Last week I was lamenting how much work it was to get together and organize worship for a retreat like this… just making sure everyone has music in the right key, and learning new songs, practicing old ones, holding practices with multiple people in multiple schedules, collecting various sound equipment, making sure you have all the right wires/adaptors/cables, changing guitar strings, lining up visuals, and the spiritual prep too… there’s so much more than that, but you forget how much time it takes to be organized. Last week was a busy one… plus preparing for deeper Thursday night, and Club Worship Friday night, and spending time with the family. It was a pretty full week.

BUT

Now that its over, I remember why I say yes to all these opportunities… I love honoring and serving God in all of these ways. Deeper went really well Thursday – a small group, but that is what it is supposed to be. We had a great time, and the discussion was good.

And then the weekend was a total blast… Club Worship had its hitches, but 2 young people gave their heart to Christ for the first time, and we had a core crew of worshippers show up, who stayed late, and really got into the music. The after party was great fun, and there is tons of excitement for the future.

The retreat went really well, despite our lack of practice, and despite technical challenges, and sound system issues, the team fell together and played pretty tight, getting better as the weekend progressed. We rocked the place, and I really felt that the worship was as genuine as it could possibly be. It wasn’t perfect, but nothing is, and there were several cool ways that God showed up. I was impressed with pretty much everyone on the team at different points as they were featured. It was lots of work in preparation, but once we got to the weekend, it went very smooth. I’m quite privileged to be able to work with a team like that who basically gave up their weekend just to help lead worship.

I also just had a blast, staying up late, jamming with Danny and Isaiah, hanging out with the crazies on the worship team at Applebee’s etc. I laughed harder than I have in a long time, and it just felt good.

Someone rear ended me, and I have another smash in the back of my van… and a light that needs replaced… but it could have been much worse.

I beat my girls home… they were at the mountains with the Esh extended family, so when they came home it was great… lots of hugs, and I realized again how much I love them and love to hang out with them too. My daughters are growing up so fast, and when I was away from them, even just for the weekend, I’m able to get perspective, and see how much they have grown.

Tori is basically carrying on full conversations which we can usually follow, and Maria keeps surprising us with what she comes up with, and how she is helpful with taking care of her little sister and stuff… she sounds more and more “grown up” in her conversations too. Its so much fun, and they have so much energy, just jumping on the bed and climbing around on stuff. Fatherhood has been great fun so far.