8760 Hours

I’ve been looking back on my life in 2015, wondering how did I spent my time this year; or asking the question, where did my time go? Where did my 8760 hours go?

I’ve been to six camps this year, one of them included a flight. I’ve watched the entire seasons of TV shows like Once Upon A Time, Criminal Minds, Gotham and The Blacklist. I’ve finished reading about ten books. I prepared for teaching in BEST class. I trained my voice for 130 hours. I prepared for my sermons. I prepared for my cell. I worked in the office for 1600 hours. I studied for my exams. I designed all kinds of stuff for Y:Fusion. And I spent almost all of my weekends with the church community in Bethany. What about you?

Everyone of us has 8760 hours in 2015. If we do not have the revelation of Jesus the Messiah, the Son of the living God, then the fact that we have 8760 hours in a year wouldn’t have any particular meaning to us. But we do have the revelation of Jesus in our hearts; we are Christ-followers. And so that 8760 hours is not just a fun fact, or something you read on 8fact or 9gag. The time that we have becomes a gift to us because we believe that everything we have comes only because of God’s grace, and that God our heavenly Father has a purpose for us as we live out that 8760 hours every year. We have the responsibility of using the time we have for God’s kingdom and His purposes on earth, making the most of every opportunity to make wise decisions and follow the will of God.

And as far as I know, you have made at least one decision to follow the will of God, and that is to say “yes” to serve in the Y:Fusion worship team. We are a part of God’s salvation plan on earth to reach people in the Kepong community through the corporate and small group gatherings of Christ followers. We are here to lead as many people as possible to become passionate followers of Christ. And more specifically, we’re leading young people or youths to become passionate Christ followers. How do we do that? As worship team members, we are leading them by creating an atmosphere of worship for young people to respond in the presence of God, every Saturday.

Creating an atmosphere of worship for young people to respond in the presence of God. Now, that is a huge task. It takes a lot of effort. It takes many people who are working together. And it takes a very clear understanding of each of your individual roles.

Worship leader: The worship leader leads the band of the week in doing what? In creating the setlist — what are the songs and how are the transitions, and communicating that during the team practice — and this person leads the worship session during our Y:Fusion services.

Backup singer: The backup singer supports the worship leader in vocals and in leadership. The singers uses melodies, harmonies, dynamics, structure, phrasing and rhythm to communicate the words and message of the music.

Guitarist: The acoustic guitarist fills the space with strumming and provides the percussive element of each song for rhythm. The electric guitarist provides the lead harmonies of each song, for example (e.g. Hosanna) and supports the song by filling in some space or creating ambience.

Keyboardist: The keyboardist adds atmosphere and fills out the sound of every song. Sometimes they take a predominant role in giving rhythm, sometimes they create a ‘bed’ of sound or offer melodic accents at certain moments. They can add diversity and colour to each song.

Bassist: The bassist provides the rhythmic and harmonic foundation of every song. They give a steady groove and a musical reference point to the melodies and where the song is going.

Drummer: The drummer provides the foundation of every song by establishing its tempo, feel and style. They support the lyrics and melodies of the songs.

Audio crew: The audio crew is responsible for the set-up, monitoring, and adjustment of all audio equipment. They focus on facilitating communication, encouraging listening, and removing distractions.

Visual crew: The visual crew prepares and operates the equipment necessary to display graphics. They focus on enhancing communication, creating visual appeal and supporting the speaker.

All of these people — all of us — are working together to create an atmosphere of worship for young people to respond in the presence of God. This is what we do. These are our gifts and talents. This is how we put the right people in the right places so that each of us can contribute our best to the team and add the most value into our youth ministry. But this is just part of the equation.

Even if we do all of these, we could very well be a live band that plays on Saturday afternoons or a weekly concert in Kepong. But we have something different. We have the revelation of Jesus in our hearts. We have put our faith in Christ the Messiah, the Son of the living God. We have trusted Him with our entire lives. And that brings two huge implications.

The first implication of our salvation is that we are being born again into a new family. We are now called children of the Most High God. Immediately after we have trusted God with our whole lives, we form relationships with every Christ follower in the world so that we can call them our brothers and sisters in Christ. And in this family, our Father expects us to do the almost impossible, the one thing that Christians have been struggling with in the last two thousand years: love one another. Instead, we let pride get in the way and give a bad reputation to our family.

That’s why we choose new songs for the young people, not for us to syok sendiri on stage. That’s why we practice new songs as far as three months ahead, not on that day itself. That’s why we practice our songs so hard before our 2:00pm team practice, not practising our own parts during the team practice. That’s why we make sure that we are punctual for team practice, not making sure that people wait for us. We make every effort to love one another.

Then, when the young people gather during the twenty or thirty minutes worship session, they will know all the songs that we play and they won’t be distracted by our instruments, or our behaviour on stage, or the visuals or the sound. They can only respond in the presence of God.

Do you know when was the last time we played You Make Me Brave in a Y:Fusion service? Exactly one year ago in Y:Fusion camp. When we introduced that song for the first time, I was quite impressed. Everyone was prepared for our team practice. So for me as the worship leader, I get to do less of coordinating the band and more of leading the song. So today, if we were to sing that song again, everyone can focus on worshipping God. They can only respond in the presence of God. We make every effort to create a distraction-less worship session because we love each other unconditionally, in this team and in the youth ministry.

That is one of the implications of being called the children of God. We are part of a new family. Another implication of our salvation is that now we belong to a new Father. Our relationship with God Most High is reconciled through Jesus Christ. By His blood, He redeemed us from sin so that we are no longer slaves to sin but children of God. And our Father expects us to love Him with everything.

That’s why we always pray during our team practice. That’s why for every new song we are going to introduce, we worship God with the song personally before we bring it up and lead the song on stage publicly. That’s why we make an effort to practice the skills and talents given to us by our Father in heaven. We practice our instruments, we practice operating the live lyrics and we practice listening and equalizing the different voices. Remember what is practicing? To do something repeatedly or habitually in order to acquire or, in our case, to polish a skill. We make an effort to practice. Love Him with everything. That’s the second implication of our salvation. Love Him with everything. And everything includes our hearts.