This is one of the reasons Christians gather weekly for corporate worship. In these gatherings we recalibrate our lives to the story of God in the Scriptures. We place our story in the context of His, and we remember where hope is to be found. In our songs and sharing we encourage one another with the reminder that “thank God we shall not live here always!”

Skye Jethani in “With” (Thomas Nelson, 2011)

Joel Houston talks about the new album and the journey that it was creating it. He also gives an explanation for the "Aftermath" title. I’ve added that video below, along with a couple of thoughts triggered by it.

A key thought that I ran away with from the video was how we should be affected by the Aftermath of Jesus’ birth, of God being made flesh and now being Emmanuel, God with us.

We usually use the term "aftermath" when we talk about some great time of devastation; earthquakes, floods, or a nuclear explosion. Maybe we should consider Aftermath from this Christian perspective. I think so many of us go to church, worship at church or home or in the car, read the Scriptures and pray, but there is no Aftermath, no fallout, no life-shaking result from our encounter with God.

Jacob limped. Zechariah lost his voice. Isaiah fell on his face. Lazarus rose from the dead. What will your encounter with God do to you?

Thanks to Joel Houston and the United team for this great concept. I just might have to borrow it.

Find the album wherever you get your Christian music, your local bookstore, music store, and iTunes.

Want to know what you’re getting into? You can see a preview of Worship Theory thanks to Amazon’s Kindle for the Web. The preview is available here, at the Worship Theory page on Amazon. At your right is a green box, with the button “Read first chapter FREE.” Click that button, and enjoy!

If you don’t already have the Kindle app that best meets your needs, just go to Amazon’s Kindle Store.