Shake Heaven

I have the pleasure and honor of being a member of one of the greatest churches, Victory World Church. It was ranked as one of the fasted growing churches in the nation a couple of years ago and based on the traffic volume every weekend, VWC is certainly growing by leaps and bounds. Each weekend, we have 4 services (God bless Pastor Dennis for his energy and dedication!) and have over 104 different nations represented in the congregation.

I am pretty sure Heaven would look a bit like one of our services.

We have some amazing leaders that bring God's vision for our church, our community and for the body of Christ to life. Our newest venture is the music. For me, worship is one of those truly intimate forms of praise to God. I grew up with traditional black gospel music and hymns because that's all I knew. To me the music was rather depressing because it always centered around "woe is me" lyrics or elementary repetitive lines. Nothing really felt like we were praising God, more like pleading with Him to bring us out of this week's latest dilemma. Coming to Victory and worshipping with more contemporary music, I noticed the distinct difference. The uplifting, soul stirring lyrics. The high energy sound.

I finally felt like I was praising God for His goodness with all my heart.

Earlier this year, Grammy nominated singer/songwriter Montell Jordan retired from the R&B industry and came on staff as our worship pastor at Victory. Montell, his wife Kristin and their 3 kids are regulars at Fusion each week so I have seen him around for a couple of years. He and Kristin are involved in Fusion leadership, hosting a marriage clinic for Fusion married couples since they do have 17 years under their belt. Part of me always wondered if he felt convicted when he would occasionally do worship at Fusion or for a Sunday service and still touring around the world singing secular songs.

He did. He realized he couldn't straddle the fence of worshipping God and worshipping the world. After some fasting and praying, retired from the secular world and joined the staff full time. Definitely was a God move because going from being an international star to working for a church are certainly not in the same pay grade.

Montell has helped bring to life a vision of worship music that Pastor Dennis has had for a while. Creating a new sound of music that encourages people to make worship a lifestyle. And with that Victory World Music was born. The first single "Shake Heaven" featuring Montell and the amazing Beckah Shae was released on iTunes a couple of weeks ago. The official music video was released today.

I am very proud of music that comes from Victory. Our worship pastors are serious about their music and go out of their way to make sure our worship sets are not just for entertainment but to seriously give praise and thanks to God for everything. I remember the crazy anticipation of the Fusion Band's "Hello, Again" album release concert last August. The entire sanctuary (about 1700 seats) was filled to capacity and the energy was ridiculous. The Spirit of God seriously reigned in that place.

Victory World Music will take its place amongst other great worship ministries like Hillsong, Planetshakers, Jesus Culture, David Crowder Band, Chris Tomlin, Elevation Church, and Free Chapel Band. Enjoy the video and make worship a lifestyle.