The heart of worship...

...is a song that I'm not entirely thrilled about.

Random.

I know.

A song I seemed to have lost interest in through the years, probably due to the fact that since '99 (when the tune came out) until now, I've played the song roughly 1,299,384,583,598,324,256,776,209.25 times.

But...

Due to recent events, the words of this semi-sacred worship classic ring true.

I'll give you the quick run down:

They say that your first Christmas as a married couple is the most memorable. I would agree.

Our First Christmas weekend started a little like this.... I knew that I would be playing with 'Grey No More' at a camp in Alva, FL from the Wednesday after Crimma to the following Sunday, so I packed up all of my gear to get it out of the way (one less thing to worry about when we got home.)

I decided that we should leave my guitars and amps at my folks house, just to be safe. So we packed up the presents for my family and headed to their house.

We dropped off the presents the my parents house and randomly got into conversation with the f-a-m... after a while we realized that we had lost track of time and were going to be late to a hockey game with some friends (FL Everblades vs. Columba Inferno... we won... and by 'we' I mean the Inferno... don't get me wrong, I love the Blades, but theys gots nothin on my Inferno!) so we dipped out..

As we started to leave, mom reminded me that we had not dropped the gear off!

"I'll either drop it off in the morning, or just leave it in my garage..." I said "....no big deal!" I casually mumbled.

We headed off to the game, and made it back home around Midnight.

I was on the other side of the house when I hear what sounded like a mass quantitiy of glass shattering, followed by a gentle, but sad "Help..."

Without hesitation (after a couple moments) I ran (walked briskly, anyway) through the cribble to find the Crimma Tree on the floor and a few dozen glass and porcelain ornaments strewn across our tile floor in a broken mess...

"No big deal..." the thought rang through my cranium once again.

After about an hour of sweeping and fighting the dog off, we were able to get the last of it picked up, at which time Laura and I went to the room and passed out.

I woke up early Saturday (before Crimma) remembering that my gear was in my car, and was preparing myself to clean it all out to head to O-Town for Crimma with The Macks.

As the garage door began to open...

Slowly...

I saw that my rear passenger door was open.

For some reason, the garage door now started to open MUCH, MUCH slower... as if the whole world began to hold it's breath..

It continued to open to reveal that my trunk too, was ajar.

To my dismay I found that I had 4 guitars, 2 amps, and roughly $900 worth of microphones jacked from my A-B Ride...

Sad.

I know.

Tell me about it!

I thought again: "No big deal..."

What seemed, at the time, to be a small issue turned into a train wreck. I waited for the police report to clear that Thursday and on called my {INSERT LARGE NATIONAL INSURANCE COMPANY NAME HERE} agent to break him the good news... Turns out I had no insurance, and my renters could only cover $1000 of the close to $15,000 loss.

Sadder.

I knower.

Tell me more-er about it!

It was in this moment that God began knocking at my door.

I had been feeling for a while that God was trying to get my attention. It was pretty much unmistakable at this point.

I wrestled with the thought that I just wasn't meant to play music.

"Is this true?" I had to ask myself.

"Did God take me this far, just to drop me off?" I continued...

"God, am I NOT supposed to be doing this?" I couldn't help but ask.

I asked this question for a couple of days. After which point God seemed to deliver the metaphorical 'back-hand', stating that "...if I didn't need you to do this, I wouldn't have left you with one guitar!"

It made sense.

Out of all the gear they was pilfered from me, they left the ONLY guitar really worth taking: 1981 Les Paul.

It seemed as if Mr. Redman had penned that tune just for me. For once in my life all really HAD BEEN stripped away from me.

I had no choice. I HAD to come to God... empty-handed... humbled... completely dependent on God.

God began to speak to me about worship. Not singing at church on Sunday... but WORSHIP. What it meant to glorify God in EVERYTHING that I do. In my realtionship with my wife... my family... my friends... even my dog!

In the way I do my job... talk to strangers... watch TV...

"WORSHIP ME!" God seemed to bellow from somewhere in the clouds.

I decided to leave 'Grey No More' that week. I would then follow suit and leave the Summit Worship Band as well... for a while anyway.

God seemed to pull me off the 'stage' saying how He didn't need me to be up there if I wasn't going to LEAD people, not just with music, but with MY LIFE.

I began to fast and pray about my life... my roll in worship... what I'm supposed to do with this little bit talent, large imagination, and new-found education.

I'm still not sure what it is... but I feel closer to it... we'll see what the future holds.

Please pray for me.

Amani,
SLIM

p.s. Looks like {INSERT LARGE NATIONAL INSURANCE COMPANY NAME HERE} is going to pay for the boggarted equipment after all! SUCKERS!!