3 Things About Prophetic Worship

Alex Enfiedjian 00:12 All right,

Alex Enfiedjian 00:13 well, welcome back to another episode of the worship team podcast. My name is Alex Enfiedjian. I’m your host, thank you again for taking the time out of your schedule to be here with us to learn to be challenged to grow, to be equipped, hopefully you found the past few episodes to do just that. We want to equip you to be the best worship leader and team member that you can possibly be that you might bless your local church. So we’ve got a lot more great things coming up in future episodes, we’ve got interviews with industry professionals, we’ve got some more training and equipping type material. And we’ve got some discussions with other worship leaders who are doing what you do serving in the local church. So hopefully, you stick around and keep tuning in. And if you’ve found this podcast to be a blessing to you, please share it. You know, tell your friends about it, tell the other people on your worship team, share it with your worship leader or other worship leaders that you know, and maybe even your pastor would benefit from listening to it. So spread the word so more people can be blessed. Well, today’s episode three, and we’re going to be talking about something that’s kind of a buzzword right now. And that is prophetic worship, prophetic worship. Now, with the rise of Bethel Church in Redding and Jesus culture church in Sacramento. And as they’ve gained popularity, this idea of prophetic worship has also gained popularity, or if not popularity, at least, it’s been put on the radar a little bit more than it has in the past. So we’re just going to talk about it today. briefly look at some scripture. And I just want to point out three things about prophetic worship. So let’s get right into the Word of God because you can’t go wrong with that. Let’s open our Bibles if you have it, if you can, to first Chronicles chapter 25. If you don’t have a Bible with you, I would encourage you to read this later. Because the whole chapter is pretty interesting. But I don’t want to read the chapter to you. We don’t have that kind of time. I just want to point out three verses to you, and kind of show you three things about prophetic worship from those verses. So we’re going to really hone in on verse one, on verse three, and on verse seven. So let me read verse one to you. from chapter 25. of first Chronicles, it says this, David, together with the commanders of the army, set apart some for the Ministry of profit, sighing, accompanied by harps, liars, and symbols, the Ministry of prophesizing, accompanied by music, it’s he didn’t set them apart from music, he set them apart for prophecy, accompanied by music. So the first thing I want to point out about prophetic worship is that it’s simply expressing God’s heart, through the emotion of music. prophetic worship is expressing God’s heart through the emotion of music. Because a prophet in the Old Testament, their job was to express God’s heart

Alex Enfiedjian 03:51 to the people. So some prophets, you know, like acted out these different things lay down on their side, cook their food over cow poo or something like that. They would express God’s heart through different mediums. Well, these prophets were to express God’s heart through music, music was their tool. It wasn’t their ministry, their ministry was to prophesy, and their tool to prophesy was music. So these musicians, they were to be close to God’s heart, to understand what God wanted to say to his people, and then express that in a way that clearly transmitted the message to the hearers. So in a sense, for you and for me, that’s still our job. It’s to be close to God’s heart. That means we need to be you know, in His Word, praying, spending time with him, be close to God’s heart, and then in the service when we sense God you No wanting to express something, then it’s our job as prophets to translate what he’s saying to us to the congregation, through the medium of music. Maybe that sounded confusing. But basically, you just want to take God’s word, and deliver it through music in a way that makes people feel it, sense it, grasp it, it needs to resonate in their hearts and in their minds. And we use music as a tool to communicate God’s word. And you know, that a lot of the time, that just is from the lyrics of the songs. But I mean, really, music isn’t an emotional thing. It’s like it really touches people deeply. And God created it that way. And we need to tap into that emotional side of music and use the word of God paired with the emotion of music, to express God’s heart to the people. And I would encourage you and me and my team. To move beyond just playing the right notes, we have to move beyond just playing the parts, we need to move to feeling the emotion of what God is saying through the song. And in and express that emotion with each vocal inflection, or each drum hit, or each guitar strum or each piano note. We need to make each hit count each note, count each chord, count each word count, express the emotion of the song, what is God trying to say, through the song, don’t just try to be on key, or play the right note, although you should do those things. But truly express God’s heart through what you play. Another way to say it is, don’t just play it, pray it. That’s so cheesy. But I like it. Basically, visualize what God wants to say to you to your church, feel it in your bones, and then use your instrument to express it. Our job is to express the truth of the lyrics, through the emotional medium of music,

Alex Enfiedjian 07:24 prophecy with your instrument, each time you pick it up to serve, feel the notes, be in tune with the spirit, and release that energy, that thing that God is trying to say release it through your playing or your singing. So that’s the first thing. Our job in prophetic worship is simply to express God’s heart through the emotion of music. The second thing which we see in verse three, is that they prophesied, using the harp in thinking and praising the Lord. So really, they were playing to and for the Lord. They weren’t really thinking about the people that were hearing them. Although, you know, we do have to be aware that there are people in the room, we can’t be totally oblivious to them, because we’re leading them. But their primary focus was to pray to the Lord, to play for the Lord, not for the people who listened but directly to God who was in their presence, because remember, this is in the tabernacle or the temple. They’re playing to God who’s right there with them. And they sat in the Lord’s house. And it’s almost like they were his personal cover band, they were playing to the Lord who was with them, they were ministering personally, to the Lord. Just imagine how that would change your playing. If you just, you know, pictured God right there, you had a want to do a great job and be you would just give it your all, and pour yourself into it, because he’s sitting there watching you listening to you. And so I kind of, you know, encouraged my team. And I would encourage you to next time you play, imagine God is sitting on his throne on your stage, and you are there to play to him. And for him, and Minister Tim, just picture that each time you play. God is here, because he is God is here. He’s on this stage, and he’s on his throne and I’m gonna play my instrument for him, I’m gonna give it my best for him or another, you know, analogy or picture would be to imagine that when we get together on the stage that we’re in God’s house, we’re on the living room floor, all of our gear is set up and he’s sitting there on his rocking chair or whatever on his chair. As a proud Papa, you know, and he’s giving you his full attention. He’s joyfully smiling at his children who are playing for him. He’s just he’s soaking up all the love, all the effort, all the energy that we’re pouring out for him. As we sing for him and we play for him, we bring our best to make our Papa proud of us to make him happy. And he is he’s pleased with us. But just imagine that picture of all of God’s children just being on the living room floor floor, and playing for their dad. As he just joyfully receives the music that we make to him, because he does, he joyfully receives what we do. It’s for him, we’re gonna pray for God just like the the prophets in first Chronicles 25 played for God. So I would encourage you to play for the Lord this Sunday, not for the people, not for the praises of man, but for the Lord. And then the last verse that I want to point out in this whole idea of prophetic worship, is verse seven, which says all of them, all of them, were trained and skilled in music

Alex Enfiedjian 11:09 for the Lord. They were trained and skilled in music. So notice this, the people that were chosen, were chosen because they were skilled. But they were also trained. I don’t know if they were trained before or if they got training then, but they were trained in their craft. And I want to encourage you, and my own team, if you’re listening, to continue to develop your skill, as a musician, don’t just practice to prepare for rehearsal. Think beyond that. Think long term. Where do I want to be? How can I improve long term, practice the rudiments, practice the parrot it is practice the scales, practice new songs, try new tone, continue to hone your craft and become exceedingly familiar with your instrument. Because here’s the deal. When you are familiar with your instrument, and you know how to get that sound out of it, but just whatever sound you’re hearing in your head, you know how to get that out? Well, when God and when you’re in tune with God’s Spirit, and he prompts you to play a certain way, you know exactly how to get that sound to achieve that effect. So become very familiar, keep growing in your skill, and practicing and preparing, just as you would, you know, expect your senior pastor to prepare and practice his sermon so that he could be a blessing to the congregation on Sunday, you and I have the same responsibility, we are going to stand up in front of that many people, and we’re going to lead them into the presence of God. So take that seriously, continue developing your craft and your skill. And again, the reason why is so that when you have control and command of your instrument, it is so much easier for you to express the Lord’s heart to the people through what you play. He prompts you to play a certain way and you know exactly how to achieve that effect. You will be skilled to prophesy through music. So those are kind of my three thoughts about prophetic music. I’m sure there are a lot more things we could say. And a lot more scripture we could bring in, but I want to let you get on with your day here. But I want to encourage you know the Lord, be close to him. Know your instrument, be familiar with it, and minister to your people through the medium of music.

Alex Enfiedjian 13:46 Alright,

Alex Enfiedjian 13:47 that’s it. I hope you have a blessed day. I want to encourage you if you can leave a rating for me on iTunes. It’s the worship team podcast, just search it you’ll find it. leave a rating leave an honest review so I can keep getting better. If you want to engage about this conversation a little more you can do so at Alexon music calm, just find the worship podcast page and you can you know leave some comments there and share the word spread the word and bless other people. I hope you are blessed. I hope you have a great week that your family is safe and sound and happy and that your church family on Sunday worships Jesus passionately. God bless you. Take care and I’ll see you soon with some more great episodes.