Saturday, January 15

Ever have a dream you were so sure was real?

(Caveat: I just watched Carlos' talk on disturbing and disrupting the local church. It's long, but it's good, and let's just say it might be on target. That may have been one of the wells that my subconscious was drawing from here. Or maybe it was God trying to tell me something profound. Or maybe I'm pompous and presumptuous, and have a huge head. It's sometimes really hard to tell with this kind of thing...)

Just woke up from a dream. I was leading worship at the biggest Catholic youth conference I've ever been to, and which I'm sure I've talked about on here before, Steubenville (Mid-America, in this case). We had Mass, followed by Adoration, which for my non-Catholic people is a lot to get into, but it's basically a time of worship where, because of our beliefs about the Eucharist, we believe that Christ is physically present for us to look at, be with, touch (in some cases), and worship. The God of the Universe comes down, sits on the altar, and deigns to let us worship him.

Anyway, point of the story. Instead of leading from here:

ST102 - Sunday Morning and Mass 063

I was leading from here:

ST102 - Friday Evening and Adoration 020

and it made all the difference in the world. I was literally sitting in a stadium seat with my Adam Bitter hat on, my guitar strapped around me with a mic in front of me, my bass player to my left and a drummer somewhere behind. Presumably also in the stadium seats. A little impractical, maybe, but it was a dream. It was also the most incredible feeling: I could lead, but completely be myself because no one except for the people sitting around me had any idea who was leading. I was completely free to worship when I'd lead everyone to the point where the didn't need me anymore. We got to the Adoration portion of the evening, and I could worship just like I have been at every Steubenville I'd ever been to, sitting amongst the crowd, except that I was in charge of where the evening went. I don't remember everything I sang, but I ended with "How Great is Our God" and it brought tears to my eyes to hear all of these people surrounding me, worshiping along with me, with a song that I barely use anymore because "it's so old man! like from 2004!", but that was almost surely huge in my formative years when I was coming to know (Conocer) God after so many years of knowing about God (Saber) (when I, in actuality, had no idea what I was doing).

Then, in my usual way, to bring home the fact that this was, in fact, me doing all of this, Adoration ended, the host speaker took back over, and the youth minister I've worked with the most, the one who's been with me as I've been learning how to be a music minister, Jen, tapped me on the shoulder and told me that I did a good job, to which I replied, "Kind of. Could have been better. I don't know." Which is probably what I've said at the end of pretty much every Mass, Adoration, time of worship, whatever, that I've ever led. I'm really bad at taking compliments. But then one of my teens, who I was also sitting next to, said "I liked the way that you put your guitar down and prayed."

Interesting.

2 comments:

  1. That's a pretty freakin' cool dream! Wailin' on your axe in the middle of the congregation during Mass! Love it!

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  2. Thanks man, it was incredible. Reminded me of the old days when toe organ and the choir were in the choir loft, behind the congregation. Maybe that's something I need to start experimenting with, since lately a lot of my great worship experiences have come while I'm leading from the back...

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