As a recording and touring artist, Travis’ meteoric rise is nothing short of phenomenal. Nominations in three categories for the 2018 GMA Awards, join the list of Grammy nominations, # 1 spots on Billboard, and seven award sweep at the 2017 Stellar Music Awards. In late September, Travis will step back out on the road for a series of tour dates as part of the 2018 Passion nights with Louie Giglio and Elevation Worship, and Hallelujah Here Below, also with Elevation Worship.
Crossover is the name of Travis Greene’ s latest disc, but this is not the kind of crossover most people associate with a recording artist. This crossover refers to stepping into to the land filled with God’ s promises. While God has called all of us to take this journey, not everyone makes it, and that is one of the things that Travis is out to change.
Travis is not afraid to roll up his sleeves and do some heavy lifting and embrace change head on. In 2016, he and his wife Dr. Jackie Greene founded Forward City Church in Columbia,
South Carolina. Seriously folks, if you’ re looking for some best practices how to present your church to the world, you need to check out the Forward City web site and Instagram feed. Their Annual Report is conspicuously placed in the primary navigation on their web site, screaming out,“ Click me, you know you want to!”. And sure enough, like everything Travis does. that page pulls you in with vision and culminates with a call to action to engage their culture. If I lived in South Carolina, I’ d be beating down the door, guitar in hand, begging for a chance to serve there. This is potent stuff folks, so please, please show this to your web and social media teams!
So now that we’ ve filled in a few blanks about what Travis has been up to, it is our pleasure to introduce our readers to Travis Greene!
[ WM ] Travis, l love the way you use the word rhythm to describe your life. Making sure to stay in synch with the rhythm that God has set for your career, ministry, and family. What are some practical steps for aligning one’ s entire life to God’ s rhythm?
[ Travis Greene ] First of all, being obedient – what did God tell you? I think that’ s the first important thing, what has God placed in your heart. The Bible says that he will give us the desires of our heart, and I think that’ s been misinterpreted to mean He will grant us our wish list. What that’ s saying is, that if we’ re in good standing with Him and we are walking with Him, He will place the right things to desire in our hearts, giving us the desires that need to be in our heart. Whatever your calling is, whatever you’ ve been created for, that has been placed in your heart, and for me that is the only way to be in the right rhythm with Him.
The Bible says,“ The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord.” He would never call you to a place that He can’ t keep you in. So how do you balance it out? How does the life of a Lebron James look easy when we know there is no way that it could be easy to do that much? The only answer for it is grace. I get asked all the time how I wear as many hats as I do, and it’ s only by grace. If God calls you to whatever it is in a particular season, He can put enough grace in you, more than is natural, to make it appear easy even though we know that it’ s not. He gives you the ability to fulfill the assignment, and that is the only correct rhythm to live in.
[ WM ] What advice do you have for those seeking to discover that special thing that God has set aside just for them. That special communion with Him where he reveals the hidden treasure He has waiting on the other side of‘ their Jordan’?
[ Travis ] I have two answers to that, and I’ m going to plagiarize my wife on the first one. She says,“ Feel fear and do it anyway!” I think that oftentimes we feel like fear is a warning from the natural world, maybe I shouldn’ t do this. In the spiritual world it’ s not, it’ s just a part of it. Fear is that first cousin of faith, it’ s that cousin that always irritates you but is still family so it’ s still going to be around and you’ ve got to tolerate it. Fear will always come knocking at your door. You can open the door, greet it, feel it, but definitely don’ t let it in. You don’ t want to let it in and be hanging out with it. So that’ s the first response I would give anyone – feel fear, but do it anyway. I don’ t care if you’ re scared or not, do it anyway.
The second thing in conjunction with that is that you’ re not waiting on God – God’ s waiting on you. A lot of times we believe that if things haven’ t started happening in our life – if the door isn’ t wide open, if the money isn’ t readily available, or the degrees aren’ t in our resume, that maybe that means“ not yet.” With God, that’ s not what it means, it’ s the opposite. If everything lined up, then it wouldn’ t require faith. I preached at Forward City recently about the story where David took it upon himself to count his men, and he got into a lot of trouble with God for doing that. But we do the same thing, we want everything to add up. We need it to calculate perfectly before we step out on faith, but faith never adds up, faith is always risky. You’ re going to get to the Red Sea and
September 2018 WorshipMusician. com
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