'Not much' became 'much more'

Right after we had our NYCUP orientation session and first dinner with the Bowery Mission family the day we arrived at the Bowery Mission, we headed down to the chapel for our first service experience.

Just five or ten minutes after the service was supposed to start, Becca calls me out of my seat, walks me and a few other NYCUP people to the back, and proceeds to tell us that we are being asked to lead the chapel service and that we were selected because we were the few she knew were comfortable singing in public.

Yeah. I wonder what my face looked like at that moment.

My initial response was the mode I'd typically respond in: panic. I had no previous chapel service experience to see what we were working off of, I had no idea what worship leading experience the Union College kids who were playing guitar and singing with us had, we had no music or words for everyone to use, and we didn't have a few minutes to spare to practice even just a little.

That panic lasted for about thirty seconds.

After that, it was decided that Paul from Union was going to play guitar, Jon and Andy were on the djembe, and the Union college kids had chosen the songs already, of which we were familiar with. After those first thirty seconds I realized all I needed was my voice and my open heart ready to trust and praise God. I handed Jesus my five loaves and two fish.

And as we sang I could feel that it was there: the beauty and purity of letting God take what little you have to offer, and guide you in giving the glory back to Him. No one really sang with us. There were people who were sleeping, people who just stared, and maybe some of the other NYCUP students who were singing along with what words they could remember to the songs. But God was present.

And then finally getting to see what their chapel service looked like deepened my understanding of what I experienced from that first day. For worship a handful of staff and students from the Bowery stood at the front and with no instruments, no screen to project words, and with seamless transitions from one song to another, they offered their whole hearts in worship to God. It was musical worship that was stripped down to its purest form - a lifted voice and an honest heart. There was a sense of rawness and deeply rooted joy that I had not experienced before. There was no need to impress others with musicality, or to plan things down to perfection. Just a simplicity and a grounded faith that echoed throughout the rest of the day the the remainder of the week.

There was nothing else like it.