God. Before each worship session I had to continually lay down before the Lord my fear of man, and remind myself that the Lord has given me this huge passion and small gifting, and He would get the glory if I was obedient to combine these two things, and share it with others, when he asked me to.