The title in all caps is deliberate. When it was said, it was with such passion that there's really no other way to convey it. The statment has been made many times, but the time worth talking about was this last Sunday immediately after church. Grant Delagrange said it. Quite a few of you reading this know Grant. For those of you that don't, it's your loss. I'm not sure how old he is, but I'm thinking around 17. Grant has Down's Syndrome. That's not really the important part of the story. The only reason it's relevant is that often I think that those with Down's tend to be a little more forthright than some of the rest of us.
Here are a few things about Grant that are important. He loves Jesus. He loves music. He loves to worship. He loves being with his church family. I think that he would be hard-pressed to answer whether he loves Doug Hood or Jeff Eager more. (Doug's our worship leader and Jeff is the drummer) It's always a treat singing with the worship team for more reasons than one. One of them, though, is that you always know that at least one person in the congregation will be right up front worshipping with their whole self. That's Grant. This last Sunday we had a great time of worship together. The service was switched around a bit. We did almost all of the singing after the sermon. The last song we sang was "I saw the Light". It's a great song. My favorite part of the whole service was Grant's comment at the end. He walked past the front of the stage with a huge sigh, sounding like he had just run a few miles. He breathlessly exclaimed, "I CAN'T HARDLY TAKE IT ANYMORE!"
Why aren't we all like that? Yes, it's because he likes Doug and Jeff, and they were playing the song. Yes, he likes singing. Yes, he was probably even more charged because a few of the guys put their shades on near the end of the song as they sang about the Light. But really, the reason he could hardly take it anymore is because he loves to worship. He LOVES it. He loves his Jesus and wants to let him know. He was so full of passion that he literally could hardly take it anymore. He's not ashamed to let anyone know that. We could all take a lesson. Too bad only those of us still on the stage got to hear it. I appreciated the sermon, the choice of songs, and the sharing time, but the thing I appreciated most Sunday was Grant's challenge. He didn't realize he challenged me, but I've been thinking about it since.
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4 comments:
Oh man, I was in first service and totally missed it :) That is so encouraging though. We are so lucky as americans to have the freedom to worship openly so yes we should act just the same as sweet ol Grant. He is actually graduating this year! I can't believe it! Hey send me your address, I have had this organizing handout to give to you in church each week and I keep missing you. I am not sure if your address in the church directory is the address you are at now. So sorry I have not forgotten to give it to you! Thanks once again for your challenging blog!
Love it!
Cheryl...I loved this post and you did a great job describing Grant and his passion for worship. It's funny that you posted about this because I was just thinking of Grant today...when he calls out during a song, it helps me worship better and I love that. It's so cool how God gives us all different gifts & talents.
Cheryl.....I haven't been checking your blog, because usually you don't post too often. I've been missing out!
Neat story about your worship time at church. We should all be so energetic about our worship.
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