Weekly? Maybe.

Here's what I'd like to do. I'd like to update this weekly with news of the internship and what I'm doing and what opportunities God brings me, and what life is like, et cetera. I think Monday or Tuesday would be a good day to do that.

Speaking of Mondays, I'll tell you about something that we had a class on last week. Aaron had Jon Stallsmith (one of the teaching staff at Grace) talk to us about the Sabbath. We went through Gen. 1 & 2, and some stuff in Exodus 17 about the Sabbath and what it means and how important it is to keep the Sabbath. We also talked from Matthew 10. (If you want my notes from that, send me an email and I'll send them to you.) All of that to say, I am trying to set aside Monday as a Sabbath rest for me. This includes things like sleep and rest; unhurried prayer; recreation and fun; relationships, especially spending time with Mary; decompressing and processing, and more. This would be the day for me to be able to put my thoughts from the past week down, or up on the internet, as the case may be. I think this is very important. This is not just for special people who are really, really spiritual. Keeping the Sabbath holy is for every Christian. We can't be too busy to have a Sabbath, it's to be a part of a holistic life of holiness.
I'll stop preaching now. Keep in mind that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. I don't have this all together. I'm not doing as well as I should on this, or on many, many other areas.

Sunday, Isaiah and I led worship in the main auditorium at Grace. I'll find out in a little bit just how many people were there this weekend, but I know that, over the course of the three services, there were probably over four thousand people who came through the doors. That's more people than I have ever led worship for in one day.
Isaiah did a wonderful job on Sunday. Aaron was commenting yesterday about him, that he was very warm and compelling an inviting on stage, and that he felt like Isaiah connected well with the people.

Buddy preached a sermon as sort of a follow up for Craig Gross' (www.xxxchurch.com) sermon last week on the dangers of sin and especially sexual sin, namely pornography. Buddy preached from Mark 6 about Herod and his stolen wife and step-daughter, and the death of John the Baptist. His main points were that sin is never singular and that we are responsible, not only for our actions, but also for our influence. He showed a rap video at the end of his message, about a middle aged man taking a prostitute and making her a porn star, basically, and then about a young man, looking at porn on the internet, and finding this girl. It shows how far-reaching our sins are, and how interconnected sin is. After the video, he prayed and then we came up for the response and worship. In the 5:15PM service, he didn't even pray, he left while the video was going, so I got to do the whole transition. That is a tough place to transition from. It was very intense. I'm thankful that I got to do that, it was a great experience. It was a lot of pressure and a lot of fun, and I felt the weight of responsibility for all those people. I prayed that I would lead well. Aaron was really encouraging about what he saw me do yesterday. The response of the people in the congregation was also good. I do think that most of the people are really comfortable with Aaron leading, and it was a curve to have Isaiah and me there, instead of him.
All in all, yesterday was an incredible experience...so much more than I can say.


I'm headed out now. Tuesday mornings are staff meeting at Grace, and I want to go with Aaron.
At the beginning of the internship, he talked about how his vision for the school is that it would be like Elijah and Elisha. One of the things that stuck out to all of us about the story of the passing of Elijah's mantle was the no matter what Elijah said, nearing the end of his time on earth, Elisha wouldn't leave his side. I want to learn as much as I can from Aaron's leadership, and his example. I want to go where he goes and see how he walks out his life, not just in ministry, but in every day.

Keep praying for me. Thank God, provision for tuition for October has come in. I have about a third of the tuition for November, and none for Dec.-Feb. Keep praying, and if you have to give, please pray about contributing to my ministry and my training and education.

If you read this, you're probably in my group of friends and circle of influence. Chances are, you're in thoughts frequently. Know that I care about you and appreciate you.


Cheers,
-Daniel

Post Script - The internet went down this morning as I was typing this, so here it is now. Update: I didn't get to go to staff meeting. We had Vania, who babysits the Keyes kids, come down and do a workshop on good ways to keep the basement clean and orderly...very mickey mouse, but still fun. Enough for now. Comment and stuff.

9.22.08

Yesterday, I led worship with Aaron at Grace Fellowship. It was the first time I've been on stage in the main services at Grace. I played keys and led two songs. We had three services yesterday, and all of them were really good. Here's the set-list we did.

Glorious One by Fee, which I led
A Shield About Me by Eoghan Heaslip

Give Us Clean Hands by Charlie Hall, which I led
Made Me Glad by Miriam Webster with Your Name by Paul Baloche
Not What My Hands by Aaron Keyes


We had the founder and pastor for xxxchurch.com, Craig Gross, speak yesterday. He basically gave an overview of their ministry and shared the dangers of sexual addiction to pornography and how it, like any sin, keeps you from being able to do what God wants you to do. You should check out their website and maybe search for some of their media interviews. One thing that I love about their ministry is that they show love to every person they meet, no matter what lifestyle they live. Craig told about how he is friends with Ron Jeremey, notably the most famous man in the pornography industry. I love how they talk about it with such openness, and it has begun to change the way most Christians view and treat people who have struggles with sexual sin. Our job is to show love and to disciple people, not to look down on them and alienate them even more. I'm not going to preach to you, I just want to share what I feel about the message yesterday. Check out their website.


I'm super excited, because Isaiah and I are leading worship at all three services at Grace next weekend. Aaron has an event on Thursday night, when Grace's worship ministry usually rehearses, and he is leading worship at Midtown Community Church on Sunday night, so instead of having to rearrange rehearsals, and then leave Grace early on Sunday evening, he's just having Isaiah and me lead for Grace this weekend...without him. I'm nervous about it, but I'm extremely excited. I'm praying that I don't get too caught up in making sure that everything happens perfectly, but that I focus on hearing from God about what songs to do, and that we do a good job in preparing and leading, so that God is most glorified by what we do. I'm also praying that the Holy Spirit, as we lead, will pull on hearts to seek God more. I can't remember who said it, but someone was saying that it's important to remember to pursue excellence, not perfection. I hope that makes sense to you.


Oh...Aaron's basement is finally almost finished. The kitchen is done and usable, as are the bathrooms. Those are the important parts that have been missing for the past two weeks. Thankfully, we're self-sufficient now. I feel better about it, becuase I don't feel like we're encroaching on Aaron and his family as much. They have been so gracious to us so far, but I don't want to run out of favor, ya know?


My time here is up, but as it is any time, if you want to know more about what's going on in my life, just ask.


-Daniel

BLOGS

Good afternoon, fellow human beings.

This here is an update on how the "Aaron Keyes Worship School" (A.K.A. "The school") is going.

We've been very busy the last two weeks since we got started. Aaron's basement is almost finished. We have been sleeping down here for almost a week now. The painting is all done except for a very, very little bit of edging. The electrical work is all done. The kitchen isn't done and there is no plumbing down here.

We've led worship several times at several places so far, and we'll be doing even more in the future. I'll be leading this Sunday with Isaiah at a church in Covington, and then helping lead at a youth event in Grayson.
Let me tell you about the thing in Grayson. Grayson UMC is starting a weekly youth worship service on Sunday nights, and we met on Wednesday with the Youth Pastor and the Middle School leader to begin planning for it. The school is basically going to be doing worship for this service every week. The way this will look is that probably two of us will go every week to lead for them. We're going to be basically starting from scratch with the students, as far as worship is concerned. We're going into it assuming that they don't know anything about worship. This is going to be a wonderful learning experience for all of us involved. The youth leaders there have never done anything like this, nor have their students, and we have the opportunity to really shepherd this group of students in worship every week. It's going to be awesome. I'm pretty excited about it.
Really though, leading worship is the minority of our time spent for the school. The majority of the emphasis is on truly and deeply studying the Bible, not just what it says about worship or music, but just understanding the Bible, in general. Aaron wants us to know more than just how to be good song leaders, but to learn to be pastors in worship. My heart is to learn how to orient my whole life to be focused on true worship to God.

Did you know that the first time the word "worship" is mentioned in the Bible is when Abraham is going up to sacrifice Isaac? That should tell us something about the emphasis of worship in the Bible. That worship is about obedience, and sacrifice...and not primarily about music. Check out Genesis 22 for yourself. See what you think it tells us about worship. Also, look for the parallels to the story of Christ.

In the next couple weeks, we're going to be getting a different place for a blog set up for the school. There will be our calendar, as well as our study assignments and our thoughts on leading worship. I'll be getting you a link to that.

Take care, keep praying for me, and seek God. He desires you. Really.

-Daniel

A

Hey everybody, I want to tell you what's going on with my internship with Aaron Keyes. Here's a little blog to tell you about it so far. This is just a simple overview, not with a lot of detail.

I'm hoping to be able to post a blog once a week or so, and I think it will get easier, once we get settled in.


Last Wednesday, I met at Grace Fellowship church at 6:45 to meet up with my new roommates, my new mentor, and a whole bunch more leaders at Grace. Jeremey, Brett, and Isaiah are my "schoolmates". I had actually picked up Jeremey from the airport before we went to Grace. At grace on Wednesday night, we met leaders and saw how the children's and middle school programs happen.
After the service, we went to Aaron's to see his house. The basement where we will be living is not even close to being done at this point. They had just put up sheetrock that day. We crashed that night upstairs in their guestroom and their kids' room.
On Thursday, we basically just got ready and left for Destin, FL. We went with Aaron and his band to play for a NorthPoint Community Church singles' retreat at the Hilton SanDestin Beach Resort. It was a HORRIBLE place to stay...not. It was awesome, actually. They took such good care of us, and we didn't even do that much all weekend. We got to spend a good bit of time with Aaron and his guys, and seeing them lead worship was great.
We got back early Monday morning, and spent all day priming the walls downstairs. Today we had an early morning prayer meeting, followed by a session with Aaron, with him just opening the bible to us and sharing his heart for the next six months. We'll be spending A LOT of time reading and studying. This is cool.
This catches us up. The next few days will still be kind of hairy, because we're still not moved into the basement, and so we don't really have a place to call "home". That will come soon, though.
When that happens, I'll be keeping you posted a lot more often.

Pray for me, I still need lots of provision in the area of finances.


More to come, for sure,
-Daniel