Sid: Now when I talk about people that have either through vision, or in the body, or out of body gone into the throne room of Heaven; I have to tell you it does provoke me to jealousy; but I have found a Psalmist that when he worships God he takes everyone into that experience if they have a heart to do it. Now I’m speaking by way to telephone to Keith Duncan. Keith has been a worship leader for twenty-seven years, but the difference between what he is today and what he was is the difference between a New Covenant Psalmist and a professional worship leader. Would you agree with that Keith Duncan?
Keith: Absolutely, absolutely Sid I think we have lots of people like myself who are professional musician who found an occupation and a place to connect in the local church. But there’s a difference that takes place when that professional occupation encounters the presence of God and causes a shift in their music, as well as their personal life and focus.
Sid: Why is it that it that just every church you go to there’s like a routine if you will; it starts out with real fast music; then it goes slow and then you know it’s time for the announcements. I mean it’s so predictable I don’t believe that that’s what God had in store for his people where you can predict everything.
Keith: [Laughing] I agree Sid; I think part of that is because as human’s we’re creatures of habit, and we like our routines. I like coming in from work and I like to sit down on my recliner with my remote and that’s my routine. If my routine gets disrupted I have a problem with that; no matter if it’s good or bad, but I think also the same is if there are some paradigms in the church, some thoughts, some processes of thoughts that see music really that we do on Sunday morning as merely just an icebreaker to get the people together to sing so that we can hear the preacher preach his red hot sermon or his great sermon. And I think that with no detriment to the Word; because I think the Word obviously we need to hear the Word; you know we’re changed by, our faith is built by the Word; by the hearing of the Word. And that just, the Word disciples us, but I think often times we put so much emphasis on the Word that we really miss the true meaning and the true purpose of what our praise and worship segment, or our music time before the service begins. I think we miss the importance and the significance of that and because we’re so focused on the Word. And the truth is that the impact of the Word can have such greater impact and effect in our lives when our heart is prepared and opened and ready to receive the Word instead of us just coming together to sing a song so that we calm down from the drive, from all the traffic jam that we’ve been in getting to the church and the kids screaming in the car. You know sometimes we just take that as the moment and the time where we sing and everybody gets calmed down and relaxed and now we can hear the Word.
Sid: Now there seems to be a shift Keith in churches, the biggy churches, the mega churches around the United States are in a mode called seeker sensitive with a good honorable intent. The good honorable intent is to get a non-believer to transition to be a believer, but as a result the rest of the church only has a few minutes worth of worship.
Keith: Yeah.
Sid: What do you think of that, what do think God thinks of that a better question?
Keith: Well, I believe first and foremost I believe that the seeker sensitive will meet the non-church, the non-believers if you will. I’m reminded back to the vision of the river, and scripture tells us that the river flows really shallow from the court and the further that the river flowed the deeper the water got and there were some people that were in the river that were, that were ankle deep in the river; there were some that were waist deep and there were some that were in over their heads in the river. And so what part of my understanding is with this is that the seeker sensitive gets people into the river at least, let’s get them saved and into the Kingdom, but I can’t believe that we, it’s not their intention to stay ankle deep in water. I think it’s our intention o pull them into the deeper to encourage them. Come, let’s go swimming, let’s go deeper, don’t wade in the water when we can swim in the water.
Sid: Well, you know what’s my belief is that it is a wonderful, honorable intent and many people are getting saved; but the roots are not deep. It’s saved but there isn’t intimacy with God and with what I see prophetically that is coming on planet earth those that are ankle deep may get out of the water when things get tough.
Keith: That’s right, that’s exactly right. If our focus is just on pleasing the people then our worship and our word will be very shallow. But when we understand and this was part of what my transition was all about in ’97 was is that God transition me to quit singing to the people and begin singing to God; because if I’m singing to the people then I will basically enable them to give a score card for our praise and worship and I will let them dictate what songs we sing, or how long we sing, or how loud the music is; and I will cater to what they want rather than what God wants.
Sid: Well, I thought it was a theocracy, I thought God was in charge.
Keith: Yes. [Laughing]
Sid: Keith, how does someone become such a fabulous Psalmist; you started at a young age. Now I started at a young age, but I didn’t get very far; I still can’t play the piano today, it just wasn’t my thing. Why did you start learning the piano?
Keith: Well, actually I had two grandmothers on both sides of my family, my mom’s mom and my dad’s mother. Both of them played the piano and one of them was much more accomplished than the other. When my grandmother who was accomplished passed away my other grandmother began to pray, “Lord let that gift and let that talent transfer into Keith’s life and let him really expand with that.” And something happened Sid that there was a transfer of gifting and I connected with one teacher and it didn’t really work; but then I found this other teacher that helped me to be able to connect and just begin to develop, and all of a sudden this transfer of talent and anointing. There was something even at that young age, there was an anointing that was on my life and was manifested and people could see that and that’s what I truly believe in this transfer of anointing, I believe in speaking that because I experienced that myself personally. I would discover chords that ordinarily I would not have discovered in reading music; because I could hear things that the music was not notating out on the paper. And so therefore I wanted to, I wanted to release it, I wanted to discover how do I release what I’m hearing. Little did I know that that was part of what God was trying to tell us the church today release what you’re hearing in your spirit, quit playing somebody else’s music release what I’m giving to you. Because what I’m giving to you has so much more impact and will affect and change so many lives more than just sticking to the notes. And so that’s where I began…
Sid: You know, our time is slipping away but you do concerts all over the world, you call them Throne Zone concerts and when you do it you said “There’s usually a very special time that occurs when there’s a transition and people have an opportunity to have Heavenly experiences; have down loaded direction for their life. Tell me about that moment.
Keith: Yeah, there’s you know the scripture talks about and if you think about it in the Tabernacle of Moses; with Moses Tabernacle there was an outer court; there was an inner court; and then there was a Holy of Holies. Well we know in the outer court there was lots of praise and celebration. If you think about that and take that pattern and let’s overlay it into what we do with our praise and worship segments in churches on Sunday. We open with a fast song to gather the people; to celebrate to rejoice about what the Lord has done and we sing to one another about the things that God has done. Look at what the Lord has done, he healed my body, he touched my mind, praise God hallelujah, but we don’t stop there because there is a greater destination; a higher calling that we can have an encounter with God. So we make that transition into the inner court to where we begin to worship and sing songs to God. And we begin to tell Him of his greatness and to thank Him for all the things that He has done in our lives. But to just to tell Him of how awesome and powerful of a God He is, and the focus shifts off of everybody else to where our focus begins to shift on God. But Sid so many times we stop right there, but there is another dimension that since Christ has come, since Jesus came the veil was rent in two God says “You can come into this Holy place with Me.” And so that’s true even in worship.
Sid: But you know most believer’s Keith never get there.
Keith: Oh no.
Sid: What a tragedy, I mean you spent a life as a professional worship leader and you never got there. And I right?
Keith: That’s exactly right, because I didn’t know I could do that, I didn’t know I had access to it.
Sid: You know what, because our time is slipping away, on tomorrow’s broadcast I want them to taste what God has done since your experience in the Throne Room, but tell me about these two CD’s and your book “The Throne Zone.” Actually you take one of your “Throne Zone Encounters” that you do all over the world and you recorded it live. Tell me one person’s experience when they were listening to your concert.
Keith: Just recently we had a man who had undergone radiation treatment for a brain tumor, as a result of that radiation treatment it had blinded him in one eye. While he was in that “Throne Zone Conference” in that atmosphere of worship that morning his eye began to clear up and throughout the day as he continued to soak in the presence of God, and as he continued to just worship the Lord. This was a person who had never experienced anything like this. He came from a very liturgical background, a liturgical church; they had never experienced Charismatic worship or the…
Sid: Listen the anointing was so high, not only did he get his sight in his blind eye he took his hearing aids out and could hear.
