It’s so insane that it’s already senior year…and it’s even more insane that there are only four more weeks of school. Which means only two more times of leading worship at IV.
Joanne and I have been praying for 3.5 years for God to move in specific ways in worship, and it’s so awesome to see how God is making that happen…even if it’s in the last couple weeks of school =). It started with Spring Retreat. Every night worship was building up until the last night when Joanne led, and the Spirit moved like crazyyy. People were dancing..and not just like swaying side to side but straight up legit dance moves dancing. We could feel the floor shaking cuz so many people were moving around and engaging with worship. It wasn’t just the dancing that we were praying for, but for people to just be FREE in the presence of God. Be free to engage however they want to engage. There was such a genuine spirit in the room that night, you knew that so many people were intimately meeting God. It was awesome.
Last night we had a praise and worship night where IV partnered with CYUAG (a black youth group on campus, most of them from the church Grace Covenant). After weeks of crazy planning and stress and then peace and then a little more stress, God brought everything together. Three hours of praise, worship, spoken word, testimonies under the stars on sungod lawn. It was beautiful, powerful, moving, uncomfortable, cold, hot, all of the above and everything else. It was awesome having different worship styles (I love Brandon & the Grace Cov worship team!!) and seeing people get out of their comfort zone and just worship. There was a lady from Grace Covenant church in the front row that held hands with one of our IV kids every time they worshipped. It was powerful and awesome to see and exactly what the event was intended to do.
The coolest part hands down was seeing people jump and dance during Did You Feel? And You are Good. AND that as we ended with You Are Good, we just broke out into a dance party. Dancing, riffing off of the bridge, and everyone on stage/the audience did the electric slide haha =). We had a joint team for You Are Good and it was so much fun working off of the singers, being free vocally, dancing, freestyling and just enjoying UNITY, enjoying the presence of God, enjoying a Friday night where we can people with family and just love on our Father. It brought me so much joy to see the crowd just being free and moving in joy. A memory I will seriously never forget, and God making my dreams come true.
Afterwards I was talking to my friend Jes, and she said, “Caroline, I remember the time when you were the only one jumping.” I laughed because I remember those days too haha, and this was an amazing sight to see. It was awesome to see God fulfilling the desires I had for worship for this community.
Only two more weeks to lead worship, but I know God can still do some crazy things in that time =).
Haha I totally remember that too, and I was in shock at how comfortable and how much fun it was to worship that night. Can you imagine what people must have been thinking as they walked by?