The Tom Schmidt Bonus

My Band A PARADIGM RESTORED

Will be performing this Thursday, Friday and Saturday. I would LOVE to see you at one or all of these occasions. Thank you for all of you who support my music.



Thursday Night


Friday Night


Saturday Night (me and my guitar)



9 PM Borders on 2190 N Rainbow...

"Your love is better than life." Psalm 63

I find my heart wandering daily for life and joy in many things and people, but none of them can compete with the incomparable love of God.

When I read psalm 63 today I thought about the love of God and it's impact on my life, this also led me to think about the things that compete for my love and devotion and take my focus away from the lover of my soul: Jesus Christ. Commonly I find that I choose a person or group of people to be my god. When I idolize a person or relationship I want my best interests in my timing with my agenda; here there is no love because all I want is my best interest and not theirs. Another person was never meant to be God to us, God is meant to be God to us. I was also reminded how service can also become an idol for me, I find that sometimes I spend more time talking to God about things I want do or accomplish for Him that I forget to spend being still and enjoying His presence. It's crazy how serving God can become an idol that takes the place of God, kind of like what happened with the Pharisees. Sometimes my music is an idol.

Then I thought about God's love and how real it is and how it is more precious and valuable than anything; God's love is penetrating and life shaping. God made me, chose to be in a relationship with me, God chose to die in my place for my rebellion, God gave me His Word to read, God placed His Spirit within me, God has given me friends and a family who love me, God has blessed me with sooooooooo much (health, music, job, ect...). God has given my life true meaning and purpose (to love Him). The greatest joys and pleasures of this life cannot compete with the incomparable love of God. His love is better than life, I pray you would see and know that with me today.

"Christ, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge." Col 2:3

The answers for how to live our life and what everyday decisions to make are found in our Lord and God Jesus Christ. He holds all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge.

I've seen this in action lately and have been amazed by Jesus Christ and how relevant his words are to my life.

example 1: I have been struggling lately with: how do I show Christ at work? How can I be a Christian substitute teacher and what does that look like? Lately I have been feeling condemnation and thoughts like "I'm wasting my time" and "i'm a failure" have been coming at me strong. Then I opened the bible and read His words.... Psalm 34:1: "I will bless the Lord at all times..." This line seemed to jump off the page and instruct me in the way of wisdom: this is how I can be a Christian substitute teacher; I can see every single thing I do (no matter how menial or grand) as an opportunity to bless the Lord. When you love someone you do things to show them your love for them, and this is true with God. But with God he sees everything, and everything we do can be an opportunity to delight in God and show Him our love and affection. From lifting our hands in worship to lifting the bar of soap in the morning we can see everything as an opportunity to bless God and show him how much we value Him. God has shown me that to be a Christ-loving Christ-honoring substitute teacher I must see Jesus at the center of all that I do.

example 2: Today I woke up and I did not want to go to work. The idea of blessing God was far from me, and temptations to call in sick and sit around and do nothing flooded my mind. "Why do I have to go to work again, what a waste of time." My motivation was gone... then I read about God his glory in Pslam 57:11 "Let your glory be over all the earth!" God's glory is magnificent and awe-inspiring and I can seek to bring Him glory where ever I am on this earth. God showed me then that I could seek to have every area of my life as a place of pointing to the glory God. This makes my life sooo full of meaning and joy. Every thing I do is an opportunity to give glory to God. Like the earlier example, there is no segregation between sacred and secular, all is sacred. We have been transformed in a holy people who live holy lives in all that we think and do.

Jesus has all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge, when we seek Him and His Word we are liberated and given true purpose and true joy.

1 Cor 2:14 "But a natural man does not accept the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; and he cannot understand them, because they are spiritually appraised."

The other day I was having a meal with some people I really love and care about, and after talking about a few of different things I was able to tell them what Jesus meant to me in my life. The response I had from them were blank stares and uncomfortable looks which transitioned to them changing the topic. This happens to me a lot and sometimes this makes me really sad. How I desire to connect with these friends of mine about the most important person in my life! How I desire that they would know the forgiveness and freedom there is in Jesus Christ! How I want them to see the truth!

From the verse above I remember why talking about God is weird and makes no sense to these friends of mine, it's because they have not had an encounter with the Living God or have not entered into a committed, real relationship with Him. Talking about Jesus is utter foolishness to those who don't love and know Jesus.

The thing is that sometimes I get this same response from church-going "christians", people who say they believe in God and go to church. I wonder if these people really do know the Lord, or if they are just going through the motions of Christianity. Most of my life I fell into this category and was a church going believer of God who prayed, but I didn't love God with all of myself and I wasn't living for Him, so in reality I wasn't really a Christian on the inside, just on the outside or enough not to have to deal with my sins. The things of God were foolish to me then. Now my heart breaks for those who claim to be christians but cannot understand spiritual things because in reality they aren't really Christ-lovers or followers of Him at all. I know where they are coming from as I once was there, I once was merely a cultural christian.

God I pray for strength to show patience and love to those around me who are not spiritually minded because of their darkened hearts and minds. Lord open the eyes of professing Christians who claim to be your followers yet don't love you, don't spend time reading your Word, don't follow your commandments, don't love those around them; God open their eyes to the truth that faith without works is dead and that in reality they are not Christ-followers at all. God I pray that you help me to remember that through your Spirit I have access to your very thoughts (1 cor 2:16). Let me see the world through your eyes today.

	Psam 148 Praise the LORD! Praise the LORD from the heavens; Praise Him in the heights!
	Psa 148:2	Praise Him, all His angels; Praise Him, all His hosts!
	Psa 148:3	Praise Him, sun and moon; Praise Him, all stars of light!
	Psa 148:4	Praise Him, highest heavens, And the waters that are above the heavens!
	Psa 148:5	Let them praise the name of the LORD, For He commanded and they were created.
	Psa 148:6	He has also established them forever and ever; He has made a decree which will not pass away.
	Psa 148:7	Praise the LORD from the earth, Sea monsters and all deeps;
	Psa 148:8	Fire and hail, snow and clouds; Stormy wind, fulfilling His word;
	Psa 148:9	Mountains and all hills; Fruit trees and all cedars;
	Psa 148:10	Beasts and all cattle; Creeping things and winged fowl;
	Psa 148:11	Kings of the earth and all peoples; Princes and all judges of the earth;
	Psa 148:12	Both young men and virgins; Old men and children.
	Psa 148:13	Let them praise the name of the LORD, For His name alone is exalted; His glory is above earth and heaven.
	Psa 148:14	And He has lifted up a horn for His people, Praise for all His godly ones; {Even} for the sons of Israel, a people near to Him. Praise the LORD!

So yesterday my band led worship at an event called Youth Night. This was a great event put together to reach out to Vegas youth with the gospel of Christ and a great opportunity for our band to serve as the worship band. Through this event 1 girl became a Christian, 4 people recommitted their lives to Christ, I learned quite a bit about worship leading and I broke 2 strings on my guitar...

First off I was really excited to have this opportunity for our band to lead worship because of the open doors for us to serve and the forward movement for our ministry. I thought about all the youth that could become connected in our movement and all the pastors that could hear us and potentially ask us to lead worship for them. So in preparation for this event I did a lot things including: thinking a lot about what songs youth from across the city would know without a projector to read the words off, I wrote a new song, rehearsed the band, promoted like crazy on myspace, bought a new shirt, I shaved my face, styled my hair, got into the Word and prayed quite a bit. So with all my perfect plans what could possibly go wrong?

Well it wasn't more than one verse into the first song that one of the strings on my guitar broke (this is like a worship leader's worst nightmare, scarier than off-key co-singers and dropping my pick) and to top this off I didn't bring an extra guitar. I was really caught off guard by this and not sure what to do; I could change a string quickly or not play my guitar and let the band carry the sound. So the next song I let the band carry the song while I sang, but our sound turned out to be lacking without my guitar. So I quickly stepped a side (while our bassist talked to the group about worship) and put a new string on my guitar (probably the fastest I've ever done this in my entire life, like maybe 60 seconds). So with a new string everything should be great right? But lo and behold a few minutes later the new string I put on my guitar broke too. So 2 broke strings overall...

But something funny happened during the chaos of my guitar, God showed up and reminded me that leading worship is not about me, my image, my ministry success, my hair with gel in it, my cool new shirt or how relevant and good sounding my band is. Leading worship is about helping people to respond to the greatness of God and offer up their hearts and minds to Him. Suddenly I wasn't so concerned about all the things I did in preparing for worship and the potential success our group could achieve from the day, now I was completely concerned about this group of kids who wanted to worship God and doing everything I could to assist them in the process. I didn’t want my guitar problems to distract these kids from worshipping God, I wanted with my whole being for these kids to continue to worship Him and to help out as best as I possibly could. My prayers, focus and leadership for the rest of the event were more focused on bringing Jesus worship than ever before. This is exactly the attitude I needed to have. I believe God allowed me to break 2 strings to humble me and give me a worship leader's heart.

I think musical talent, preparation, prayer and knowing your audience is very important in leading worship, but above all of these we must have a worship leader's heart. We must be concerned about the adoration, the lifting up, the exalting, the honoring, the intimacy with and praise of Jesus above all things. If we don’t hold this view in our prayers, preparation and leading of worship then we are doing everyone a great disservice and failing as worship leaders. One who leads worship must have a worship leader’s heart: one that seeks out and delights in the praise and worship of Jesus Christ.

Prayer requests: We are recording vocal tracks on Thursday for 3 songs we did in the studio, auditioning of a new bass player, direction for spring and summer as we want to record, write and lead people in new worship, open doors for our ministry to reach the lost with the gospel of Jesus Christ and that I would have a worship leader's heart today and everyday.

at 6:45 my band, A Paradigm Restored, is performing at first friday. Come out and support us, bring a friend and pray that God opens doors for the gospel to be shared and that we would speak it clearly as we should (Col 4).