[ WM ] With churches trying to be able to come back together in person in times of worship now that the pandemic here in the U . S . seems to be abating , it ' s also a good time for worship leaders , band members , and tech teams to take inventory of the “ how and why ” we have live worship services in our churches … kind of a return to the Heart of Worship 2.0 for 2021 . What have you learned through this time , and what would you like to say to your fellow worship music community at this important time in history ?
[ Matt Redman ] It ' s interesting that you referenced the song Heart of Worship because , during this whole lockdown season , that song seemed to have gained a little bit of a resurgence … even though it ' s over 20 years old . I found that really surprising . But as people fed back to me the reason , it kind of made sense . A lot of people were sensing this was a time of being stripped away again , a time of breaking things down to basics . A time of reviewing how and why we do things and reviewing motives and reviewing practices .
And I myself have found it a really helpful , and at times painful season of reflection and review - and some repentance , too . Lord , forgive me for the times that I ' ve just gone on auto-pilot . Lord , forgive me for the times where I ' ve been trying so hard to get worship into the world that some of the world has got into my worship . It ’ s so easy to do that . It ' s so easy to go down some dead-end streets or to find yourself veering away , even at a little angle , from where you were hoping to get to . And it ' s been a really good season to reflect on all of that stuff - and it ' s made me realize that some things that I don ' t want to do anymore , and there ' s other elements of ministry that I treasure more highly than ever before . Even just being in a room with people and singing our hearts out together has become such a valuable thing that we took for granted . So , for me , like everyone else , it ' s been a very unusual season , but I can see that God has been strongly at work during this time .
[ WM ] You started a podcast with Jeremy Riddle called Redman & Riddle . I ' m sure these