Tribute to a Worship Leader (Who Doesn't Have Swoopy Hair or Wear Skinny Jeans)

This post is a tribute to Harrison Gillming, NLC's Pastor of Creative Arts.

Harrison would kill me if he knew I was posting this, which is why I did it without telling him and while I was out of town!

A dirty little secret of ChurchWorld is that Lead Pastors and Worship Pastors often don't get along.

The Worship Pastor thinks: "The Lead guy is a soulless, heartless, bottom-line focused automaton who only cares about his preaching moment in the spotlight. He doesn't understand artists, and he has really bad hair".

The Lead Pastor thinks: "That Worship punk is a temperamental diva who refuses to color in the lines and instead of thinking about the big picture of the church's strategy spends his time obsessing about the kind of product he puts in his swoopy hair and how he is going to squeeze himself into his $200 designer skinny jeans, and match all of that with his Vneck t-shirt with rivets".

Obviously, Harrison doesn't have swoopy hair and I have never seen him in skinny jeans.

Which is good.

But far beyond the surface things, there are a few characteristics about Harrison I want you to know.

He loves God and his family.

He has integrity - as a man and as an artist.

He is an incredible team player.

He is crazy talented, but I have never seen him have a diva moment in almost half a decade of working together.

He is genuinely humble.

He is always willing to go the extra mile, in areas that have nothing to do with the stage or performing.

He cares about the mission and vision of Next Level, not just the worship and arts area.

He absolutely loves and cares about the band, our vocalists, and our tech and production teams.

This Sunday night at the LOVE REVOLUTION CD release concert you will see the fruit of his creativity - a set of amazing songs he wrote and our musicians will perform. It will be God-honoring and inspiring and amazing.

But the most important thing to know about Harrison is that the guy off of the stage is the same as the guy on the stage.

And that is why I am so honored and grateful to get to work with him.