Jessica Bennett

Worship is what sustained me and allowed me to connect with God.

My name is Jessica Bennett, and I have the honor and privilege of being

the worship leader at our Fellowship of the Parks (FOTP) Bedford campus.

Even at an early age, going to church was important to my family. All my

family were in music, and I even started singing in church when I was four years old. I quickly fifigured out that music and worship were going to be a big part of my life forever.

What I struggled with when I was young was an immense amount of

stage fright and performance anxiety. In elementary school, I questioned

that a lot. I remember just saying, "Why’?" I love music, I love how I can

see that music connects us and brings joy, and yet I am afraid.

I would get physically ill. I would go to the point of almost blacking out.

It was hard. I felt like God was not letting go of me. It was not like He was

saying, “Okay, just stop that plan.” I knew that God had given me this

passion, and I knew that I had skilled ability, but this was no good. It

wasn’t going to work for me to keep letting this fear control me.

A professor in college once told me to try performing in theme parks. He

said that you do fifive to six shows a day, six days a week and that it might help get rid of this fear.

So that is what I did. I started performing at a theme park. I met my

husband at a theme park, and we also performed on cruise ships for a

while. I had every opportunity to get rid of the fear inside of me.

Then we had our fifirst baby and decided we did not want to raise her in

a green room on a cruise ship somewhere. I had always voluntarily led

worship as well and I knew God was saying: this is what I want for your life.

I pushed against it at fifirst. I kept telling God I would just keep performing

and tell everyone about God backstage. He just kept leading me and

opening doors to be in full-time ministry.

Early on in my time in ministry, when I was still having the fear, and going

through obstacles in our lives and in our marriage, I felt God’s strength

through each step. Worship is what sustained me. One particular day, I

was on stage praying right before worship began. I had a lot of anxiety

and God clearly reminded me: the strength does not come from myself—

it comes from Him. I needed to give it all to Him. He gave me this

opportunity so I would rely completely on Him.

Do not lose hope in what God is doing even in the times you feel

inadequate or afraid. He is going to do what only He can do. We just

worship through it all and He brings us through it.

He will be honored through it if we just surrender to Him.