Mar

08

John 1:1

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning”

My story

I could hear the beat of within my chest,  thump, thump, thump.  Each one was louder than the talking in the room.  My hands were sweating, my heart trembling, my lip gently quivered as I fought back the tears from rejection.  “You are a paid singer. We don’t think you are worth the investment for a staff person position. We are looking for a man to be our worship leader”  These words continued to echo in my head screaming at me. “You’re not good enough. You’ll never be enough” Then they politely asked, “How do you feel about this?”  My response was not the finest of my moments. Unable to fight back the whelping tears just behind my eyes, I said, “excuse me” and left the room. You see I had just sat through a meeting where my character and calling were being pummeled by leadership who didn’t seem to understand or care about the pain they’d be afflicting on me for years.  

Now out in the hallway weeping with snot running down my face as I cried out to God for help.  “Breathe in, breathe out. Breath in, breathe out”, as I coached myself on how to calm down. After I composed myself and timidly walked back into the room.  I sat next to my husband with my head down. He quickly exclaimed, “we are done here”, grabbed my hand and led me out.

That meeting affected me in a way I didn’t realize until I was met face to face with crippling fear from the rejection I’d been carrying.  That day started me on a path I wish then I could escape. It led me to a complete breakdown. I went on the next few months afraid of virtually everything, including sleeping.  I would wake up in a terror. I was afraid of being afraid. Needless to say after a few weeks of not sleeping God was graciously leading me to his feet where I could alone find peace.  My husband had just taken a new job and I was traveling with him for a week. It was there afraid to be alone I ironically found myself alone for hours a day.

This was the start of my new journey with Jesus.  I went to the local Staples store in that town and bought an artist drawing pad and felt tip pens.  I love the way the heavy paper feels under my hands. I began to dive into my only hope, where it was just me and Jesus…..and John.  I asked God for guidance. I asked the Holy Spirit to bring light to his word. Little did I realize he would bring a new light as to who Jesus is.

I walked outside the hotel room, sat on a rusty pool chair, and let the warm sun gently rest on my back.  I opened the bible to John 1 and couldn’t get past the first verse. “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.  He was with God in the beginning”  I began to think, the beginning?  Then I flipped back to where it all started, Genesis 1.  “In the beginning..” There’s that word again, “beginning”.  God created the heavens and the earth. Now the earth was formless and empty, darkness was over the surface of the deep, and the Spirit of God was hovering over the waters.  1:2, “And God said, “Let there be light”.

Jesus is the Word that was with God in the beginning.  As I sat there in utter amazement of the intricity of who Jesus truly was, I paused.  I reread Genesis with the knowledge that Jesus was the Word that was spoken. He was the Word that God spoke, “Let there be light”.   I continued to read on in the creation story understanding that Jesus was the Word that was carrying forth creation.

I may be a little out there, but this is what I believe God showed me about a deeper level of love from Jesus to the world.  As I continued to read in John 1:10, “He was in the world, and though the world was made through him, the world did not recognize him, but his own did not receive him.”  Bam!!!! Jesus was the the Word that came forth to create the world. He came to be in the world that was created by the Word that was him to save the world. He came knowing the world that was created by the Word that was him would reject him. What kind of love is this?

As I sat there with a buzzing of a bee near my head, my sweet Izzy (our doggie) stared at me wondering why I was crying without any apparent reason.  It was in that moment John opened up my heart to a new way to see the love of Jesus for me.  I was falling in love with Jesus like never before. I remained there for what seemed like hours staring at the sun, marveling at the light that was created only by the Word that was my Jesus.  Overcome by his love, for the first time in over a month I felt peace, indescribable peace.

This kind of love did not create me with unique talents and abilities and passion to then label me unworthy or unable.  I was not a mistake. I was not being overlooked by man, I was being protected by Jesus. In that moment he began to break down the strongholds that had held me physically captive for over a month.  He began to free me from my personal prison in the shadow of his love. John’s words (which are actually Jesus the Word) were saving my life all over again. This is the start of how John saved my life.

 

Bridgette Hammers is a worship leader songwriter out of Dallas, Texas.  She and her husband joyful parent a furbaby named Izzy with the hopes of one day having their own children and adopting.  You can find more blogs and music from her at www.bridgettehammers.com  She is available for bookings to speak and lead worship.  

 

 

Jan

01

What’s Next?

Bridgette Hammers

1.1.18

“Are We Asking The Right Question”

As we run into a new year, many of you are already asking, What’s Next?  These two words have paralyzed with fear for years.  Am I the next…? God, What’s next?  NEXT!!  I wrestled with God over his plans for my life as if he needed my approval before he could move forward.  He began to teach me the reason his response was always silence, was because I was asking the wrong question.  It’s not what’s next?  It’s what’s new?  God’s word says that he is doing a new thing not a next thing.   His mercies are next?  Nope! His mercies are new every morning.  There is something about God that loves for us to have a daily walk with him.  Trusting him for the “new” each morning.

God is infinitely creative and does not need anything from us.  He has created each of us so uniquely that not one of our journey will be identical- not one!  I found myself making plans for God’s purpose in my life.  Strategically planning and dreaming how each step would unfold.  Finding myself extremely frustrated that my best laid plans were not lining up with God’s plan.  I was making battle plans for the One who knows the future, for the One who is beyond space and time, for the One who knew me before I was even formed in my mother’s womb.  I would ask him, “Am I the Next…..  Who-ever”?  

He began to break it down real simple for me.  I’m not running my plans by you.  Bridgette, you can trust me in my greatness and faithfulness or you can live in anxiety and fear.  It’s your choice.  I wish I could say that I was smart enough to let go in that moment, but I wasn’t.  It took God allowing me to go to one of the darkest places I’ve ever been to admit, “I don’t got this”.  I need his plan, his way, and I trust whatever that is.  

God doesn’t use the same battle plan twice.  He is not a god that needs to duplicate his winning plan/plans.  He does not need a formula.  He can use a stone in David’s hand, He can use 3 jewish boys to defy a king in a fiery furnace, and he can use an unknown, unqualified chick to lead thousands into battle with only a mic in her hand.  

You see God is not up to what’s next.  This is how the world plans and thinks.  God is up to what’s new.  So as we prepare for the new year, let’s bend our ear to God’s heart and ask “what’s new”.  What new thing is God doing and let’s go slay our enemy in battle.

 

Reference:

Lamentation 3:22-24

Psalm 139

 

Dec

06

Thank you!

Wow, what a wonderful year!  We are excited to share with you a few of the wonderful things that came in 2017.  Thanks to your support by sharing and purchasing music, we were able to reach over 250,000 plays on streaming for “No Longer Slaves”.  This song has reached so many across the world because of your continued support.  We have received so many testimonies of God’s faithfulness and mercy being shared through the worship music.  I am humbled by so many that God is reaching throughout the world.  This could not happen without all of your continued support and sharing the new songs.  

In October I started a great position at Cottonwood Creek Church in Allen, TX.  Keith and I absolutely love our new church home and what an honor to have such a wonderful church come along side the calling in ministry by supporting me as I lead worship and write songs.  

I will still be leading worship at National and local conferences as well as touring and traveling to Nashville to write and record throughout 2018.  If you know of any churches looking for a worship leader for events please keep me in mind.  

We are so excited to announce that a new single will be releasing early 2018.  “Never Unaware” has already been well received by so many churches, and I can’t wait to share this with everyone!   Below we have links to Breaking Free which ranked in the top 3 for Praise Charts #songquest2017, No Longer Slaves, We Arise, and Voices Rise.  Simply click the link to purchase or donate.  

We’d like to thank you for your continued support of sharing and worshiping with us online.  Please continue to share our Spotify link and continue to help others find our new worship music by sharing this link.  http://bit.ly/bridgettemusic

Again thank you for all your support!

Bridgette

 

Nov

17

Grave Clothes

“Take off the grave clothes and let him go”

John 11:44

Published by We Are Worship September 2017

When I read the bible I try to put myself into the story.  I ask myself questions like, what was the weather like?  What did the people look or smell like?  How would I react as the main character of the story?  This is my perspective on a story we have read and heard many time, Lazarus being raised from the dead.

It’s a dusty hot dessert day.  The sun was beaming down on Jesus as he rolled into town.  The news of his close friend’s death was fresh on the hearts of all the family.  Mary and Martha were torn between grief and understanding.  Mary is in the kitchen probably cooking something awesome to eat while Mary is waiting to see when Jesus will arrive.  They loved Jesus, but didn’t understand why he had allowed their brother to die.  Jesus comes in to meet them and asks them to go the grave.

In John 11:39 Jesus proclaims, “Take away the stone”.  Martha’s immediate response is, “by this time there is a bad odor, for he has been dead for four days”.  Martha is very aware that she’d love to see her brother again, but the smell might kill a few people outside of the grave.  ***** Jesus’ response is to call her brother back to life.  We know what happens next Lazarus is called from the grave, “Lazarus come out!”  Let’s pause there for a moment.  We are told the story from the perspective of Jesus and Lazarus’ sisters, but what could’ve possibly been going on in the tomb?

Picture Lazarus lying there, wrapped tightly in burial clothes in a hot, dark cave.  Laying there lifeless, he hears the voice of Jesus calling to him, “Come Out!”.  I can picture him taking that first gasp of breath….. as he tries to figure out where he is.  His first breath of resurrection air was quickly masked in the stench of death, that was him.  I picture him doing the “raise your hands if sure” armpit sniff test….. to discover that foul smell, strongest BO of all time, was in fact coming from him.  The next thing to do is to come out of the grave.  Can you picture Lazarus hopping out of the tomb with both feet and hand bound? Mumbling, “I’m coming, I’m coming”

“The dead man came out, his hands and feet wrapped with strips of linen, and a cloth around his face”. You guys Lazarus was the original walking dead mummy.  All the folklore originated right here in John 11.

It was what Jesus said next that shook my world.  He said, “Take off the grave clothes and let him go”

As many times as I have read or heard this story talked about I had never seen this!  Lazarus had just experienced resurrection power.  He was dead and now he is alive. Yet he still had the stench of death on him.  He was still bound by the grave clothes.  It was in that moment I realized that we as Christians have experienced resurrection power, we were dead and now we are alive, and we can still be bound by grave clothes.  So many times we walk around smelling of death and decay. Jesus is saying, it’s time to take off the grave clothes.  Take off shame, take off hurt, take off fear, take off pain, and all things that are death to us.  It’s time to be free.  Lazarus would of looked incredibly foolish after he was raised from the dead if had kept wearing the grave clothes.  And so do we!

I began to allow my mind to wander a little deeper into Lazaurs’ experience.  I started to ask myself, what was he wearing under his grave clothes?  That answer would be nothing.  In order for Lazarus to be fully free, he needed to be willing to be fully known.  YIKES!  We love the idea of freedom, but transparency scares us back into the grave.  I know I’m very comfortable sharing my victories and testimonies, but I need God sized strength to share my journey of growth and weakness in the middle of the battle.

We read early in this chapter that the whole town came out to the grave.  It truly takes a village when we are on our freedom journey.  It takes people to help us recognize our blind spots and help lead us to transparency in safety.  So I’m asking you today, are you a walking mummy?  Have you experience Jesus’ resurrection power in your life, and you are still bound by the grave clothes?  If so, there is hope, there is freedom, there is healing.  Today, you can “take off the grave clothes” and be free.

 

 

Apr

26

Call to action for friends and family to help spread the word about Human Trafficking in the US and how to purchase “Voices Rise” to raise funds for Traffick911.org