As we were struggling to find a worship leader for today, I decided on Saturday to finally volunteer even though I was a little unwell with a sore throat and cough. After committing myself for the task, I told God ‘I promise you God that this illness will not get in the way of me leading worship’. God replied, ‘That’s not your job Benji. Its my job to promise you that your sore throat and cough will not get in the way of worship at Church this Sunday’. Our MIGHTY God kept that promise and we could dwell on the mightiness of God through this time of worship. There is no-one like our God. He is so big, so strong…

Today was a positive, interesting time leading worship at Church. The Gang With summer vacation, it was difficult to find people to help. D offered to help – she had just started helping with the worship team a week ago. J had also texted saying she will practice and join on Sunday. K was a little unsure. After a little texting PM said she could do sound mixing. So I texted the final song list and was just doing a solo practice at home on Sunday evening, when GK called and said he’ll drop in at home for a brief run through and also catch J for the practice. We had a good practice. Somewhere in the middle, GK also…

Today I had the joy of leading worship in Church. I was led to use a theme which hinged on a song by Skillet called ‘Stars’. This may not be a standard choice for most worship sessions, but I loved how God moved to put things together to create a fruitful time of worship at Church. “The One who holds the stars”When we look at all the wonderful things God has created, it is wonderful that we can respond to them by worshipping Him. It blows my mind away that our God is powerful enough to create mountains and flowers and hold each star in place perfectly. It is even more amazing that this awesome God cares so much more…

You’ll need to know the history of my cajon to understand this wish… and if you don’t, well it’s too long a story to blog.

It was touch and go – exams at VIT and incessant rains meant worship at church today could end up being minimalist. After a few text messages, the team was assembled. Dan hopped onto a bus at Bagayam and made it to Hospital before it rained too much. I picked her up and drove through slushy roads to pick up Sam. Andrew couldn’t join us as the bass guitar was not working. Arpudh whizzed in from Karagiri.We entered a dark church with no electricity. Power had been out 4 times since the morning and the generator was not working. We also didn’t have a laptop! Would we end up with acoustic worship as we struggled to remember full lyrics?! I’d…

I’m not even sure if it is spelt Mathew or Matthew, but he is the guy who made Grahams trip to India possible. He’s just a regular guy in a shirt and jeans. I met him for twenty minutes during dinner with Graham on Saturday and I must accept that today I feel that he has impacted my life as much as Graham did over the weekend. After spending 9 years in the UK he made a choice to come back to India to serve and follow Gods calling. He came back about 4 months ago and had his first child 2 months ago. I know how huge such a change is – We barely managed to tolerate the move…

Its always nice to meet someone who has influenced your choice of music. And when I knew Graham Kendrick was coming to Vellore, I knew it would be an awesome weekend.“Shine, Jesus, Shine” was one of the first songs I had learnt at TAMI with India YFC. “Servant King” was one of the first new song I learnt at CMC as it had CMCs motto in the first verseSo after grabbing my tickets and registrations from Roshan I was fully prepared for friday night after 2 sleepless nights in the nursery. I left work an hour early, grabbed a power nap and we scooted off to Scudder Auditorium. We were very lucky to get seats! “An Evening With Graham” was…

End of the month and these are the songs that left their mark in my ear and my heart. Top five songs:1. Praise like Fireworks: Rend Collective2. Desert Soul: Rend Collective3. Boldly I Approach: Rend Collective4. Alive: Hillsong5. Dhanya Tera Naam: Sheldon Bangera Artist of the month: Rend Collective (You would have guessed that by now!) Lets see what the next month throws at me!

Today, as we drove to church, a store, a lunch get-together at Bagayam and then back home, the predominant music playing in the car was by Rend Collective.Stumbling on to the band was semi-accidental.When we were in Chennai last year, we worshipped at a church called Ashraya. The worship leader led in a very lively song that stuck in my mind for weeks and then slowly faded away. In November 2014, my sister visited us at Vellore with her family. As we caught up and did lots of exciting things, we also played some songs that our children liked. J said that K loved this song and then played a video for us from youtube – the song was “Build…

Christmas has dawned and I now have time to think about the songs I enjoyed the most this season!I’ve been hearing them everywhere – in the shopping malls, on the radio, on TV and even over my iphone. So Here’s a countdown of my top 10 Christmas Carols. I’ll start at number 10 and then count down to no. 1! Click here to read the list of my ten favorite Christmas carols