I have a real passion for raising up worship leaders here in North Carolina. That passion began in my work in Asia over the last 14 years. I have had multiple opportunities to speak into the lives of worship leaders in several Asia3countries in Southeast Asia and East Asia. I try to create in the leaders’ DNA that they need to make disciples and pour into the lives of other worship leaders. My translator for my last two trips to a country in east Asia had an opportunity to disciple the worship team at her church–primarily in digging deeply into the theological understandings of worship and how worship leaders can better enable their congregations to worship. Jean is an amazingly talented young lady with a heart for God. Here are her comments about the journey. I hope this will ignite in each of you a desire to help those under your care in their worship journeys.

Asia2I have been Kenny’s translator for the past two times since he first started coming out to my country to teach on worship. While he was here, we served together on teaching the Worship Summit and the Worship Leader Bootcamp. The conferences were very well received by different churches and their worship leaders. We all agree that the training is something that all churches can benefit from.

After Kenny’s short visit this past time, more people became interested in the material; some are from previous conferences, and some brand-new. In my church, there is a whole worship system being built up. After discussing with my pastor, who is also very passionate about worship, we decided to offer the training at our church for the whole worship team. Because we are one team from one church, we had the luxury of spending a total of 7 weeks on the material while learning real-time lessons through serving the church.

It was definitely really challenging for me to conduct all the training without Kenny. To translate the material and to teach it are two very different energy outputs. However, I really appreciated this opportunity for me to use Kenny’s material and grow together with my team. I had the opportunity to see us grow week by week as a worship team, learning what worship really means and what can we do as worship leaders to serve the church.

Asia1One of the most memorable moments of training is when we were learning on “Worship and Discipleship” and “The Great Commandment Matrix”, we felt the spirit moving in us to just pause the class and repent–for ourselves, for our team, and on behalf of our church as a whole. We realized we love too little and we need to grow in our walk with God and our perspective of this world in order to have a stronger burden for those who are still unsaved. It was eye-opening to see what this material can do for us when we really put the heart into learning it.

Today we finished our last class. We had a short debriefing at the end of it. Some people shared that they felt ready to fight the battle with worship. Some shared that their whole perspective about worship has been changed. One said she realized that she didn’t even know what worship was before this class. One said that she was sure of her calling on worship. We had a good time praying and fellowshipping to end the training. Through our training, I saw a team opening up to God’s heart and growing closer with one another. We still have a long way to go, but we now know the core of worship and can use it to serve our church and our town. For myself, it was an experience that I would not have it any other way. I am truly thankful that I was able to do this. Praise God!

As I mentioned in another post, one of my greatest passions in mission endeavors is to raise up an army of believers who will train others and train trainers to train others, leading to an exponential growth in discipleship.

What are you doing to disciple those under your care?