1/30/11 worship set

Our God
Jesus Messiah
Amazing Grace (My Chains are Gone)
   *during offering
More Than Amazing
   *communion elements
Revelation Song
My Savior Lives

Work of Art...

Have you ever looked at a knitted blanket or tapestry and seen how intricately those threads are woven together to form a beautiful piece of art?  I have never been able to knit or sew but I am fascinated and a bit jealous of people that can.  It truly is an art and I love to watch how a person can take several different color threads and begin knitting them together and the end result is a magnificent blanket or throw that can take your breath away.

At night when I put my kids to bed, the last thing I do is kiss them and remind them that God made them very special, that there is no one else just like them and that he has a great purpose for their lives. 

“For you created my inmost being; you knit me together in my mother’s womb.  I praise you because I am fearfully and wonderfully made;”

-- Psalm 139:13-14

This always brings a smile to their faces and is a very exciting thought!  When I look at my family I see how God took Matt and me with two very different color threads and began to knit us together the day we said, “I do”.  Then as we had Ben, the thread he carried was one that added another vibrancy to the work of art God was forming.  Then came along Callie and her thread was also full of color, a color that was needed to continue the work.  Now we have Caleb and his unique thread is being woven into the tapestry even now.  As God weaves and knits my family’s beautifully colored threads together it becomes a tapestry for his glory.  You see each thread on its own is very special and distinctive, but knitted together they become stronger, full of vibrant color and dimension that evolves into a work of art.

The same is true of us as worship leaders.   Each of us are very special creations and have different gifts and talents that on their own can do great things, but as God knits our threads together for his glory, we become stronger and unified in the call to serve and worship him.  I believe God is knitting this tapestry together with a smile.  I see God moving in our lives and every time we come together to worship and sing, we bond together more in him.  I am honored to be a part of this marvelous group.  Jesus is the center!  He has prepared us for this work.  Through him our lives have meaning and worth and together we are a beautiful work of art. 

“For we are God’s workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do.” 

-- Ephesians. 2:10

I want to personally thank you for your dedication and love for our Lord.  Our times of rehearsal and worship together are so special!  To lift up praise to our Lord and encourage each other in prayer are sweet, sweet times!  Sometimes we get so caught up with daily pressures and burdens that we lose sight of how special we are in God’s sight.  Read and meditate on both these scriptures this week, Psalm 139:13-14 and Eph. 2:10.  Find joy in the Word!  We are wonderfully made!  As the saying goes, “God don’t make no junk.”  I heard this many time growing up and it is true.  God has made us in his image to do great and mighty things for him.  

Please know how special you are to me too and I look forward to our worship together!  

Blessings~

Allison Jordan

SHBC Praise Team

1/23/11 worship set

You, You Are God
Most High
Take My Life (and Let It Be)
The One Who Saves 
   (special during offering)
God of This City

Salt and Light...

A couple of years ago, I rode down to Southport with a lady that seemingly “had it all together”.  You know, a person that you don’t know very well but have an impression of based on what you have seen or heard from them.  I had not spent much time with her but I have to admit I was a little intimidated by her.  She had a demeanor that came across very dedicated to work, and not a lot of room for mistakes.  She also could laugh and cut up but had a dry sense of humor to where you weren’t really sure if she was unhappy with something you had done or just joking around.  It was very difficult for me to understand her.  Well, she invited me to ride down to Southport with her to a meeting.  I thought it was a little strange that she asked me but I felt as though I should go.  During that trip down and back I learned a lot.  As she referred to me as a “woman of faith”, she began to open up and share things with me about her life.  She began to ask me questions about what is right and wrong.  I remember as she started talking, I just prayed and asked God for a listening ear and a careful tongue.  I quickly realized that I was there for a reason.  I was there to share God’s love to a woman who I thought, “had it all together”.  

I learned on that trip, that I became quick to judge someone I didn’t really know well.  She was a woman that was searching and hurting and I almost let my “impressions” of her ruin an opportunity to share the hope that is in Christ.  I also learned that people all around are watching us.  I had never told her I was a Christian but she was watching.  People everywhere around us are hurting and they are searching for something or someone that can give them hope.  What a wake-up call that was to me!  The Lord convicted me strongly that I need to be less quick to judge others.  We are the salt and light!  We are the ones who should share the love of Christ and follow his example of loving others.

“You are the salt of the earth.  But if the salt loses its saltiness, how can it be made salty again?  It is no longer good for anything, except to be thrown out and trampled by men.  You are the light of the world.  A city on a hill cannot be hidden.  Neither do people light a lamp and put it under a bowl.  Instead they put it on its stand, and it gives light to everyone in the house.  In the same way, let your light shine before men, that they may see your good deeds and praise your Father in heaven.”
--Matthew 5:13-16

I don’t want to lose that saltiness! I want a flavor-filled life for Christ that is infectious to all those around me!  When we live for Christ, our light shines brightly for the entire world to see.  We have the awesome responsibility to come in contact with many people who are hurting on the inside.  Our “impressions” may be that they have it all together, but we need to have sensitivity to their needs.  I know that I want my light to shine brightly and not have it hidden “under a bowl”.  I pray that my light for Christ will bring light into the lives of the hurting and induce the flavor-filled life for my Lord that salt can bring.  That is when they can receive the hope and love that is God.

I praise God that he showed me my failures yet again.  It is in my failure that I see his glory and realize that I am nothing without him.

Have a blessed week in the Lord!

Allison Jordan

SHBC Praise Team

1/16/11 worship set

Let the Praises Ring
Better Than Life
How Great Thou Art
Our God
   (special during offering)
Lord of All

Sin-ectomy...

About a year and a half ago, a few days after his 13^th birthday, Ben had his tonsils out.  Yes, a tonsillectomy!  What a big word!  I had heard how painful they could be on a child, but the older the child gets when the surgery is done, the harder the recovery.  Poor thing! He could hardly swallow, he was nauseous, and just felt crummy for days.  He could hardly eat anything and even lost about 10 pounds in about a week.  It is so hard, as a parent, to see your child in pain.  I wanted to take that pain and make it go away, but at the same time, I knew that pain was necessary to make his overall quality of life much better.  When his doctor came out of the surgery to give us the report, his comment to us was that Ben’s tonsils were “mammoth” (enormous, huge, massive).  He said his life would be dramatically better now that those “mammoth size” tonsils are out.  His breathing will be better and he will have a more peaceful life, physically.  What a statement that was!  Ben had struggled for 8 years with congestion, breathing difficulties while sleeping, and overall sluggishness because of not sleeping well and then to hear that his quality of life would be dramatically better was wonderful news!  Of course, he had to go through many days of pain and discomfort before it got better but we knew there was a light at the end of that tunnel.  

After sitting with Ben during his recovery one night, I decided to go out for a run.  I began to ponder that statement the doctor made.  “Now that the mammoth size tonsils are out of the way, his quality of life will get better.” 

It made me think of my walk with Christ.  There are times in my life when sin gets in the way, it becomes “mammoth size”, and hinders the quality of my Christian life.  The very breath of my soul becomes labored when sin gets in the way and there is much unrest.  There are times when the Great Physician needs to do a “sin-ectomy” so that my quality of life in him can once again be what he designed it to be.  This “procedure” is often painful and can be uncomfortable but oh so necessary for my overall health.  The end result is rest, peace, and breathing the sweet oxygen that permeates to the depths of my soul and gives me life!  How sweet it is!  I began to praise God and ask him to reveal to me the sins in my life that need to be removed.  Though I knew it could be painful, I wanted to live a clean life that was pleasing to him and I was willing to let him cut it out.  Forgiveness and mercy are there to cure the sin that has been repented to our Great Physician!  Only he can heal our sin-infested souls and make them beautiful for his glory! It is all about him anyway.  Any pain that I endure could not hold a candle to my sin he carried on the cross.

Repent, then, and turn to God, so that your sins may be wiped out, that times of refreshing may come from the Lord.

--Acts 3:19

What areas of sin in your own life need to be “surgically” removed?  Maybe there are areas of bitterness, selfishness, envy, bad attitudes, harsh words, grumbling and complaining, or the sin of “me-ism”.  Whatever the sin, it hinders our relationship with God Almighty and needs to be removed.  I pray that this will be a time of great healing in all our lives so that we will be able to breathe and worship the way God intended.  It’s time for us to dig deep and reveal ourselves wholly to him!

To prepare for your procedure, read your “surgical” instructions from God’s Word and allow the Great Physician to do his work in your life!

Blessings~

Allison Jordan

SHBC Praise Team

1/9/11 worship set

Worship Medley
    -Holy Holy Holy
    -He is Exalted
    -Awesome God
    -Lord, I Lift Your Name on High
    -Shout to the Lord
    -Everlasting God
    -Glory to God
Awakening
Mighty to Save
How Great is Our God

Happy New Year!

How exciting a New Year can be! A fresh new start, and with the reality of a New Year most people have a long list of resolutions that they intend to stick to: losing weight, exercising more, paying off debt, being a better person, etc.  You may even have a list that looks similar to this. These are all great, and things we should strive for but I am not a fan of making a list of resolutions.  Don’t get me wrong, it is great to have goals and work toward those goals, I have many myself, but there is a stigma attached to New Year’s resolutions and many people never follow through.  Working at Weight Watchers, I see it every year.  The first week of January there is standing room only in the meeting rooms, but come March, the newness has worn off and the resolutions fade as the year progresses.  Why is this? 

Resolutions can be shallow without God’s divine guidance!

I have had my lists of resolutions before, too, but what the Lord has shown me has taken on new meaning.  Throughout the last several years, the Lord has taken me on some amazing journeys to know him more.  Some of these journeys have been quite painful -- just being honest here -- but they have been completely necessary to bring me to a place of complete and utter dependence on him! As you can see these journeys, I can attest, were AMAZING!  What the Lord would show me was that everything I do needed to be bathed in prayer and given to the Lord for wisdom and discernment.  When I depended on my own strength, I would fail miserably, but when I put my faith & trust in Christ to follow through on his plan, goals were met and he received the glory! That totally changed me!

I am so excited to enter 2011!  As I have taken a long walk this past week looking back on 2010, I can only give praise to my God! This has been a very busy year for me and my family and the Lord has stretched me so far out of my comfort zone in many areas of my life.  But all praise be to God for all the wonderful things he has taught me!  When I began 2010 I had no idea what was in store, and I admit if I had known, I probably would have run away kicking and screaming! Lol!  God is the one that holds the future.  He knew what was in store for me, but allowed me to hold to my faith and trust him completely to go in his footsteps.  What a journey it has been! I have seen his face and clung to his Word to get me through every curve and turn I encountered.  My God is so good!

Now as I begin 2011, I enter with such peace that whatever God has in store, I will trust and have faith!  I want to seek my Father’s face even more! I want to grow so much more in love with him this year than ever before!  That is why I don’t make “New Year’s Resolutions”.  You see for me, every day is a new day to love and follow my Lord!  I can wake up every day and have my goals and my plans set, but it is all about him.  Every day I will wake up and commit that day to him and commit to do his will.  I have to die to myself.  I am an old wretched sinner, and daily I have to deny myself and allow the Holy Spirit to fill me to overflowing! 

If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me.

-- Luke 9:23

Oh, the joy that comes from allowing God to rule your day! With Christ in our lives, every day is a fresh start and daily we need to deny ourselves, pick up our cross, and follow our Master!  His ways are perfect and his mercies are new every day!

Because of the Lord’s great love we are not consumed, for his compassions never fail. They are new every morning; great is your faithfulness. I say to myself, “The LORD is my portion; therefore I will wait for him.”

-- Lamentations 3:22-24

Welcome 2011!  Our family has already sat down together and looked back at 2010 and prayerfully considered our goals for 2011; where we have been and where God is leading us individually and as a family in all areas of our home, our personal lives, our ministries and our relationships with our great Lord! What we have concluded is this: 2011 belongs to God and we will strive to do his will and further his kingdom!  We want our priorities to be in line with his.  Because he is the Giver of life and all that we have, all that we are, is only for him and his glory!

I love to sing to my God! Sometimes in the quietness of my home I give my Lord a personal concert and sing praise to him for all that he is!  When I sing, it is to an audience of One! All for him and him alone! And one day I will stand in his presence and be able to sing to him face to face and proclaim his GREATNESS! Woo-hoo! Can I get an AMEN?

One of the songs that I sing to my Lord is one that has become my anthem of prayer for 2011.  May the words be a prayer to you, Lord:

It's all about You, Jesus,

And all this is for You,

For Your glory and Your fame,

It's not about me

As if You should do things my way;

You alone are God and I surrender... 

to Your will!

Abba Father, it really is all about YOU! I surrender every fiber of my being to you! May my life reflect the beauty that is you so that others may come to know you and your will be done!

I pray that 2011 is full of blessings for you and your families! We serve an AMAZING God and he loves you so much! No matter what this year holds, we can have faith that HE holds this year in his hands! He is in control! I can’t wait to see the blessings unfold and his glory revealed in every passing day!  

For His glory in 2011~

Allison Jordan

SHBC Praise Team