Florida Outpouring Part 2a: Worship

My prayer as I traveled to Lakeland for the revival on Sunday night I had one prayer. It was that I would see and receive all that God has for me, and those things that weren't of Him would be obvious and fall to the floor. I wanted to put aside all that I had read and heard and seen and walk in the door just as everyone else did that night. Expecting to experience God's presence.

I used my trusty GPS to find the location of the revival which was now at the municipal airport just southwest of Lakeland. I arrived to a HUGE fenced parking lot. There were some parking attendants guiding people in. I arrived at about 8:30, which was about an hour and a half late, but I could hear the worship cranking from a gigantic "tent" setup near the parking lot. I met a few people that had been there a few times and they all had good things to say as I walked past some food vendors and a lemonade/water stand and up to the tent. Wasn't sure where to go since there were no signs and nobody that appeared to be greeting or leading people in. I'm a big boy, I can figure it out.

Going in. I was ready. I had heard from some people that you could feel the weight of God's glory when you walked in. I was ready for it. I expected it. I didn't get that immediately. Sorry, I just didn't. I even stopped for a few minutes at the back and just tried to get aware of my surroundings. I did sense God's presence and I did see many very sincere people worshiping, but I just didn't sense anything that I would describe as a 'weight' or 'heaviness'.

The first thing I noticed as I entered were a few people laying on the floor near the back. I wasn't sure if they were worshiping or sleeping since they had brought blankets or sleeping bags to lie on. As I walked through the tent up to the front on the left side I noticed a LOT of people who were either in wheelchairs or had some sort of disability. The thought ran through my mind that I may see them at the end of the night walking out much different.

Let me talk a little bit about the worship as I experienced it.
As a worship leader, I know two things. One, God's presence always shows up when His people are truly worshiping Him. You can feel it. You know it when you are in that moment. Two, when you bring that many people together to worship it is dynamic. Not because God's presence is there MORE necessarily, but because there is an emotional response to the crowd, the music, the leader, the atmosphere AND the increased faith of the people just being around each other engaging in worship. I saw a LOT of people sincerely worshiping God. I also saw a LOT of emotional 'guidance' from the worship leader. At one point, the worship leader stayed on a single chord on the keyboard for at least 7-8 minutes and stared off into one spot with a completely blank stare. Im not sure what that was for, but the crowd loved it. The longer it went on the louder they got. It didn't seem so much that people were worshiping as much as they were celebrating whatever it was that the worship leader was doing because it was so anti-everything they had ever seen in a church service. This was to become the theme of the night. More on that in post Part 2b.

On a positive note, I really sensed God's presence in the worship and I was engaged in it for some time. Then came the prophetic worship. At times, it was powerful and beautiful. It really was and I enjoyed it. But there were times during the prophetic worship that were just plain awkward moments. The worship leader would be riffing and say something off base and you could hear him backtrack and correct. Nothing major, probably just my sensitivity. There were people dancing in the aisles, lots of flag and banner waving, some crying, some people were slain in the spirit, some were shaking, some were sitting and praying...pretty much the gamut, but not nearly as crazy as I had anticipated. I felt pretty comfortable worshiping there, even given the distractions.

At one point, I moved to the right side of the stage and near the back 2 women were praying and laying hands on a teenage boy who jerked and shook and occasionally screamed out at the top of his lungs. This was a very odd scene even for this revival. From what I could hear, they were praying for God to use this kid, but it looked and sounded more like he was being attacked by them. Many people around were really distracted by it. A guy in a wheelchair rolled up behind where I was standing. I could hear him praying in the spirit. It was beautiful. Actually, I didn't hear much praying in the spirit and I didn't hear much use of tongues even from the stage. I was a little surprised by that. I expected more of that than was there. I don't want to judge, but there was a real contrast between the quiet spirit led prayer of the man in the wheelchair and the occasional outburst of unknown words that the leaders sometimes came out with. Maybe because they had a crowd?

There was another dynamic going on that I noticed. The people closest to the stage were way more engaged in it all. These people were full tilt worshiping with everything they had and were almost as much a part of leading the worship as the band was. That was actually pretty cool to see happen. Then in what seemed like concentric circles out of that the response varied until you got the the farther sections where most people appeared to be observing it all or trying to get away from the clamor going on up front. Interesting to see.

Banners, dancers, flags...they were all there. I didn't see the tambourine lady, but Im sure she was there somewhere near the front. One lady had full camouflage on which she had embellished with gold accents and waved a huge golden banner thing. Something about an army was written on her back but I couldn't make it out. She wasn't still long enough to make it out. I did noticed the production crew occasionally make the banner folks move to the back behind the camera line.

This was an atmosphere of excitement and anticipation. There was definitely two things there, God's presence was there...that was obvious. It didn't have the 'weight' that was described to me by others, but God's presence was real and it was awesome. I was able to engage in worship and really did feel like God was being honored there. I don't know how else to put it that doesn't come across negative, but there was also a lot of pure emotion and hype there too. I don't think that emotion is wrong in worship, but when it seems like what is being done is being done to prolong the emotion...it's easy to get caught up in worshiping the emotional response rather than God. I have to admit a few times I got caught up in it and I had to re-focus myself on what I was doing. I sometimes even have to do that during worship at Seacoast. Emotion can sometimes become our religion, or our idol, and I think to some extent it is happening at Lakeland. I don't think that it is any ones fault that this happens, but I do think that leadership at the revival embraces this type of response rather than guiding people to re-focus on the object of our worship rather than the emotional response prompted by a leader, the music, the volume, the crowd, etc. This would become extremely apparent as the night went on. More on that in part 2b. Coming next.

As a worship leader I understand the importance of excitement and emotionally engaging people as we lead them to experience God in worship. Let me be very transparent...a worship leader who can't engage people on an emotional level isn't going to be around for long. It is a vital part of leading people. A worship leader has to learn how to do it. But there has to be a balance. When an emotional response becomes the goal rather than the means to a goal it seems something is out of place. I can't believe that I as a music guy am saying this, but I would love to see what would happen in these services if they cut out the musical worship part of the services for a while and dive into prayer and the reading of the word in it's place and just see what difference it makes. I wonder how many days the revival would have gone without a killer band and sound system.

I will mention this in the next post, but the speaker for the night called out to churches to break out of their box. Actually, he was a little more harsh than that, but that was the idea. To an extent I agree...we do need times of worship with no limitations on time. We need times of worship where people are free to express their worship in any way they want to whether it be praying in the spirit, lifting hands, laying on the floor, dancing, etc. But at the same time, it's not that we need to break out of the box to become like someone else. It's just a different box. God has given churches and leaders vision to reach people with whatever means necessary. For some it is traditional worship services and liturgy. For some it is a contemporary worship service with drama and dance. For some it is full-on, full-gospel charismaniac worship (thank you, tambourine lady). For us it is a 75 minute service where the word is taught in a practical, non-spooky environment and people can respond to God in worship in many ways (candles, cross, communion, prayer, giving). None of them are wrong or evil or even lacking. They are different and serve different purposes for the gospel to go out.


The big picture is that I saw God being sincerely and earnestly being worshiped that night. It was awesome to see and experience. I can't wait to worship with Seacoast this weekend.