This past weekend I made a trip north to the Church of Corinth to attend the first ever NTD Worship Conference. What a travel nightmare it turned out to be. The conference was held in Corinth which was about a 4 hour drive from Marble Falls. Now that isn’t the bad part…no…the bad part is the terrible flooding that occurred the entire drive north to the hotel. At one point, one of the towns we drove through received over 12 inches of rain! What? You heard me right. It was a weather nightmare weekend.

Moving on…

The conference was a one day conference that went from 9am to 3pm…and this is a worship conference for a Pentecostal faith denomination…which basically means that 3pm is just when things start to slow down. Having a 4 hour trip, we cut out at 3pm sharp…

The first hour was a time of worship and orientation. The worship was provided by TCOC (The Church of Corinth). They are great! Sherri Williams, (NTD Music Director and Music Director for TCOC), really has done a great job assembling a bunch of really great musicians together to form the TCOC Worship Team. She also did a great job on the conference…all things considering. It was the first of its kind. You really can’t know what to expect in those circumstances. All in all I thought it was good and would love to be a part of the next one!

I attended 3 workshops…”media”, “guitars, gadgets, and gizmos”, and “audio”…the best of the three being the “audio” workshop. I actually brought 2 of my audio guys just to attend that workshop…which delivered! Thanks TCOC! All in all it was a great conference for small to medium size churches, like mine, who are really oblivious to most of the details and ministry that surround worship.

Ok…my one critique. (You knew it was coming.)

Media…

I know this hit me probably because this is something that is dear to my heart and is a ministry that I have extensive knowledge on…so bare with me. The media workshop was more of a history lesson of how media has transformed in ministry and a 30 minute question and answer session. Now let me be honest that media isn’t the strong suit of TCOC…and that is with most churches…so I get that. However, what drove me crazy is when they showed what “environmental projection” was and the room went crazy with Q&A. It was like showing a kid this awesome toy that they can’t afford. And here is my only critique…I think a media workshop needs to be more application than information…or at least a balance of both.

There is a lot more I could say on the subject…but I won’t. However, what I will say is that I am going to offer to teach a workshop next year in an effort to be a solution rather than a critique. I can’t stand people that complain and never offer up a solution…enough said.

So with that…I’m going to send an email to our NTD Music Director…and I hope to see you at next year’s NTD Worship Conference!