Read
an interview that John Wimber Gave several years
ago in Worship Together magazine. It was written during
the height of a wave of renewal activity in churches
around the world.
This is excerpted from an interview done by
worship leader Stuart Townsend with John Wimber
several years ago in Worship Together magazine.
It was written during the height of a wave of
renewal activity in churches around the world.
John, what’s your perspective on how
works of God relate to the worshipping life of
the church?
Historically, every move of God produces new
music. Often the new songs were simple style and
used contemporary settings – the popular music
of the day, if you will. God raises up teachers
and leaders who have emphasized the importance
of praise and worship, and this produces the
dividend of hearts ready and receptive to the
work of God in the lives of God’s people. Just
as back in California we dig waterways and
ditches to prepare water to flow through them,
so the teaching and leadership can develop a
readiness and hunger for works of God.
How should writers, musicians and
worship leaders prepare for what God wants to
do?
The difficulty will not be so much in the
writing of new and great music; the test will be
the godliness of those that perform and deliver
it. In that sense some of our worship community
is not well prepared. Many have been allowed
into worship leading because there is a need for
their worship and musical skills. But little has
been said to them about the need for godliness,
spirituality and depth of maturity in their
individual and family lives. Quite frankly, many
of our musicians are just not steeped in a daily
spirituality.
We learned a lot from our own experience of
God’s initial revival in the Vineyard in 1979
and the years that followed. In that period we
had both blessing and destruction.
We had people who were just not ready to be used
of God in a highly public way, although you
would have thought they were from their gifts of
teaching, ministry or music. They were very
gifted, but they just weren’t very godly. We
need to be aware that in times of great
blessing, there is also the potential for great
testing and trial. With the blessing goes great
pressure.
What kind of pressure?
It’s easy to become so enamored of some aspect
of the outflow of God, that in trying to protect
or champion it, you will find yourself out of
line with orthodoxy. As leaders we need to
remain congruent with orthodoxy and orthopraxy,
to maintain our focus on the ‘main and the
plain’ in Scripture.
How do we practically go about it be
ready to be used by God?
We need to remember that seeking God for
experiences and gifts is superficial; we are
simply called to seek God. I’ve preached many
times that we are called to a reverential
serving of God with our whole heart and being,
and that nothing is guaranteed except for God. I
can’t guarantee that your children will be
happy, or that your spouse will love you
forever…but I can guarantee that if your
desire is Jesus, you’ll get Jesus.
When I went through cancer a year or so ago, I
was astounded when people from my own church
asked me, “Weren’t you afraid you were going
to die?” After about the fiftieth person, I
realized that I hadn’t really taught my
congregation very well. I had to get before them
and say, “In June 1963 this man died. And
everything from that time to this= has been
Jesus.” I’m not trying to hold on to my
life; I gave my life up.
When I became a Christian, I was a musician with
two U.S. top ten albums I had produced [for the
Righteous Brothers]; it was the establishment of
my career after thirteen years of hard work. But
God spoke to me in the two-line parable of the
pearl of great price: “I want it. Give it to
me.” He didn’t say “Give it to me and then
I will give you a career as a pastor, or I will
give you music that will go all over the
world.” He said, “Give me everything.
Liquidate all your assets, and I’ll give you
the pearl.”
Now the pearl isn’t a new career, or the
opportunity to make a name for yourself as a
worship writer or leader. It isn’t even the
ability to sustain yourself in that profession.
If your motivation as a worship leader involved
in local church worship is to make a full-time
career of it, you’ll probably be disappointed.
The pearl is Jesus. And if He is your focus,
you’ll have to face things, but you will come
through in a godly fashion. So this is not the
time for secret sin; this is the time to pay
attention, to sober up, to focus on the things
of God, to get rooted in the word of God and in
the church community; to give yourself
wholeheartedly to God, and deal with any
weakness in your armor. If you do that,
glorifying God in your personal private life as
well as your public, professional endeavors,
your shield may get a little dented, but
you’ll come through. END
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This is excerpted from an interview done by
worship leader Stuart Townsend with John Wimber
several years ago in Worship Together magazine.
It was written during the height of a wave of
renewal activity in churches around the world.
