Blog #001

Welcome to our weekly blog, Searching For Sanctuary.

It's been said that every person regardless of religious or spiritual alignment worships someone or something. Bob Dylan sang it in the 80s, "You gotta serve somebody" (from the 1979 studio album Slow Train Coming).

Whether you're seeking God on a solitary mountaintop, in a small group of close and committed friends, or you've joined the exhilarating chorus of a thousand-voiced assembly, we hope to rattle your thinking about this activity called worship.

Over the past three decades of serving local Christian congregations by leading their music and worship ministries, we have thought long and hard about the meaning of worship in the modern American evangelical church. We've been searching for sanctuary - that place were God is found and his grace applied.

We are throwing down a challenge (nod to Bobby Flay) to pursue God-honoring, Bible-based, Christ-centered, Spirit-empowered, history-informed, awe-filled, outsider-inviting, grace-overflowing worship.

This blog won't promote a particular style, image, coolness factor, or ancient liturgy. But in it we attempt to lay a solid foundation upon which a true and enduring structure can be raised. To quote the French philosopher Simone Weil, "In order to always be relevant, say things that are eternal." This blog seeks to address the current state of worship with the eternal.

Searching For Sanctuary is for the worshiper in the pew (or folding chair - gotta love "church-in-a-box") and the upfront worship leader. It's for the singer and the silent, the pastor and the parishioner, the saint and the skeptic.

To foster dialogue, we will occasionally write reviews of church services we've recently attended and then seek your comments. It will be similar to the food critic column in the newspaper (you remember those don't you?). The point is to help all of us better understand worship, not to be critical.

There are many excellent worship resources available on the Web and in print. Here are a few of our favorite sites: Dr. Chris Alford's www.epiclesis.org , Bob Kaufllin's www.worshipmatters.com, Ron Man's WRI at www.worr.org, and the teaching videos and insightful writings of Dr. John Hubley, ThD at www.mindheart.com.

Join us in the search. We hope you'll visit often.