From reasons spanding from discomfort to excess coffee intake, I laid awake Saturday night waiting to fall asleep. Church leaders know how frustrating it is to know that in just a couple hours you will need to be awake, working with musicians, inspiring leaders, and guiding congregations.. “On your best”. I especially didn’t like waking up 45 minutes before my alarm. A nightmare morning. But, however unideal this morning was for me, I was struck with incredible expectancy for what the morning was going to hold.

This weekend was my first time serving as MD (Music Director) and co-leading worship with Chloe. Chloe leads worship in Fuse (our Jr. High ministry) and also joins us in Branded. It was a good experience for me to get more acquainted with leading worship, and for our team to learn to adjust to shared leadership. I led Freedom and I Surrender, and Chloe led I Am Set Free (along with Todd singing the guy parts), and The Grave is Overcome.

I think this shared leadership concept is very beneficial for worship teams to learn. This requires the entire team to shift a bit each song, being attentive to another person and allowing them to lead the moment. Not only does this allow others to grow, but brings incredible unity to the team. I’m excited to see our team grow in this direction.

This weekend we introduced The Grave is Overcome, an original song that a friend in our church wrote that will be on our next recording entitled Greater Still. This is quite a brilliant song that paints a picture of the ressurection. I am so sure that God did something during this song, as it builds up to the climax of the song where students are invited to sing loud “I’m free at last!”. Chloe in some services reminded our students how Jesus’ work on the cross isn’t just a one time event, but it is still happening, and we can sing as if it is as well.

While I described that for me the morning started out as rough as it did, I can surely that the weekend was “easy”. There was no need for striving, because God took over and did whatever he wanted to do. Thankful for an awesome team and an awesome God.

The Set
Freedom • Bethel
I Am Set Free • All Sons & Daughters
I Surrender • Hillsong
The Grave is Overcome • TFH
Spotify Playlist

The Team
Chloe du Plessis • Todd Elliott
Sean Pritzkau • Judah McCarthy
Paul Wright • Brandon Salteres

Something awesome happens. Your name must be attached to it.
A brilliant idea comes out. Draw the attention to yourself.
Someone else has a moment. Get in the spotlight!

Blame. We love to dish it.

Something wrong happens. Get your name off of it.
Something breaks. Point the finger.
You screw up. Who else was involved? Must have been their fault.

I’ve never realized this more clearly than now – our world is driven by Credit & Blame.

• If your friend has a killer song idea..You were totally with him! You must be in the credits. Tweet about how hard you worked to help him.
• You get in to an accident. You must find an excuse. It was obviously the woman in front of you’s fault.
• You’re part of a team. Your team sucks. But of course, it would be absurd to admit that your apathy is part of the problem.

What astounds me about Jesus is that he is the antithesis of all this madness.

The message that he brought was countercultural. It went against the already established culture of his time.

Jesus denied the credit and took the blame.

If anyone deserves credit, it would be the one who was around at the outset of creation. The one who had come from heaven. The one who was doing the work of the Kingdom that people had been proclaiming for thousands of years. But in no way he took credit for himself, but in all ways he pointed the glory to the Father.

Jesus was fully God, and fully human. He was tempted in far greater ways than we ever will be, and he himself remained blameless. No slips. No regrets. No mistakes. But for all those who who have been found guilty (everybody else), he took the blame upon himself. He didn’t point the finger. He pointed it at himself. Have you ever been embarrassed? Jesus was completely humiliated.

Jesus brought about a total new way of being. So I think its worth a try.

To accept our own faults and to declare others victories. Who’s with me?

I met them during my time at Roberts. They’re two of the funnest and most passionate people I’ve ever met, and I’m glad to call them friends.

Carrie and Erv are pursuing their dream. They recently revised and rebranded their book “Cheap Love” and are working towards republishing it under the new title “Marriage Adventures“.

This book teaches through the Starr’s experience of how to have an extraordinary marriage through effective money management, authentic communication, and a dynamic sex life.

I personally believe in this project. We are all well aware of the problems in the country and in the world, and the way I see it is that at the end of the day everyone returns to a home. I think that through investing in personal relationships starting from husbands and wives, and then to their children, that we will start to see a better world.

They currently have 59 hours left on their funding campaign towards Marriage Adventures and have $530 left to raise of their $2,500 goal. COMPLETED their project!!

Would you consider supporting them? Consider it my birthday present

We had an awesome team this weekend with a good mix of experience and talent. Isaac led worship this weekend, side-by-side for the first time with his sister Ivanna. I’m excited to get her introduced and involved with worship in Branded. She’s got a voice that compliments Isaac’s in an awesome way and a real passion for worship.

We’re in a cool season in Branded where I am introducing a lot of new faces and fresh songs. This weekend we introduced two new songs to our high school students – “Freedom” and “I Surrender”.

Freedom is a new fast-paced, driving song by Bethel that brings newness to the familiar truth that “Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom”. I was delighted to introduce this song because there is currently a serious shortage of fast praise songs that have something to say and doesn’t sound hokey. This being said, someone go write some new praise songs with depth.

It was a “beautiful thing” to hear our students sing out Beautiful Things this weekend. I’ll never get over how incredible it is, despite brokenness and present circumstance, to hear over a hundred students declare that God has and is making them new.

I personally felt that worship was special in the later services during I Surrender. My heart resonates so strongly with these words.. my deepest desire is that from the innermost place in my heart that God would have his way in me.

Like a rushing wind
Jesus breathe within
Lord have Your way
Lord have Your way in me

Like a mighty storm
Stir within my soul
Lord have Your way
Lord have Your way in me

The Set
We Are The Free • Redman
Freedom • Bethel
Beautiful Things • Gungor
I Surrender • Hillsong
Spotify Playlist

The Team
Isaac Simpson • Ivana Simpson
Sean Pritzkau • Jamell Ponder
Brian Sieling • Caleb Nelson

Unfortunately it has been misconstrued to justify extreme violence and racism in the world as well.

How can we read and understand the Bible, with all of its complexities, and apply it to our lives today?

The scriptures weren’t written to you.
This may be shock you, but the Bible was actually written to another audience. Not you. You might have a lot in common with them, but you’re also very different. Your president is Obama, you found my blog on Twitter, and you own a car. See? Very different.

It’s not one book. It’s many!
Yep. Many books. 66 in fact. With different authors.

So to properly understand the text, you’ll need a basic understanding of who’s speaking, who are they speaking to, and what is going on. We must learn how to take their ancient conviction and understand it, so that we may apply it to our own situation.

Oddly enough, the hardest part about interpreting the scriptures today is that, well, it’s today.

We need to change how we read the text.
Most of us already think we know what the Bible says based on what people have told us it says.

So instead of coming to the text to learn we subconsciously come ready to confirm the things that we already believe.

“We see what we know rather than knowing what we see” -Abraham Hescher

It’s like if you interrupted a veteran and began to tell him about the war based solely on the cartoons you watched growing up. Come on. Just let him talk.

Read the small books in light of the big book
The Bible tells a story. From beginning to end, it tells of God’s creative work, humankind’s rebellion and disobedience, and how Jesus has come to restore and redeem the world.

Everything you read will somehow fit into that. Keep the big story in mind as you read the small stories. You’ll soon find how your story fits in as well.

Use resources
You’re not that brilliant. I’m not that brilliant. We just don’t “know” what was going on way back when. Context is important. Don’t be afraid to have another resource next to you along side your Bible. It will help you more than hurt you.

Teachers: Although it would be impossible to stay up to date on the entirety of development of Christian thinking over history, it would be foolish to read a text and misinterpret something simply because you are uninformed of basic recent scholarship. Study up!

blueletterbible.com
bestcommentaries.com
biblestudytools.com
logos.com

Don’t just read. Wrestle!
We must wrestle with the scriptures if we wish to allow them to transform our lives. Don’t understand something? Pry at it. Don’t like something? Pry harder. This is where true life transformation happens.

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I recently wrote an academic paper on this topic in my studies at Northeastern Seminary. Still interested? Email me at SeanPritzkau@gmail(dot)com for the full document

Fill that blank in with anything. Writer, Creator, Musician, Photographer, Dancer.. whatever. Whatever you do.

No matter what your passion may be, you know what it feels like to have nothing left. Like you have exhausted yourself of every creative juice in your body. You are a sponge that has been wrung dry. You are empty.

Do you feel like this? You’re not alone. It’s normal.

Creative idea’s don’t always come easy. That’s part of the thrill. Sometimes you have to work for it.

Here’s a tip – Move!

Seriously. Sometimes it can be that easy.

If you know me well, you know that I literally live in coffee shops.

One day of the week Java’s, another day Joe Bean, another Leaf & Bean, and if I’m desperate.. Starbucks. I literally visit them all regularly.

And if you’ve seen me at one, I may stay for 5 hours at a time.. but sit in 2 or 3 different spots.

I cannot get bored. I cannot let my surroundings become monotonous. In doing so, my creativity becomes stifled. I dry out.

It’s the same reason I take different routes when I drive. New imagery brings me new ideas.

Theres my tip. Try it out. Move.

I had the opportunity to be a part of this project by Nate Cronk and Mike Kim on recording the video for their song “Sing Hallelujah”. They wrote this song and were inspired to record and release it as a resource for churches to use as part of their congregational worship. I love their heart for the local church. Thankful that I could join them and other worshipers from the Northeast and be a part of this.

You can purchase the single on iTunes here!

Eleven years ago today an event occurred that shaped the world as we know it.

9/11. Most of you can think back of where you were at the heart stopping moment where you heard about what had happened. You probably though it was a joke. It’s starting to get about that time where many were too young to remember 9/11.. and that makes me feel entirely too old.

I was in a 6th grade classroom when I heard about the attacks. I didn’t really know what to make of it at that age.. or how I was to respond. I’m still not quite sure if I do. All I know is that it taught me about something called tragedy.

Our lives are a lot like those devices they use in hospitals to measure your heartbeat. If the line stays pretty smooth and consistent, then things are going alright and our lives feel pretty repetitive and mundane. Suddenly though, something may go wrong and that line that represents our life peaks and throws us off balance. We tend to get worried and scared when this happens, and we aim to find a cure.

That line to me represents tragedy. 9/11 was a moment where the lives of many around the world peaked, and we were left in sudden worry and disarray.

These tragic moments are often when events occur that are out of our control, and we can’t really explain what the cause was or what we are going to do about it. The sad thing is that these kind of events in our lives are going to happen again, and there isn’t anything that we can do about it.

I want to live my life not continuously worrying about the tragic, but always being thankful that my current tragedy has been prevented and I am prepared for whatever kind of storm life throws my way.

I am spending today remembering 9/11 and being grateful that although life seems slightly chaotic now in the midst of my studies, relationships, and ministry, real tragedy hasn’t come my way.

Remember.

(Post Header by Kirsten Reilly @tfhny)

Project 7 is an organization I’ve been following for about a year now. They take everyday products that we all use and use the proceeds to fund incredible projects.

Think about it.. We spend SO much money. We have no clue where it goes.

Even when we give towards charitable organizations, often we don’t get the opportunity to see the difference our gift even makes.

What I love about this organization is that you can catch a glimpse of the change your contribution is making. You can almost feel it. Once you do it a few times, giving gets addicting. Life change is getting addicting.

So check out Project 7. You probably already buy these things pretty often anyway.

Make a difference, Spend Smarter.