Built Together - a conversation with the B-Town Worship Collective

In this episode, we reflect on the miracle of the Church as local congregations unite to worship as one body. Through conversations about B-Town Worship Night, the speakers explore how music and shared worship break down barriers, foster deep unity, and offer a glimpse of heavenly worship described in Revelation. The discussion highlights the Holy Spirit’s power to move beyond performance, bridge differences, and encourage believers to see themselves as part of God’s larger story. Listeners will be inspired to feel less isolated, more connected, and reminded of the hope and presence of God in their community.

Transcript

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Dude, it's good to be sitting together here with you all. Why don't we just start real quick for anybody who doesn't know who each of us are. Let's say your name, say what church you're with, and how long you've been there. So I'll start. I'm Quentin.

I'm with Sherwood Oaks Christian Church, and yeah, I've been here for 7 years now. I had to think about that for a minute. I am Kristen Childress. I am with South Union Christian Church, and I just passed my 1-year mark. Heyo, I'm Reese.

I'm with Genesis. I've been there 4-ish years. And I'm Adam DeWeber, and I'm at Christ Community Church, and I've been there 8 years now. Just as we're kind of just sitting here talking, sharing stories, I'm curious what got you all into worship leading. Like, when did you kind of decide that you felt called to lead worship in the church, both like in a volunteer role or even just like in a full-time capacity?

Like, what, what drew you to this type of ministry? I actually started worship ministry when I was in 5th grade. I started on our worship team, and then when I was in high school, I was at a CIY and felt that call on my life. I went to Bible college, and then actually God was like, just kidding, I want you to do youth ministry. And I did that for a decade, and then I left that and was like, okay, I think my time in youth ministry is done.

We started going to South Union, and the position opened up, and I was like, we felt that again, and my husband was like, you need to apply. Like, I think God's telling us, like, this is where we need to be. So he brought it all back around, and now here we are. I was gonna make a joke about you realized, like, youth ministry was a lot of work. I'm not sure which is, like, more work though, youth or worship, so whatever.

Yeah, they're both a lot of work on different levels. They're great people. Youth ministers are great people. Yes. I don't know that that was, like, a cognitive decision that I ever, like, at any one moment was like, this is what I want to do, but I was playing like secularly for a long time, and I had an encounter with God, and like the venues and the music that I was playing wasn't exactly like reflecting where I was at the time.

And so I was kind of— it was subjected upon me, I guess, voluntold. Okay. The, uh, church that I was with at the time, the pastor came up to me, he was like, hey, I know you're looking for an outlet. And so he offered me a role to just play not really sing, and then I got to a point where I was like singing, and yeah, one thing led to another, and then I joined up with Genesis, and they led me to you guys. Here we are.

Here we are. I played the drums in the Back Pew Boys, which was the worship band from my youth group several decades ago. Your youth group band had a name? Yeah. And it was the Back Pew Boys?

Yeah. I feel like we've talked about this before. Maybe. It was— I was the only one who was actually a boy, and the rest were all men. I mean, full-grown men.

There were no girls, actually. Nothing against— I mean, yeah, let's not get into all that. It wasn't a gender role thing. It was just, uh, the fact that they all happened to be boys. They all happened to be men.

You were the boy. I was the boy. I was the drummer. And they were like some old dudes that liked to play music together. And kind of— and a couple of them were kind of like your story, like they used to play in bars and then And then they didn't play anymore, they didn't have any place to play, and the youth pastor was like, I'm trying to put a band together.

We're like the only youth group I knew of anywhere that had a band back then because I'm old. Don't look at the camera. I just, I just had to look at the camera to let them know. That was great, that was great. So I played drums, uh, with them and then, uh, led to some stuff on our district and, and I was getting more involved and, and back then there was no worship music really.

I mean, it was like hymns, but there's no contemporary worship music. My youth pastor wrote these spoof songs like Can't Get No Satisfaction, but it was Jesus gives me— stuff like that. Oh my gosh, it's amazing. Yeah, I mean, you know, the things that worship leaders, church people do. I was doing that, and then after college I came back to, um, to help with the youth group at my old church, and that was, that was a jump-off point where I was helping other people learn how to do it and And, um, it started being very meaningful to me, and that's when I started really getting into it.

For me, my story getting in, I— my mom was always involved in music, and she kind of did the same thing. Like, she actually sang for like a country band for a while, like a local, like, just country cover. Yes, she did. But yeah, actually here, the Little Nashville Opry here in Nashville, Indiana. That's— she did that on the weekends for 30-some years.

But I mean, I grew up always just involved in the church. She was actually on staff as children's ministry for a long time. And about the time I was getting into like junior high, high school, she was really trying to kind of pull me in. Some other people in the church were trying to pull me in to do music and kind of got started in, yeah, in that time leading youth group worship and then just kind of grew from there in college. And now here I am, you know, just kind of decided that that was really where I, nothing felt quite the same as doing it when I was doing it within like the church context, leading others.

And yeah, music just didn't satisfy.

The same way, um, for me personally in other spaces. One of the things for me that I've always loved about music, worship through music in particular, is it's something that's so unifying to the body of Christ. And I'm curious, like, why do you guys think that is? Like, what, what about it for you is super unifying? Like, what are some cool things you've, like, experienced and been a part of that's been unifying about worship ministry?

Just, I don't know, kind of open-ended talk about that, this idea of unity through worship in the church. There's something— I won't call it magical because I think God designed it this way, so it's not exactly— but it is supernatural. That's the word for it. About a melody and about rhythm and just all the aspects of music that go into a song, a hymn, a gospel song, a modern worship song that whether you know the words or not— I've been in concerts or worship services where they were singing a song in a different language and it was still moving, right? Even though I didn't know the words.

So then when I know the words, when the words are meaningful, and when they're pointing to a reminder of what God's done in my life, who he is, And on top of that, uh, I can join in. It's like a collision of stars. I mean, it's just all these really great things all in one. And so it kind of takes— it takes all the— almost takes a lot of thinking out of it. Like, once you get into it, you just— you can just experience it.

You've got the— you've got the meaningful lyrics, you've got this melody, it's all moving in a really special way. Yeah, I mean, to piggyback on that, like, one of my favorite pseudo-famous pastors, um, Darrell Johnson, says that, uh, like in Revelation they talk about like the creatures, they cry out, holy, holy, holy Lord God Almighty. You know, like worship is ongoing from like the beginning of time to the end of time. We get to enter into it. You know, it's not a matter of like, we're not bringing anything new necessarily.

We just get to decide that like, are we gonna be part of this thing or not? You know, and for me, like, just there's no egos, I guess. It takes a lot of the pressure off, you know, of like, Again, I said earlier, like, I played secularly. Like, that— when you play scenes like that, then it's all on you, you know, of like, how am I gonna sound? How am I gonna, you know, perform or whatever?

Not that that stuff doesn't like necessarily transcend into like gospel music or worship music, but it matters a whole lot less. Like, you still want perfection because you want to bring your best to God, but It's not a matter of, like, I mean, yeah, I want to hit the right notes, but even if I don't, the Spirit is still going to take it and do with it what needs to be done. Yeah. The Spirit's strong enough to overcome a bad note. Yeah.

Just to jump in and piggyback, there was a phrase that you said at one point. This was maybe a year or two ago in a conversation, just in talking about that, like, being a musician in a sacred space versus a secular space, like, how God works a lot of times in those secular spaces. I don't remember the context you said this, but you talked about the idea of being a musicianary? Yeah. Like somebody had maybe shared that with you or something?

Just that like— No, well, my friend Paul and I— Paul, who plays guitar in the worship at night. Yeah, we like to think of ourselves as musicianaries. Just we're not always saying, we're not always proclaiming the words Jesus, Jesus, but trying to live that out. Just being a good presence. Yeah.

Yeah, I love that, and I love that you guys are in that space. Yeah, what about you, Kristen, with this idea of unity? I think for me it's because it, it bridges gaps. Like, there's so many people that I walk up, like, in here and talk to, and even for myself, that it's— I heard that sermon and then it didn't hit until I was singing about it after. And it, like, it fills a space where, like, while you're trying to learn and trying to soak in, like, what God is bringing, the Holy Spirit gets to move for a minute because you let your guard down.

So, like, That I think is my favorite part and it's so unifying because everybody can do it. Like whether you can sing or can't sing or can play an instrument or can't play an instrument or every single human being can participate. Like there's somebody in our church who's special needs and they worship in the most beautiful way. Like she sits kind of like in the middle and I get to see her and I like can't look at her too much 'cause she makes me emotional. 'Cause she just like, it's so raw.

And whether she like fully understands like what Jeremy says on a Sunday morning, she understands the presence of God because of music. Like, that is such a cool thing to me. And like, we talk about that a lot with our band because we have people who are such amazing musicians at our church. And sometimes we look at them and we're like, hey, it's okay. Like, we're just worshiping.

Like, we're just serving God. We're just getting to do this thing. And it's not— it doesn't— like you said, the Holy Spirit can overcome a bad note or singing the wrong thing, or it doesn't matter. Like, we're putting what we have and bridging gaps for people. And that is so cool to me, like that we get to do that.

Yeah, I love that. Well, and I think for me, like one of the things about like unity is like we talk about being the body of Christ and like in singing we are quite literally like breathing together like a body breathes. Like we're inhaling, saying the same words, exhaling our breath like in the same rhythm at the same pace. Like it's like a, there's something special. Like, I don't know, it's just really cool.

Like there's like this moment where it's like we're actually a body. Like we are literally breathing together. Like, all as one people. And I just, I don't know, there's some, there's some really cool imagery there about just like we're actually physically behaving like a body. All of us have been a part of and seen, you know, that on kind of this grander scale in Bloomington at the B-Town Worship Night.

Like, I mean, what's that been like for you experiencing that unity across churches in those moments where you get together? I mean, maybe not even just at B-Town Worship Night, like that's a common ground we all have, but we've all been in contexts like that before. Like what's, What's that like when you see local little c churches come together as a big C Church in those moments? I think that the existence of the church is a miracle. Yeah.

The fact that there are people all over the globe who have a rhythm of getting together and, and some parts of that church are, are actually, if they're on the liturgical calendar, they're actually doing the exact same thing together. I mean, it's just mind-blowing. It's miraculous. It's so beautiful and surprising. And so getting to exercise that in a way that pushes back for me on years of like feeling like it's a bunch of teams competing against each other for the most people points or whatever, you know, and it's just pushing back against that and it's leaning into the existence of the capital C Church.

Saying we are on the same team, we are worshiping Jesus together, the King of the universe. Not the King of the universe, but the King of Bloomington, the King of this body. And so for me to see that, to see cooperation where, I don't know, rewind 25, 30 years, maybe there wasn't that cooperation. I don't know. But it's very encouraging.

Not only that, but, you know, in a town like Bloomington where we have such a diverse set of values and backgrounds and all that stuff, just to see a bunch of people who honestly, if you polled 100 random people on that night, you'd get a pretty broad spectrum of political, social, etc., viewpoints, but they're not there to discuss and debate. They're just there to be unified under one banner, one voice, one name. I mean, it's so, so cool. Yeah. Last year getting— so I started at South Union like a month before the event happened, so like I just was part of the prayer team and just kind of sat back and watched how everything worked.

Just like, I grew up in Greene County and we had an event similar for youth. It was called Youth Invasion and my home church put it on, but there would be like, in a town that has like 5,000 people in it, which is Linton, there's like 400 kids that would come to this event and it's for a weekend. It was a blast and you always felt, you did, it was like you knew there was people outside the 4 walls that you knew that also loved Jesus and there was something like almost like Holy Spirit empowering because you knew they existed. Whether you went to school with them or saw them in Lytton or the Lytton, Bloomfield, Jasonville, whatever, it didn't matter. Yeah, you knew they existed.

So like, it was so cool last year to see that like there's several thousand people there who just wanted to worship Jesus. It didn't matter that, like you said, their different beliefs are different, worldviews are different. It just We are big C church, not the little c church in that moment. And that's exactly how it's supposed to be. And it's like a glimpse into what it will be like in heaven for me.

Like, it's this, it's just like, I cried like several times just like looking around. I was like, this is so great. Like, this is so cool. Yeah. I don't think that I can really add anything outside of what's already been said.

They said it well. Yeah. I don't know that I have much to add to that, add to that particular note either. I mean, it's just, it's been, it's been a fun journey. Like just getting to do this, you know, for the past, what is this?

This is year 5? Year 5. Wow, that's wild. That's a wild statement in and of itself. As we kind of wrap up, you know, this, this conversation, what's your prayer as we head into this night?

You know, we're— as of recording this right now, we're about a month out, but we're getting ready, prepping all the things for the night, praying, practicing, putting setlists together. What's, what's your personal prayer for, for that night, for what the event does for the church? Yeah. For me, it's that everyone will walk away from that knowing that they are not by themselves in their faith. Like whether they're connected to a church or not, that they know there are people in their community who also love Jesus.

Yeah. And that they leave knowing him a little more. Like that, we pray this over every Sunday, is that people just walk out knowing him just a little more. Just a little more. Just looking a little more like him.

Not so people see us, but so that they see God. Yeah. If we can have everybody in that space leave doing that, the impact that the people of Christ will make will be so cool in our community. So that's, that's been my constant prayer for this event. I love that.

I'm going last because I said too much last time. I would say my prayer is probably just one that's been prayed every year. I hope that people come to know God if they don't know God, you know, and I mean to piggyback that they're empowered. It's easy to get jaded in Bloomington, you know, I mean anywhere that you are, of looking around and just see how the world is. Like, it feels like there's a darkness sometimes, but I mean there's a light that shines through the darkness.

So I just pray that everyone would come to know God. Sort of along the same lines as you said was, uh, I want the people that, that I serve in my church to get stretched just a little bit, but also be encouraged that we're not alone, we're not an island, and we're part of something bigger. And this is a reminder of that. This is like a small-scale version of that almost, you know. And myself the same.

Actually, Quint and I were talking before the tape rolled. Just about how this year life has been different than the other years. And, um, and leading up to the event has been different. The prep situation's been different. Like, a lot of things just feel different.

But when it comes down to it, what I really want is, is, uh, for me is the same that I want for my church too, to, to be stretched, to be challenged. Um, in my comfortability of like sitting in my own space and doing my own thing, and then also to be encouraged that like this is a big team and we serve one Master who's bigger than anything, you know, so it's— I'm hoping that that's what happens. Yeah, you know, you talked about just the feeling that life has felt so different. What I love about this is, you know, like a church, you know, when, when we get to— and, you know, we're a, we're a small microcosm of the army of worship leaders that has grown into this collective, you know. Uh, there's so many others that we could have pulled in here and, you know, could have sat here and talked.

And I love each and every one of them, and I love that we get to bring our real selves to each other in leadership. Like, it feels good to just walk in companionship you know, kind of kinship, that peer level. We're all doing the same thing, and many of us share the same struggles and frustrations and joys and all those things, and we get to bring that. And so I think, yeah, my prayer centers a lot on like the leaders and the pastors that get to be a part of this, that we leave feeling like this was something special, that like God showed up not just at an event and like that we got to be part of a cool event, but that we leave feeling like, man, like I feel encouraged, I feel seen, I feel a part of this grander story, and I don't feel isolated, you know, here in Bloomington. Whether a worship pastor or a lead pastor or whatever, you know, kids pastors, we got everybody kind of shows up, and it's just this— it's like this family time.

And I think as leaders, like, you look out and you see each other in that crowd, and there's just this, like, kinship that you, you see when you see that other person that you know that's, like, in the trenches of ministry with you. And so my prayer is, is for us as leaders that that we come to this event and, you know, obviously, you know, we all carry a lot of the weight and the stress of planning things at times, but that we— once we get to that Sunday to the park, it's just like, all right, let's enjoy these 4 hours together and just, yeah, let God get the glory for all of it. So, and get some food, drug food. Yeah, give us— hold on, give us a little preview. You sent me the list earlier today as we wrap up here.

Who's, who's, uh, who's maybe showing up at that, uh at that park this year? We got some good ones. I'll only say the ones who have confirmed. Okay, there you go. That's fine.

Returning, we've got Big D's Barbecue, Flaming Grill, which is, uh, like— were they there last year? Yeah. Yeah. Okay. They're good.

Yes, they are. Cup of Joy, which is like coffee. And I mean, who doesn't love coffee? I mean, we all need coffee. Uh, let's see.

Oh, my phone's over there. It's got my list. I'm gonna forget. But anyway, uh, uh, there's There's some good ones. A couple new ones that, that I'm excited about are Little Bowl Thai.

Oh, I love Thai food. Oh my gosh. Uh, Black Leaf Vegan. Okay, great. Okay, I know, but here's— I'm sorry.

There's someone out there that will really love that. Vegans, we love you. Breaking the fourth wall here. We love you. Yeah.

Okay, I've— my, my father-in-law went. They, they were at the fair, the state fair last year, and I tried to get them last year. Yeah. They were at the state fair last year and they went to the vegan place and they had a conversation with the owner, the lady who runs it, and they said that the folks are delightful and the food was amazing. I mean, shockingly good.

I'm so excited to have them back. Okay, great. I'm in. I'm in. I'm gonna be eating some vegan food that night.

Ah, dang it. You're right. But I want the Thai place though. I've never had Little Bull Thai. Little Bull Thai.

Yep, Peely's Party Taco back again. Great classic, love it. I hope that for those listening that they're just— it makes them want to come more because Pinoy Garden, they were great. They were great a couple years ago. They've been, they've been 3, 3 or 4 times, right?

3 of 4. Yeah, yeah, amazing. Well guys, thanks for sitting down. Bearded Baker. Sorry, you're gonna have to say that again.

Bearded Baker. Wait, what is the Bearded Baker? Bearded Baker does sourdough breads and, uh, bread, right? Bread. Yeah, carbs on carbs.

And they're— and they're— this is true. Yeah, yeah. Hey, carbs shared don't count. Did you know that? Like when you share them with a friend?

Is that what you're saying? So if I get a cookie from the Bearded Baker, who's— he's, he's teamed up with a guy called Weirdo, Weirdo, that makes like cookies and desserts. So get you a big old cookie. From Beard of Bacon. And if I share it— share it with me, it doesn't count.

Are you trying to get me to buy the cookie too? Is that what you're doing? You're saying you buy and then share? Oh, I see what he's doing now. You see that freeloader?

Whatever, guys. I love getting to sit and just laugh and talk about life. Uh, we could go for hours, but I think we'll, we'll call it there. So thanks for sitting down, and I'm getting super excited about B-Town Worship Night coming up on the 27th. So looking forward to it.