International Worship Leader Darlene Zschech’s Life with Christ: ‘He Holds Me Every Day’
Movieguide® Contributor
When you’re in tune with your faith and priorities, “It’s not something you’ll work to stay in” says accomplished worship leader Darlene Zschech.
“It’s all part of my fellowship of Jesus, mission… I think the life of a Christian, but my husband and I in our church so I don’t fight to stay in and I just stay near to Jesus and he holds me every day,” Zschech said in a podcast episode this week.
“It’s not something I work to stay in,” the “What a Beautiful Name” writer said of her relationship with God, “at all actually. You know, my followship of Jesus, like I was radically saved at 15 yeah and so in following Jesus I find myself, you know writing or leading but actually even… these are things that I have the privilege of being able to do and apply myself to but you know, we pastored church… I’ve raised three children. I have six grandchildren now…These are the riches that are my community of faith you know.”
Her walk with God “looks different” at every “season.
“I’ve learned little secrets along the way though, that I got to pay attention to seasons and The rhythms of grace for my life,” she explained. “Seasons, they are necessary and they come and go but the other stuff, it’s a joy and it’s an honor. It’s an honor to lead anyone in worship anywhere at any time and you know—I wouldn’t even really call it a career ‘cause it’s just something that I do.”
She believes it’s important to know when a season has passed so that you can move on to the next thing God wants to show you.
“I’ve learned that you know if you overstay your welcome in a current season,” she added, “even though you feel like you have to stay there and you’re a bit hesitant to jump into the next one, if you overstay your welcome… it’s never fruitful.”
Zcech talks about seasons in her book, “The Golden Thread.” In it, she explores how God is there in “every season,” even when it may seem dark and scary, like in 2013, when the singer-songwriter started her battle with breast cancer.
Movieguide previously reported:
“I know how to worship. I know how to declare God’s goodness. I know how to dig into the Word, but I had to go to a deeper place,” Zschech says of her 2013 cancer diagnosis.
“What I found in my valley of the shadow of death is, I found the presence of God, and I realized, you know when it says ‘the valley,’ in Psalm 23, ‘of the shadow of death,’ you can only have shadow if there is light, and it’s just a fact that God doesn’t leave us. Just because we’re saved doesn’t mean we won’t have troubles.”
Zschech previously wrote about how cancer changed her:
Finding the scriptures and having them close by is important so that at any time you can quote the word and bring your experience up to what the word of God says, not try to change your theology down to where you feel. That has been premium for me.
Another thing has been the people around you. You have to be really vigilant with the people who are in your world. I’m quite a soft person, I love people. But after a while people would pray over me and pray these heavy prayers that made me feel so depressed! At the beginning I just stood there and took it. But after a while when people would start to pray like that I would actually stop them and say, “You know what? If you’re not going to pray a prayer of faith then don’t pray over me because I only want people around me who are going to speak life, pray faith, be a sense of joy and hope to my family and church.”
My daughters would ask, “who are you, Mum?! You have changed so much!”
I just became really vigilant with the atmosphere that I allowed in my home. And I’m still a bit the same. I live quite differently now and I like it – I don’t know if everyone else around me does, but I do!
Today, Zschech is happily cancer-free and praising the Lord with all of her voice.
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