by Darren Inouye

2020 was a year in which normality was interrupted and challenged. Our normal experience of church changed, and in that change I believe God was refining me.

One area of refining was my view of “church worship”. I felt this refinement begin at the first outdoor service my family attended. Daniel Gee was leading worship acapella, and we could barely hear his voice as the sound setup was limited. We had to rely on the voices of our brothers and sisters singing beside us to follow along in worship. There was no fancy trickery to pull me out of our reality during that Sunday worship time. You could hear the shaky, amateur, beautiful and real voices of people praising God. You could hear the muffling of their voices as they struggled to sing while wearing masks, contextualizing the times we were in. In past “normal” seasons, I may have considered these very things a distraction, but in that time and on that Sunday, these were the instruments and people who led me into worship. 

When Pastor Victor initially let me know that we would have summer worship nights, I was overjoyed to be outside again worshipping with brothers and sisters. I remembered how we exalted the Lord above our pains, struggles, differences, and successes.

During those summer nights we joined together in the singing of prayers, truths and scripture within and despite the contexts of our individual lives. Once again, God showed me beauty through the simple, real and messy worship of people who love Him and lift their voices to exalt Him. 

The outdoor services of 2020 and the summer worship nights of 2021 were a great reminder to me that worship is so much more than excellence of sound. They challenged me to appreciate worship contextualized by real people undergoing real struggles and exalting the name of our Lord Jesus through it all.