One of the concepts that Pastor Steven has challenged us with lately is approaching ministry with an “in the box� mentality. With this approach, we accept the limitations that we can’t change, such as portability, and use them to fuel creativity and thus leverage what could be a weakness into strength.

There are many ways that this concept manifests itself in our worship ministry. There are elements of our box that we can’t and sometimes don’t want to change, such as the schedule of our services.

Each worship experience is programmed down to the minute because every second is valuable and we want to maximize the time given to the preaching of God’s word. If one service gets out late, than there is a ripple affect that throws the rest of the worship experiences off schedule. Therefore, at Elevation, we will never be able to have extended, spontaneous times of worship.

In order to prevent the 4 song set that we have every week from becoming stale, we must think in the box. By planning ahead and seeking God during the week, we are able to creatively come up with new ways for the service to flow that allow for different elements of worship such as having a video in the middle of a song, having an extended prayer during a musical transition, or putting most of the worship songs after the sermon rather than before.

In other words, worship should never feel like it is in the rut of 2 songs, announcements and then another song before the bumper. Work within your box and use that to fuel moments that take worship to a new level.

Sometimes we might put ourselves in a box in order to foster greater creativity. During our current series, My Generation, we have picked songs that we have done a lot and forced ourselves to do new arrangements.

Make a fast song into a slow song, change the key so that you can tag it with a great ending chorus from another song, or use the bridge of a Coldplay song as the bridge for your worship song. What I am finding is that when you breath new life into a song, it actually causes people to re-engage with lyrics that may have become routine. By putting yourself in a box and giving yourself limitations, you will come across some great ideas that help your people’s heart engage with God in a new and fresh way.

Wade Joye, Worship Pastor

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I thought I’d take this opportunity to share who Pastor Steven Furtick is from my vantage point. Actually, what I’d like to do is dispel some myths that other people say about him and give you a real look under the hood; which will be much more fun.

So here we go. This is in no particular order and not in Letterman format. I have been with him for a long time and feel very qualified to write this and if you don’t agree this is my opinion and nobody else’s. In review, below is what I hear about him followed by what I know about him.
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Pastor Steven is…
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1. Inaccessible- He preaches 40-45 times per year (all available online) and blogs 5 days a week. If you need him more than that than you might be needier than he is inaccessible. We’ve also structured the church to allow him to seek God and prepare for Sundays while the rest of the staff does what they are called to do.

1. An overnight success- God called him to plant a large church in a large city 12 years ago. That’s a long night.

1. All about the numbers- Well, this one is true… He is all about the number of lives changed, marriages restored, addictions defeated, and people crossing from darkness into light. And so is God.

1. Too focused on evangelism- Our Sunday mornings will always be the super bowl. It will also always be the public display of what we do as a church. Everything is designed so that people far from God will be filled with life in Christ. Hence the term evangelism. What you don’t see are the hours of meetings planning and strategizing on how to move large numbers of people forward in their faith through small groups, volunteering, and living out their faith.

1. Arrogant- The larger Elevation grows, the more humble he becomes. He knows that he could not accomplish on his own what has happened at Elevation. I think there is a lot more temptation for pride and arrogance in a small church where the Pastor is the expert and knows how to do everything than a fast growing church where the leader is learning from God as he goes.

These are just a few myths that I thought I’d take a minute and bust. Pastor Steven Furtick is a great man of God; poised to impact the kingdom of God like no one else in our generation. It’s an honor to serve him and this church. It’s an honor to call him my Pastor.

Chunks Corbett, Executive Pastor
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About a week ago I wrote a blog entry that centered on our new believer follow up process. My purpose for the blog was to introduce our philosophy; you can read about it here.

At Elevation we have decided that we are going to cast the net as wide as we can in order to catch as many fish as possible. Jesus teaches a parable about this topic in Matthew 13:24-30 that has guided our decision. He suggests that the risk of trying to ‘pluck the weeds’ is far too great, you might unintentionally ‘harm the wheat’. It’s better to leave the ‘weeds’ alone and let God separate them out at the end of the age.Â

We have applied this basic principle to how we call people to salvation in our worship experiences. On occasion we may get some people who for the wrong reasons, or without a complete understanding ‘check the box’, but isn’t that risk worth it in order to make sure that everyone has the opportunity to genuinely receive Christ’s eternal gift of salvation. There will always be time to separate the wheat from the weeds later on, but frankly, God didn’t ask us to separate his harvest, he told us to sow the seed!

So, with all that said, here’s what we are working on to provide as many touch points as possible after someone ‘checks the box’.Â

• We have put together a Nextlevel packet (this consists of a Bible, a letter from Pastor Steven, a book mark with the plan of salvation on one side and the table of contents for their new Bible on the other, and a copy of our most recent worship CD).Â
• Also the people who ‘check the box’ will receive an email from Pastor that afternoon. This email invites them to share their story with us.
• Immediately, following the service a team of people begin plugging people’s information into a spreadsheet that is loaded on Google Documents and by 6:00pm many of the people who ‘checked the box’ that morning are receiving a phone call from us.Â
• Following that phone call people can choose to take any number of ‘next steps’ including a class about our church called 4G’s, a group devoted to New Believers called Starting Point (thanks North Point), a regular small group and/or a volunteer opportunity.

We don’t have a perfect system. But we have a clear vision: people far from God being filled with life in Christ. To that end we are casting, to that end we are sowing seeds, and to that end we are tending the harvest that has been brought in!!!

John Bishop, Community Groups Pastor
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We have recently begun introducing original worship music as a regular part of our worship experiences. These songs have been received well, and have been inspired by the seasons we have gone through as a church over the last few months.

The desire to do original music is pretty common among worship leaders, so here are some guidelines we use at Elevation for whether or not a song makes the cut.

1. Would we use the song even if we didn’t write it? Just because you wrote the song, that doesn’t automatically mean it was meant for corporate worship. It may be a good song, but one that is meant for your personal time of worship rather than one that enhances your Sunday worship experience.

   We apply the same standards to our original songs that we do to any other worship song. If it can’t hold its own between the best Hillsong United song and Steve Fee tune, then we won’t use it. It has to be a great song regardless of who wrote it.

2. Does it faithfully give voice to what God is doing in our church? One of the reasons I believe God has blessed the original music we have done so far is it has given our people a specific way to respond to the distinct moves of God in our midst.

   During Dominate, we did a song called Undivided about putting everything on the table before God, which was one of Pastor Steven’s main challenges to us during that season. Write songs that are born out of what God is doing in your context, not out of a desire to write the next huge worship chorus.

3. Does it pass the team test? At Elevation, we are blessed to have three worship leaders on staff. We have a weekly writing meeting on Thursdays were we work on our original material. We won’t do a song unless the whole team feels good about it.

   We also submit all of our original material to our Pastor for his approval before we introduce it. We pay special attention to our lyrics, because we want to make sure that everything we write is Scripturally sound.

   If you don’t have a team, find people that you trust who will be honest with you about your songs. When you find those people, be willing to listen to their critique. There is a good chance it will make your song better.

Wade Joye, Worship Pastor
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