Crushing this seemingly innocent, but actually super evil attitude in my life. Join me.

When I first started working at Moon Valley Bible Church, my boss was this guy named David. He was a really bright church leader, who taught me a really important lesson. When it came to preparing for Sunday morning, he would say, "We're going to prepare as if 20,000 people are coming this Sunday." Then he led by example. And each week he would work his tail off to make everything about Sunday morning excellent. 

Photo courtesy of Morgan at Flickr.com

After a while, I picked up on David's attitude. I started working harder to plan ahead, and I began paying closer attention to details. Before long, preparation became part of my routine. And it felt great. 

A slippery slope

But fast forward a few years, and things have changed. Allison and I have another child, my role at the church has increased significantly and... I'm older and slightly worse for the wear. But most notably, that sense of hard work to make things great isn't as strong as it was. It slipped away so slowly I didn't even notice it. 

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Loving what you do is not enough. Here's the shot of adrenaline your passions need

They say if you do what you love, you'll never go to work a day in your life. But I'm not so quick to buy that. It seems like a wise proverb, but does it really hold true? Is love really all you need to keep what you do fresh and interesting? I have a hard time agreeing.

Photo courtesy of Lotus Carroll at Flickr.com

I do what I love. I'm a full time musician and church leader. I play music at my church and I get to create environments where people can connect with God and each other . And they pay me to do this. I do what I love, but sometimes it really feels like work. And not in a good way. 

Some days are more challenging than others. Some seasons are more tiring. And sometimes it even seems a little bit stale. And I believe this happens, not because I don't love my job, but because love is not enough. There's another element to keeping the job you love... well lovable. 

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Worship Leaders Don't Talk Good. Is That Okay?

Last night I got into a full on argument with one of the worship leaders at my church, during rehearsal. We were playing through 'The Wonderful Cross'. Our disagreement was over the number of syllables in the word wondrous. She was very adamant that the word only had two syllables, but I sung it with three (won-der-ous).

At one point she even looked it up in a dictionary, which clearly stated that the word has two syllables. But I didn't let that phase me, because I know great artists don't let little things like facts or truth get in the way of creativity.

Photo courtesy of Taymtaym at flickr.com

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My embarrassing one on one with baseball celeb Louis Gonzales proves my blog is already successful!

This is a little embarrassing to admit, but I do not understand sports. Not even a little. When other guys stand around talking about how many touchdowns the Cowboys got last week, I'm the guy that's like, "Touchdowns, that's football right?" I'm not even exaggerating. It's that bad.

So obviously I wouldn't be familiar with any sports celebrities like, oh say, Luis Gonzalez, who (from what I'm told) hit a game winning single that broke 2-2 tie with the New York Yankees and won the World Series for the Diamondbacks in 2001. That's a pretty amazing fact, and one I wish I was antiquated with before I met him.

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The 10 Best Ways to Lead People Who Are Older & More Experienced Than You

Young church leaders don't have it easy. Aside from facing the same wide array of problems and pitfalls as more seasoned leaders, young leaders face one challenge that's unique to them.

Photo courtesy of Famian at flickr.com

Unlike pastors and worship leaders of any other generation, young church leaders are regularly faced with the challenge of leading people who are older and more experienced than them. And it begs the question - How do you lead people who's shoes you couldn't fill?

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7 Tips For Nailing Your Next Audition and Interview

A few months after I was hired at Moon Valley Bible Church, my boss walked into my office with a thick stack of papers. He said, "These are the all the applications that were submitted for your job." Looking at the big floppy stack. And I said, "Dang. That's a lot of applications."

Photo courtesy of Tom Vander Well at Flickr.com

He smiled and said, "Yeah,  a lot of really quality worship leaders tried out for your job. Do you want to know why you got it?" My eyes widened and I thought What was it that set me apart? 

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4 awesome steps to navigating uncertainty and finding God's will for your life.

"Is this really the church where God wants our young family?" That's the question my wife asked me about a month before our wedding. I was working at a church plant that was about a 45 minute drive from my home, and was actually in a different city. And I was making about a third of what I needed to support my new family. But not feeling certain about how to answer my wife's question, I regurgitated something I've heard other Christian men say - Let's pray about it. 

Photo courtesy of Adam Ooi at Flickr.com

Three days later, my boss asked me to submit my resignation so they could go a different direction with the music. It wasn't the answer to prayer I was looking for. Immediately, I started looking around for church jobs. I must have submitted my resume to twenty different churches in the month before our wedding. Then our wedding day came, and I still didn't have a job. So my wife married an unemployed musician. I'm sure her family was thrilled.

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The thorn in your worship team's paw & how I'm plucking it out of mine

After church last Sunday, I had a rare opportunity to talk, about teamwork, with the youth worship team at my church. My youth director asked me to speak to them about some problems they had been having, but I really wanted to hear it from them. When our meeting began, I asked the students to explain their frustrations. And I was impressed by how forthcoming and honest they were.

Photo courtesy of Aikawa Ke at Flickr.com

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The truth about men and singing that sent a chill up my spine [Video]

"How many of you believe that singing in church is for pansies?" That's the question I asked at the last men's breakfast at my church. To their credit, about half of them were honest enough to raise their hands. But it highlights a problem among Christian men in the West. By and large, we believe singing is for women.

Photo courtesy of Christian Ostrosky at Flickr.com

Pastors and worship leaders, like myself, try to explain to men why they are supposed to sing. We quote verses that say things like, "Serve the Lord with gladness, come into his presence with singing!" (Psalm 100:2) Sometimes we even try to connect them with a song by telling a touching story that's designed to tug on their heart strings. But They're not biting. And at the end of the day, most worship leaders have the same problem - it's difficult to get most men to sing during worship services.

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Where my mind actually was, while I was leading worship, last Sunday.

Last Sunday, I was standing on stage, leading the congregation in singing. I was also completely tuned out. I was singing and smiling, but my mind was somewhere else.

Photo courtesy of David Joyce at Flickr.com

Just before the service started, one of the church's regular attenders walked into the auditorium. His hair was disheveled, and he had big low hanging bags under his eyes. He schluffed across the room to where I was standing, and asked if I had a minute to talk before the service. 

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Great God & The Strawberry Fields

It was a lazy afternoon during my families vacation in Carbondale, Illinois. My sister said, "Do you want to take the kids to go pick strawberries?"

If I'm being honest, I thought to myself that sounds like some medium-low fun. But then I also thought about how much fun it would probably be for my kids, so I agreed to go. And I'm glad I did, because as it just so happened, God was at the strawberry fields. 

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Extravagant Love In The Midst Of Unimaginable Pain

They said you have to take your kids to castle park, while you're here. It's the coolest place. And they were right. 

When they say castle, they're not talking about some 8x10 Costco playhouse made of reclaimed plastic. The park has a legitimate castle, complete with bridge, port cullus, knights, wizards, and life size dragons (if dragons were real... and the size of the one in the photo below). Even though Castle Park goes a long way towards bringing to life the fantasy of every kid, what's truly amazing is the story of how the park came to be.

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Good news. I totally got told on the internet!

When I started timhswanson.com, I was following in the steps of some other great writers. Or so I thought.

I saw these powerful leaders like Carlos Whittaker, Jon Acuff, Michael Hyatt, and Andy Stanley through whom God was doing incredible things. They were engaging huge internet audiences, and offering a ton of value to people's lives (mine included). So I started writing because I wanted to be like them.

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2 Fool Proof Ways To Stellar Creativity For Creativity-Challenged Leaders

Easter is over, and now it's time to take a quick breath before you begin planning for Christmas; which is fine because all you have to do is come up with something super memorable, or relevant, or whatever it is your church values. But one way or another, it's your responsibility to make it awesome.

Photo courtesy of Ramnath Bhat at Flickr.com

 Easy right? maybe not. If you're anything like me, the pressure of having to make everything awesome can make feel crushing. From time to time, I find myself sitting at my desk, staring at a blank page, with a dumb gaping stare. I feel filled with fear and doubt about whether or not I'll be able to come up with anything worth while. But here's the problem with that. My fear and doubt don't show very much trust in God.

When I give into insecurity about my creative abilities, I'm also doubting that God has done a good job at guiding my life. It's like I'm indirectly saying God, you screwed up. You could have selected a better profession for me, or given me a different set of spiritual gifts. But that's a bad way of looking at my life, obviously. It keeps me from seeing the blessings of who He made me to be.

The truth is, God didn't give me a highly advanced sense of creativity. And it's also true that my job, like yours, requires a high level of creativity. But my job description never says anything about me needing to be the creative person on my team. And I'm guessing yours doesn't either.

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The Relationship On Your Worship Team With The Most Untapped Potential

On our honeymoon, Allison and I read Sacred Marriage. It's an outstanding book that every married couple should read. In it, Gary Thomas poses this brilliant question: What if marriage was designed to make us holy more than to make us happy? 

More than happy?

I had never considered that questions before, which kinda helped me make sense of the dozens of failed relationships I had before meeting my wife. And as my wife and I read this book, we got a huge head start on pursuing a strong, lasting marriage. Even today, Thomas' question challenges me to see obstacles in my marriage as opportunities rather than inconveniences. 

But here's the brilliance of Gary Thomas' question, and how it applies to you and your team: 

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My Dirty Little Secret Revealed

Last Friday, I announced that I would be revealing my dirty secret today. After last Friday's post, I spend the majority of the weekend stressing out about writing this. I had that nagging little voice of doubt in the back of my head saying What did you do? You're just going to embarrass yourself. Don't do it. Write about something else.

My inner voice of doubt may be right in this case, but that doesn't matter. Whether I embarrass myself or not, the fact remains, the best way to discover more potential in your life is to learn from the mistakes of yourself and others. So, without further adieu, here's my dirty secret.

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I'm revealing my dirty secret [Upcoming]

We all have skeletons in our closets. Some of us have big, hairy, thick boned skeletons. Other's have little, white, dainty skeletons. But we all have them.

Photo courtesy of Canned Muffins at Flickr.com

I have have a skeleton of my own. I've carried it with me most of my life, and it's cost me a lot. I think about it every single day. And on Monday, I am going to tell you what it is. I have three good reasons for doing this. The first one is plain and simple, God tells us to confess to one another (James 5:16).

Secondly, it's because of a quote that has been in my head for the last five years: 

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[Quote] I'm rethinking my life plan after reading this one

Photo courtesy of EmanueleED at Flickr.com

"If you don't design your own life plan, chances are you'll fall into someone else's plan. And guess what they have planned for you? Not much." 

 - Jim Rohn

Isn't Christianity counter-intuitive? While the rest of the world is saying take what you want, we're saying more of Jesus and less of me. We're looking to die to ourselves. More of God's will and less of ours! Can I get a Hallelujah?

However, contrary to some mainstream Christian thinkers, pursuing God's will doesn't mean neglecting future planning. It's important to make plans if you're going to accomplish great things. And you are called to accomplish great things. This is where the pessimist would say How can you know what I'm called to accomplish. You don't even know me. If you think I'm wrong, I won't argue with you. If you don't think you're called to accomplish great things, you're probably right. 

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I suck at quiet time. Here's what I did for drastic improvement.

You can't be a good church leader unless you spend time reading your Bible and praying every day. Right?

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One bad Christian

I've always felt guilty about the fact that I don't maintain a consistent quiet time. I've never been good at it. And not for a lack of trying. I've purchased expensive study Bibles, devotional guides, how to books. I've tried going 'wide' by reading as much Scripture as I could in a sitting. And I've tried going 'deep' by reading just a verse or two and trying to understand as much as I could.

The result is always the same. I sit down with the best intentions. Then before I know it, my eyes are scanning the words and my mind is somewhere far away. It's frustrating. Really frustrating. I've always felt broken because of it. 

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One Big Take Away From The Take Part Conference

Everyone was blown away by the response we got at the Take Part Conference last Saturday. It was one of those things that completely exceeds expectations in every way. It was amazing for two reasons. First, I had so little confidence in myself, that I wasn't sure it would even work, which was sort of an arrogant way of thinking on my part. Secondly, it wasn't successful because of anything I did. It was amazing because God and a bunch of His people showed up and connected in a huge way.

I had the privilege of emceeing the day. And right at the very beginning, I got to tell everyone that our goal was for them to take home at least one great new idea they could use to take worship to the next level at their church. Then I got to spend a good portion of the day wondering around, asking people what their one thing was. Here are some of the things people told me.

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