… thank you guys for being faithful and for helping to change the way I and countless other worship leaders saw worship music. Thank you for challenging and stretching yourselves and for giving so much to us as a church. You guys changed my life and gave me a passion for worshiping God. Thanks!

What are you reading?

Kim and I love listening to different podcasts at night before we go to bed and last night God used that time to stir my heart. Francis Chan rocked my world. It was awesome. So I wanted to share that with you. I’m not gonna tell you what it’s about but just encourage [...]]]>

Kim and I love listening to different podcasts at night before we go to bed and last night God used that time to stir my heart. Francis Chan rocked my world. It was awesome. So I wanted to share that with you. I’m not gonna tell you what it’s about but just encourage you listen to it and expect God to challenge your heart.

Living a Life That Matters – Francis Chan [iTunes Link]

So, right now at Calvary (like most other churches) we’re in full swing in our planning for this year’s Easter services in a few weeks. This includes me in my area of planning the songs for this years services. And as always, I’ve got my list of usual suspects for songs that are [...]]]>

So, right now at Calvary (like most other churches) we’re in full swing in our planning for this year’s Easter services in a few weeks. This includes me in my area of planning the songs for this years services. And as always, I’ve got my list of usual suspects for songs that are on the list of possibles for this year. But I’m looking to see if I can get out of my little box a little and expand my horizons. So naturally I turn to all of you out there in the blogosphere. So here’s what I need from you. Let me know if you can think of any songs that would go great in an Easter service. You know what I’m talking about… the standard Resurrection-He-Arose-Christ-the-Lord-is-Risen-Victory-Over-The-Grave-Jesus-Christ-Rules kinda songs. Anything, I don’t care if you’re a worship leader or not, I just want song ideas.

Hook it up Yo…

- Vic

UPDATE: So I was just looking at my stats and apparantly some of you coming here have found a similar post from last year where I asked a similar question… If anyone wants to check it out here’s a link.

Catalyst is coming to SoCal on April 23-26, 2009. Are you signed up to attend? You should be because if you are here are some of the names that will be there with you: Andy Stanley, Erwin McManus, Brian Houston, Craig Groeschel, Perry Noble, Francis Chan, Guy Kawasaki, Dan Kimble, Mark Batterson, and Hillsong United [...]]]>

Catalyst is coming to SoCal on April 23-26, 2009. Are you signed up to attend? You should be because if you are here are some of the names that will be there with you: Andy Stanley, Erwin McManus, Brian Houston, Craig Groeschel, Perry Noble, Francis Chan, Guy Kawasaki, Dan Kimble, Mark Batterson, and Hillsong United just to name a few.

I’ve been waiting years for an opportunity to go to a Catalyst conference and now it’s gonna be right in my back yard. I’m so there…. Are you?

Click Here To Check Out and Sign Up For Catalyst West Coast

Hey everyone, since I’m on the blogging band-wagon again I thought an easy way to score myself another post would be to do one of my good old trusty Worship Confessionals again. So that’s what I’m gonna do whether you like it or not. So sit back, relax and take a minute to catch up [...]]]>

Hey everyone, since I’m on the blogging band-wagon again I thought an easy way to score myself another post would be to do one of my good old trusty Worship Confessionals again. So that’s what I’m gonna do whether you like it or not. So sit back, relax and take a minute to catch up on how last Sunday went in the Elevation service at Calvary Church Santa Ana.

Welp, let me start out by telling you that this week was totally different from most of my weeks. For those of you who are numbers people I’d say it was different than about 97.82% of my weeks. What made it so different you ask? Well, two things for me. 1) I played in our Celebration service which I hardly ever do simply because I’m always walking around and checking out the Student Ministries stuff and making sure things are going ok in those areas or because I’m just finishing up some final touches on the Elevation service. Either way, I’m usually doing something. 2) We didn’t get to have our normal rehearsal this week because we were doing a Christmas musical this week and they were using our stage where we normally are.

So, it was different. Different but good too. I actually loved playing in our Celebration service… I loved it because I wasn’t leading it and that is something I don’t get to do very often anymore. I loved just sitting back and just playing what someone else had for me and adding my own style to that. It was so sweet. I also loved that we didn’t have a full rehearsal on Tuesday. Don’t get me wrong, it was tough, but it was just a cool reminder that God is control of what we do and the Holy Spirit can work even if we (I) don’t feel as prepared as I should.

Another thing that was different about this week was that we started doing some of our Christmas songs and thats always fun.

One of the things though that stood out the most about this Sunday was just simply the fact that our people in Elevation were singing their hearts out… they were singing LOUD! As a worship leader I loved hearing that. I loved hearing the voices of the people in our congregation above my own and the others on stage. It’s was neat to see the Holy Spirit moving in our room too. I can honestly say that our people worshiped God with their whole hearts this Sunday. I love that. What an encouragement that is to me as their pastor.

Now finally we get down to the nitty-gritty… the songs we used this week and for simplicities sake I’m just gonna make a list down below and finish off this post. Feel free to ask questions about anything and I’d love to hear from you how your Sunday went. Or even better ,if you’re an Elevationite, I’d love to hear your thoughts on Sunday. Here are the songs…

• Angels We Have Heard On High – Our Arrangement
• Here I Am To Worship – Hughes
• Till I See You – Hillsong United
• The Stand – Hillsong United
• Jesus Paid It All – Arr. Nifong
• Only You – Crowder

This post is part of a group of Worship Leaders who post their Sunday Setlist. To check out what other Worship Leaders did today click here.

He is like a Mounty, he always gets his man and he’ll zap you anyway he can… Zap!

PSALTY, COLBY, CHARITY CHURCH MOUSE!!! Those are the names I grew up with as a kid. I, probably like a nice big chunk of you, grew up in the golden era of the Christian musical days when Maranatha Music ruled. One of their creations was a big blue singing songbook who had a dog, a [...]]]>

PSALTY, COLBY, CHARITY CHURCH MOUSE!!! Those are the names I grew up with as a kid. I, probably like a nice big chunk of you, grew up in the golden era of the Christian musical days when Maranatha Music ruled. One of their creations was a big blue singing songbook who had a dog, a family, and not to mention a worship workshop. So classic, this guy and the music he brought of his bright red tapes helped define me and who I am today.

Anyway, So the other day I was talking to some people in the young adult group here at church and for some reason the topic of Psalty the singing songbook came up in our conversation (If you don’t still don’t know who Psalty is then you need to go over here to Wikipedia and read this article on him). We started talking about how much we loved Psalty and all those old tapes and songs and all that good stuff. So I tell them that I wish I had some of those tapes so I can introduce my kids to them and all the heavenly goodness that is Psalty the Singing SongBook. Then they look at me and tell me that they still have a bunch of the tapes at home and they still listen to them. So to make a long story short…..

…. it’s time for me to make some CD’s and get myself and my kids rockin’ a giant blue singing songbook. HEHE!!! I’m giddy right now…. TESTIFY!!!!

How many of you out there are using YouVersion yet? I’m loving it. I use it on my iphone all the time and I’m especially loving the daily reading tab on there. But I’m wondering, who else out there is using YouVersion? How do you use it? Let me know… oh [...]]]>

How many of you out there are using YouVersion yet? I’m loving it. I use it on my iphone all the time and I’m especially loving the daily reading tab on there. But I’m wondering, who else out there is using YouVersion? How do you use it? Let me know… oh and if you wanna get in the know go check it out at www.YouVersion.com or click here to download the iphone app.

Do you YouVersion?

For the past few [...]]]> I’m always so amazed at how God provides things when you don’t expect them. I know some of you saw my tweets last night or even my facebook status but for those of you who didn’t hear, this is what happened last night with a little more background to the story…

For the past few months Kim and I have been really needing to buy a new bed. You see there was this fat guy (I’m not gonna mention any names but I know who I am) who kinda jumped on our bed and broke the boxspring. The good thing was that somehow with all my years of skilled technical labor and craftsmanship I was able to fix it (alright, all I did was turn it around so the break was resting on the frame so thus masking the problem… but it got the job done OK) only to then find it broken again a few weeks later but this time at the other end. So, the box spring was done. Thats not to mention the mattress which we bought used off some friend of a friend of a friend who wore a patch over his left eye and talked like Jack Sparrow… but for $50 bucks you’re not gonna complain too much when you’re a poor newly married couple when all you had before that was a bed that I’m pretty sure was around when the Israelites were wandering in the desert. Anyway, so enough with the back story, basically we needed a bed but we didn’t have much (any) money. So we started looking at prices and sizes and all that stuff and finally found one that we might be able to afford. So, I got started on the plan to get all the things together that one needs to buy a new bed (money and a friend with a truck) and we planned to go get it sometime this week….It was all set. Well, thats not the way it exactly worked out in the end. At about 9:30 last night a couple friends (including that previously mentioned friend with a truck) just “happened to be be in the neighborhood” and wanted to see if they could “drop by for a few minutes”…. So they came, and they just so happened to have a brand spanking new bed in the back of their truck. Needless to say, I kinda freaked out a little bit. They told us that they just wanted to bless us and that was the end of it. So I did what any self respecting guy would do at that moment…. I offered them some homebaked cookies.

Anyway, it totally reminded me of the way the body of Christ was supposed to work. We have that example in Acts 2 where is says,

All the believers were together and had everything in common. Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts, praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.

I know Kim and I feel like we experienced this kind of community last night and it is seriously so cool to see God working through our friends and feel that community and love in a tangible way. And ya know what, I can’t help but think of the last part of that passage where it says, And the Lord added to their numbers daily those who were being saved. I think thats why I just wanted to write this post. I wanna tell people that the kind of community that was going on in the book of Acts 2000 years ago among Christians is still going on now… I should know, I got a bed out of it. But seriously, I think that this is one of those unique things about Christianity and it’s also one of those things that should be so attractive to those who are outside of the church. We don’t give because we want something out of it, but instead we give because we love…. because we want to bless people’s socks off. But if we’re doing this why aren’t we seeing the people coming daily like in Acts? The community is happening but why isn’t this the way the world see us? How do they see us? And if they did see us for these things would we be seeing people added to our numbers daily?

Anyway, those are just some thoughts going through my head right now. Last night, God used my friends to bless my socks off… when was the last time when was the last time you got to bless someone’s socks off?