dEhiN’s Blog

For my readers who don’t know, I’m involved in a Christian band called PalmSway. The band is actually meant to be part of a ministry, started up by two friends of mine – Gabriel and Mishkah – and myself. The three of us all go to the same church, and God gave them the idea to start PalmSway back in 2007, and after they shared the idea with me, I felt God’s call to be a part of it as a leader. On a side note, the ministry is called PalmSway Worship Ministries, and the purpose of the ministry is to share God’s love through the various mediums of the arts. PSWM is meant to be an umbrella ministry, under which there are both individuals and teams associated with PSWM who minister through the arts. The teams are generally considered a direct ministry (or sub-ministry) of PSWM, while individual artists can be considered associated with PSWM. For example, there is a PalmSway Worship Band, which consists of Gabriel, Mishkah, myself, and several others. We practice and play in both worship settings and concert settings (whether at a church or non-religious venue).

How does this all relate to the title of this post? Well, this past weekend, PalmSway Worship Band was invited to lead the worship at a prayer conference out of town. The conference was amazing, and extremely spiritually high. Even though there was a structure and plan, throughout the weekend God led us according to His plan for the weekend. It was interesting to see the various attempts made by Satan to get us sidetracked, but God by His Spirit kept us unified (us being both PSWB and all those in attendance at the conference). There were times of intense worship, times of teaching that really spoke to me (and it seemed many others as well), and times of prayer ministry by the pastors/apostles who were leading the conference.

The conference ended on Saturday, and much of the band members ended up helping lead worship at my church on Sunday. I say this because even though the conference ended, the spiritual high was perpetuated at church Sunday morning and evening, and throughout the afternoon.

However, coming out of the weekend, as I went to sleep yesterday, I was not sure what would happen in regard to the changes and growth and intensity of experiences and feelings. Like most Christians, I find that after a spiritual retreat of any sort, life tends to pull you back down in such a contrasting way to the time of retreat. What tends to happen is that after even a few days (!), let alone a week, the experiences of the retreat seem like a lifetime away. The growth and changes seem to rescind, either completely, or partially. I for one find it extremely frustrating. Any desires on my part that sprung up during the conference to connect deeper with God seemed to fade even today as I went about my day!

All of that changed, however, when I read a post by a friend of mine entitled Journey and Destination. My friend – Greg – was blogging his thoughts on a post by a friend of his, entitled Training vs. Trying. The ideas of both posts are the same: seeing life as a journey versus seeing life as a destination. I’m not going to explain in further detail the content of the two posts – I encourage you to read them before you continue reading below, unless you are already familiar with the ideas expressed in the post titles.

I have to say I was, and am, greatly encouraged to think that life is about the journey, about training to be like God as opposed to trying to be like God. When life is about the journey, about training to be like God, the experiences I had at the conference effect my continued experiences going forward. Instead of the conference being a destination, a point in time that is now over and therefore has no direct relevance to the present, the conference is a point in time that I can build upon. Instead of me having to try and appropriate the desires, the growth, the changes and experiences of the whole weekend onto who I am now, and onto my days going forward, I can use the weekend as the next building block/brick in my journey of life.

It is still possible, even with this outlook on life, to not build upon the existing bricks in my life properly, and as it were waste those bricks. Yet, in many senses, those bricks are still not a waste. To put this more concretely, even if I should fail to consistently, daily spend time with God, the weekend’s experiences are not wasted. It is true that the bricks laid over the weekend would be put to much better use, as a foundation, if I continue to spend time with God and practice the growth that occurred. Yet, nothing I do can ever fully negate or erase the bricks laid over the weekend. Praise God!

This is definitely a perspective that I will have to practice viewing intentionally, until it becomes a part of me. Yet, I am now encouraged that no good experience in life can be completely wasted.

DH