What does it matter if we make great songs and sell a lot of records but fail in our relationships? Apart from serving and loving other people, what does any of the rest of this matter? The larger our platform becomes, the more intentionally we have to focus on the heart of our calling: to introduce people to God and to show them His glory."
-Chris Tomlin

Over the last five years or so, the modern worship movement has ignited on both sides of the Atlantic with all the subtlety of a match thrown into a bucket of kerosene. Largely unattended by media hype, the movement has emerged hand in hand with a broad wave of renewal and reawakening. While the effects have been far reaching throughout the church, both in terms of a new generation of worship songs and a needed theological shift toward greater God-centeredness, many of the key players in the movement have remained largely invisible. Not surprising given that the movement’s focus has been the pursuit of God’s glory, not the creation of human monuments or pop icons.

For artist/worshippers like Chris Tomlin, who’s gut level debut The Noise We Make marks the first release from sixstepsrecords, the shift in emphasis from worship leader to artist/worshipper hasn’t come without its tensions. Chris’ passionate, transcendent music, worshipful abandonment, and unapologetic ministry have been quietly fanning flames on college campuses and in his local church for several years now, but the whole idea of transitioning to record deals, publicists, lawyers and photo shoots has required some additional getting used to.

"I have to keep asking ‘How is this going to bring God glory? How am I going to use this to bring God glory?’" Chris says. "I believe that what John the Baptist says applies to me and to all of us as believers. We have to become less so that Christ will become greater. We have to take the focus off of us and put it on Him. So I want to use all these new industry opportunities as tools to extend the reach of what I’m doing and in that way to make His name greater. I just don’t want to get caught up in the trappings."

Born and raised in East Texas, Chris Tomlin grew up on a steady diet of country music, learning his guitar chops by playing along with Willie Nelson records. Not that you would ever guess it from listening to the gentle smoothness of his vocals. In fact, the ten songs on The Noise We Make tend to have a lot more in common with the evocative arrangements and stylings of bands like U2 than they do with any of their more country cousins.

"I love the simplicity of drums, bass, electric and acoustic guitars," Chris explains. "We’re not about putting on a big show. We don’t want to be rock stars. We’re about connecting with people and having a shared experience of coming before God and worshipping Him. We want our personalities and our music to come across in a way that makes people feel like ‘Hey, those are just my friends up there.’"

Closely involved with the Passion movement, several of Chris’ songs have already been featured on Passion CD’s, WoW 2001, the upcoming WoW Worship project and on the OneDay DVD/video documentary and soundtrack. His modern, electric compositions combined with a simplicity of melody and corporate lyrics make for songs that are immediately heartfelt and singable.

"I write a lot of songs but not many ever make it to the recording stage," Chris says. "That’s because I’m always asking the question ‘Would people want to sing this?’ I wouldn’t be the best choice to write a folk song or something with an intricate lyric. The gift God has given me is to write things that are simple and that connect with people really quickly. Even so, I have to wrestle some of them pretty hard. Communicating a profound truth in a simple way is never as easy as it seems."

In fact, the project’s first single, "Forever," a song of praise for the enduring nature of God’s love, took Chris four years to complete. The idea for the anthemic refrain of the verses came easily enough but the wide, thrumming chorus was more elusive.

"Every time we went into the studio to record something," Chris remembers, "I would bring that song in hopes that someone else would be able to come up with a chorus. I write a lot of patches of songs and then collaborate with someone else to finish it out. With this song it never happened. Then one day, four years later, the idea just hit me."

Chris wrote "America," another of the standout tracks on The Noise We Make, in anticipation of the OneDay gathering held in May of 2000. The event was attended by tens of thousands of college students from across the country, all coming together to worship and seek God on behalf of their country and their generation. "America" was the final song performed that evening.

"I was trying to sum up in one song the heart of what we wanted all those college students to take away with them," Chris says. "We came together to seek God’s face that day, but the more important issue was ‘What do we do when we leave?’ I don’t believe worship is about music. It’s about how we live every part of our lives. It’s about serving and doing good to others. If we want God to move in our land, we’ve got to understand that His Spirit does that through us as we love people and reach out to them. We can meet and pray in our own church subcultures, but it’s only the love of God, actively extended through our hands, that will make any lasting difference in our country."

Though he is comfortable leading worship for large crowds such as the OneDay gathering, Chris has developed his own personal apologetic to describe exactly how he sees his role in the church.

"I’d rather change the term ‘worship leader’ into ‘lead worshipper’" he says. " I think that’s a better description of my calling. After all, I’m a worshipper too. I was created to worship God just the same as everyone else. I’m no better at it. My need to worship is the same as yours and everyone else’s. In the same way we’ve decided at sixstepsrecords to describe ourselves as ‘artist/worshippers’ rather than ‘worship artists.’ It makes more sense because we’re worshippers first, and the fact that we use artistry as a means of worship is incidental."

The album’s strongest blend of worship and artistry occurs in the song "The Wonderful Cross," a moody, exultant remake of the Isaac Watts hymn "When I Survey The Wondrous Cross". By updating the musical arrangement and adding a soul-stirring vertical chorus, Chris succeeded in shifting the song back and forth between a reflective worship and an exuberant abandon. Churches across the country are already adopting the song for their own services.

"Our bass player was playing the hymn by himself during a sound check," Chris remembers. "It was such a beautiful hymn that I joined him onstage and began singing. In the middle of the sound check we just spontaneously burst into what is now the chorus, singing ‘Oh the wonderful Cross!’ Once we began recording, I invited Matt Redman to sing on the verses. It’s turned out to be my favorite song on the record."

The song that listeners seem to be connecting with on the deepest level though is the book of Isaiah inspired closing track "This Is Our God." Mixing a gentle acoustic melody with a lyric that simply worships God for who He is and what He does, "This Is Our God" advances the promises of solace and redemption found in scripture.

"I didn’t realize how encompassing this song was when I wrote it," Chris says. "I’ve already gotten a lot of e-mails from people who have lost someone close to them, or who are going through a divorce or some other painful passage. No matter what kind of hurt someone’s going through, ‘This Is Our God’ seems to offer restoration."

In his own life and songs, and in the modern worship movement as a whole, Chris Tomlin sees that theme of restoration as central. "God is using this whole worship movement as a means to restore us to the realization that it’s all about Him," he says. "God is after His glory first. For too long we’ve focused most of our music, even our worship services, on ourselves. The modern worship movement is putting an intentional focus back on God. If we talk primarily about ourselves and build our own followings, you don’t see people being restored and healed and saved. But when we put the attention on God and pursue His glory instead of our own, we do see lives restored and people come to salvation. When God is the focus of something people are drawn to it. That’s what I want myself and my songs to be a part of."