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Bob Kauflin Interview: In this interview with Bob Kauflin, he talks about the definition of worship, and what it means to worship God without singing worship songs. Firstly, he tells the interviewer, Tim Tomlinson, how it all started. He said that he and a few other people in his local church wanted to write songs for the teachings that were being taught in their church. This was in the 80s. Now they have made of 60 productions. He then talks about how people worship other things rather than God,. He gives examples like how we are worshiping relationships we wish we had, or idols like celebrities.  I think what he said is very interesting. I can apply this to my life by remembering that God is the only one we should be worshiping. Personally, this is pretty hard for me because I can get all caught up in what’s new with celebrities and I watch a lot of YouTube videos (wayyyy to many). And all of this distracts me from God. I think I should start reading the Bible more and ...

This chapter talks about event and everyday. Kauflin talks about how we should worship God “full time.” He says that worshiping God shouldn’t be a once a week thing. We should always be thinking about God and living life with him. Society has been taught to think of worship as singing songs at church,  it it is so much more. H then says that if we are worshiping God throughout each day, it is also extremely important that we meet as the church on Sundays. It is important that we live together.  I can apply this to my life by remembering that God is not a once a week thing. I should remember to think about him all ya and ask him for advice and forgiveness

Chapter 25: In this chapter, Kauflin talks about being skilled and authentic. I like that he says God wants us to pursue both skill and heart. It is important to have balance with these two. Sometimes we can get over whelmed by huge churches with full orchestras and choirs, but God just wants us to be authentic. This does not mean we shouldn’t be concerned about how we play. It is important to play well because God commend musical excellence. But this can sometimes get taken too far and worship ends up being a concert to show off your piano or guitar skills. I think this is important because we shouldn’t completely forget about how we play or our level of playing, but instead we should play for God and be genuine in our worship. We should keep a balanced lifestyle with being skilled and authentic. Chapter 26: This chapter focuses on “for the church and for the unbelievers.” Kauflin says that it is our responsibility to take car of each other in the church, no matter what. H...

Chapter 23:  In this chapter, Kauflin talks about planned and spontaneous worship. It is important to be planned and prepares, but we should not be so planned that we do everything precisely. That would defeat the purpose of worshiping God. We need to be open to new ideas and interests at any time. I can apply this to my life because just the other day we were faced with a challenge. The speaker we were going to have for chapel got sick and we had chosen specific songs for this chapel. Instead of doing those songs we chose to do different ones so we could save them for the chapel next week. This was an example of spontaneous worship and I think it went very well and smoothly. Chapter 24:   This chapter is about being routed and relevant. When Kauflin talks about being rooted, he means that we should be educated and interested in what has happened before us. That the Bible has been studied for many, many years. Next, Kauflin talks about the rights of relevance. This is ...

Chapter 21:         In this chapter, Kauflin talks about expression in worship. He gives us an example of this girl named "Susie." People say that Susie is a "real worshiper" because she shows expressiveness. But Kauflin says that there are several possible explanations to this. She might just be looking for attention and comes from an extroverted family. This can be a mask to her worshiping that fools others. What we need to really remember is to truly worship God. We need to remember that people worship God in different ways. Not everybody is going to put their arms up and sing loudly during worship. Keeping this in mind, it is laos important to be expressive when leading worship.         I can apply this to my life by remembering to be expressive. This is really hard for me because it is not something I am very comfortable with. I am a very introverted person when I am not with people I know, so worshiping with expressiveness is something I ...

Chapter 19: The first thing Kauflin talks about in chapter 19 is reverence. He says it is important to be reverent to show respect to God and honor Him. He also says that reverence is essential to worship. I partially agree with this. He says that worship is better when it is formal and every word is carefully chosen and devotedly said, and that casual worship makes us loose sight of who God is. I think that there should be a balance between formality and being casual. I think that being too formal is to restrictive for us to be able to worship God the way we feel is best. But it is also important to keep our respect for God while we worship. He also talks about God not only being transcendent, but also immanent, which means he is near to us. I can apply this to my life by remembering who God really is and keeping respect for Him. But I should also not feel to constricted to not worship Him the way I choose. Chapter 20: In this chapter Kauflin talks about Head and Heart. Fi...

        Part 3 of Bob Kauflin's "worship Matters" focuses on healthy tensions. Chapter 18, the first part of this section is named "Guiding Principles." Firstly, he says that we can easily get into a pattern in worshiping God. This pattern can result in us doing things, like worshiping God blandly. Kauflin states that God does not give us a strict schedule of worshiping, so instead of always doing the same thing, we should broaden how we worship Him. Kauflin gives his readers 3 principles for ordering our services: 1. Do what God clearly commands, 2. Don't do what God clearly forbids, 3. Use scriptural wisdom for everything else. As you can see, these are pretty broad standards for service. This should give us the freedom of being creative in our worshiping, the way God wants us to.         I can apply this to my life by trying to add some of these principles to the way I spend my time. I often get bored of something if it is always the same....

In this chapter, Kauflin talks about living for God's glory. Even though it is impossible to be perfect, we should strive to be like Jesus. We should commit our lives to live like Jesus did. Firstly, Kauflin says that worshiping God should make us humble. This is important because we should use our opportunity to provide others worship as a humbling action, not one to take pride in. Next, worshiping God should make us secure because our security ultimately rests in God's love. Kauflin goes on to talk about other things worshiping should make us and I think the most important is that it should make us loving. I really agree with Kauflin when he says that when we gather for worship, God himself should capture our attention. I think that it is hard for some people to just think about God when worshiping because many worries can come to mind. For example, we can be to scared to raise up our hands, or sing out loud with all our heart. But at the end of the day we are worshiping G...

In this chapter, Kauflin focuses his attention on God's presence. It is sometimes hard to understand God and the way He works. Even when we don't feel him there, we should keep in mind that he is always there. But, there is another side to this: even if He is present at all times, he sometimes chooses to "localize his presence." Kauflin says that as a worship leader it is especially important to be prepared for an encounter with God. This is very important because it shows an example to others on how to receive God's presence. 

In chapter15 of Bob Kauflin's Worship Matters , he focuses on the topic of proclaiming the gospel. He asks, "why proclaim scriptural truth we've already previously heard?" The reason is because we are human, and humans forget. It is very easy to get stressed about other aspects of our lives, sometimes we need a break, and reminding ourselves of God's presence is just the thing that helps. I can apply this to my life by reading more scripture. I think it's important to remind ourselves of God's word because we can get so accustomed to the same routine with the same scripture, but we don't realize how much of an impact it can make if we really take it to heart.

In this chapter, Kauflin talks about motiviating a crowd. It can be hard to play for an audience that is stagnant and unresponsive but there are right and wrong ways to motivate them to sing with you. One wrong way to motivate someone is to demand them to sing with you and for them to raise their hands   E can also blame it on the way we are giving them worship music. But it is not our fault. Like Kauflin says, "every Christian is resposible to worship god regardless of what we're going through or who's leading us. A worshiper worships God." I think this is very important to keep in mind because we can very easily blame it on ourselves when we see people being unresponsive to our music. But we should keep in mind it is their job to worship. We are just here to give them music and an opportunity to worship. Everyone  worships in their own ways. Sometimes it looks like they are bored in the audience, but they are actually being moved by God.

In chapter 13 of Kauflin's "Worship Matters," he talks about planing songs and how to plan them. In the beginning, he points out that when we get stressed and don't know what to do, we start thinking about the songs as how it would make "me" look/sound. But this is not what God wants us to do. He wants us to choose songs to worship His name, not so that we sound good. Kauflin also gives us tips on choosing he right songs. He says we should: plan selectively, peacefully, prayerfully, with others, thematically, contextually, etc.... I think this is very important because we can get so caught up in choosing songs, and practicing them until they are perfect, that we start getting stressed and forget why we actually play for God. On the other hand, it is also important to practice and make sure your sound doesn't affect others' worship. There is a middle ground where we can use Kauflin's tips, and we can pray for God to guide us.

In this chapter, Kauflin talks about the deceptiveness of music. He says that we can think we are praising God, but we are actually doing the exact opposite. Christians have been arguing about worship music for a very long time. And if we don't understand what God wants in our music, we can misuse worship. Despite these things, God wants us to use music to worship him, although it is not the only way to worship. I thought it was interesting that he said being moved by music and worshiping God is not the same thing. We can be moved by God's music, and it might make us sing and cheer out, but at that time, we could still not be worshiping God.

In chapter 11 of Bob Kauflin's "Worship Matters," he talks about the act of worshiping God. He says that our society has split music worship and scripture worship completely in two. He gives us an example that some people go to two different churches. One for good music, and the other for a good teaching. But we shouldn't be like that, we should be worshiping every day all day. Worship is not just done when we are in church singing. We should be worshiping all the time. Personally, in Bible class right now, we have been talking about the discipline worship. And my teacher was saying that worship is not done once a day, nor once a week at church. He says we should worship whenever we can because worship is glorifying God, which should be done every day.

In this chapter, Bob Kauflin addresses the issue that "churches can faithfully magnify the greatness of God in Christ yet fail to demonstrate the kind of empowered living and passion that the gospel should produce." I think what he means by this is that churches, and people as well, always talk about how great God is and magnify his name, which is true, but they don't show it to an extent that people can apply to their lives. We not only need to talk about God's greatness, but also live through him and have him empower us. This relates to the title of this chapter "through the power of the Holy Spirit" because we can use the strength God gives us to go through our daily lives. I can apply this to my life, especially in worship. Everyone gets nervous at some point when you are on stage, especially me, but I think that if I really ask God to help me through the power of the Holy Spirit, it could help not only me but anyone through everyday life.

In this chapter (chapter 9) of Bob Kauflin’s Worship Matters he says that “we would no longer be limited to physical structures” to meet with God. He said that we should worship God in spirit and in truth by means of Christ. Kauflin also says that Jesus is our meditator, and that we should magnify by not only worshiping Jesus as God, but we should draw attention to his specific work.   I really liked when Kauflin wrote that glorifying God means glorifying his cross. I also think that worship itself cannot bring us into God’s presence, only Jesus can do so. I really liked how Kauflin emphasized that the quality of our worship does not determine our access to God. God loves us no matter how we preform, or sound.

In chapter 8 of Bob Kauflin's "Worship Matters" he gives us an analogy from David. He says that David shows the appropriate starting point for worship which involves thinking about, magnifying, and responding to the glory and splendor of God. Kauflin also says that sometimes we forget about this because we can get so distracted by everything going on around us. He says that when we worship, we should be clear and specific and we should explore and love God's greatness. I can apply this to my life by not only adding these key points to me as a worship leader, but also to me as a person in general. I think it's very important to remember the more important things in life because it is very easy to forget what truly matters. I also like how Kauflin says we should explore with God's greatness, I think that is very interesting.

In chapter 7 of Bob Kauflin's "Worship Matters," he talks about the topic of a faithful worship leader. He says that the worship music industry is getting so big, with so many new people. This is a good thing, until our local churches think they are doing something wrong, and that they have to be exactly like those people we hear on the radio. But to God, the thing that matters the mot is being faithful (keeping our word, being loyal, reliable, etc.) to him. Kauflin also talks about temptations. For example, he says that sometimes a person's popularity can effect the way we play when we should really be playing for God. I can apply this to my life by realizing that God doesn't want me to be perfect, he created me just the way I am, and I should use my gifts to glorify him. But sometimes, we can instead get all caught  up in looking and sounding good when in reality God just wants us to be faithful in Him.

In the beginning of Bob Kauflin's Worhsip Matters he explains that worship hasn't been around for long, but we have now built it in our routine of practice. He says that one of the bases of the church is how worship music dominates it's structure and thinking and that its hard to imagine a church without worship time. Later on in the chapter, he says that the term "worship leader" can often be misunderstood. For example, it can make us think that we have to have worship leaders, or that  worship is just singing. He ends with saying that worship leaders have the ability to impact and teach God's people. I think that being a worship leader is a great privilege because it gives us the opportunity to encourage others and help them give glory to him. Sometimes, we can take it for granted, and forget who we are really doing it for. I like how Kauflin explained that the term "worship leader" can be misunderstood because I had never thought of that before...

  In the first section of the book, Worship Matters by Bob Kauflin, it says that being a worship leader can sometimes feel like a burden and a waste of time. For example, we can feel like we aren’t changing anyone’s lives and it can get mundane fairly quickly. But, Kauflin says that we have to keep in mind that we do this for God, not for ourselves. Chapter two talks about my heart: what do I love. It says that people in our modern society can get so caught up with idols, but we have to realize that God should be the only one we praise. In chapter three, my mind: what do i believe, it says that there is no point in believing in a God, if you don’t know who he is. For example,  he gives the readers an analogy that if him and us (the readers) ran into each other in Starbucks and we started praising Kauflin’s son and had the wrong image of him, there would be no point in talking highly of him like that him like that if it were’t the right words. Chapter four is our hands...