The best worship music I’ve ever heard

This last weekend we had the privilege of being asked to take part in Revelation Conference, in Adelaide. The conference is run by Mark Peterson, who works with the Trinity network of churches.

It was wonderful to catch up with our old friends Nathan Tasker and Nicky Chiswell, to hear talks by Peter Adam, and take part in all sorts of workshops. Every part of the conference was inspiring and helpful.

But the highlight, for me at least, was the final night. The wonderful house band walked off stage, the house lights were raised up slightly, and Mark Peterson walked alone in front of the crowd with an acoustic guitar. We were told before the session that everybody had to bring an acoustic instrument. And they did. Behind me was a piano accordion. In front of me a djembe being played by a ten year old. Nicky Chiswell had the triangle. An army of acoustic guitars stood by. There were obscure Arabic drums, soprano saxophones, and a bunch who, like me, had only their voices to contribute.

Mark began the session in his thoughtful and measured style with a single, simple question - ‘are you glad … that you have been saved?’. We thought about it for a bit. And then he put our first song up on the overhead. There were words, chord symbols and four part harmony parts. We sang through a series of hymns and popular choruses. For ‘Holy, Holy Holy’ Mark asked the percussionists to lay out and we all picked a harmony based on the SATB score on screen. For ‘Lord I Lift Your Name on High’ the percussionists led us most of the way.

It was the most extraordinary singing experience -- perhaps the most moving church experience -- I’ve ever had. God was kind to us and it did not descend into chaos, but a beautifully balanced harmony of diverse instruments and skill and styles of playing. Depending on where you were standing you could hear different sounds, but everywhere people were singing loud. The acoustic instruments perfectly complemented the human voices, and it seemed as though the instrumental sounds were coming up from within the voices.

Afterward, Nicky Chiswell said to me (perhaps with a hint of tears) ‘we’ve been trying too hard!’ All these amazing musicians on stage, workshops full of talk of genres and arrangements and careful planning - and yet when we took a step back and let everyone contribute the result was amazing. A taste of heaven’s music, perhaps?

But when the band went back stage, to my surprise they didn’t drown out the voices – rather, everyone sang with just the same focus and joy and passion. The moment of acoustic singing and playing had passed, but the worship continued with just as much integrity.