Guidelines for Preparing the Online Praise Jam

1. Choose a pop song that you like, something that you really love to sing and/or play.
2. Bring the song and its lyrics to prayer, asking the Holy Spirit to reveal to you the “echo of God” in
the song.
3. It is important to bring to prayer also the people who would listen to your sharing, like to have
them in mind and the situations that they could be living, allowing God to speak to them
through you and your reflection.
4. To simplify, you can choose three lines from the song that are most meaningful to you. From
these three lines you will base your reflection of the song.
Guide questions for reflection:
a. What is your personal understanding of the line? If you could cite example or image
that would explain further, it would help the audience understand too.
b. What could God be telling about this line? What could be in His heart? Here you will
share a passage from the Word of God that could be behind this line. What is the
Word of God telling to you and the situations or realities you and the listeners are
living? What does God want to say to them in and through the Word of God? If you
are not sure what passage to use, you can always ask Adriana and/or me. We are
here to help and support you.
c. It is best if you can share a personal experience about how God reveals himself to
you in connection with the Word of God or lyrics. In this way, you are helping the
listeners to also discover and recognize God in their lives and also in the words of
the songs that they listen to. One of the goals of this Praise Jam and especially that
we use pop songs is in order to make us see that God is so near and close to us,
even in the songs that we listen to, thus, giving us the understanding that God is
here with us, closer to us than we imagine; we just need to train our ears and hearts
to listen and be attentive to Him.
d. You can repeat this pattern in your reflection of the three main lines of the lyrics.
You can also choose to share just one experience, perhaps related to the line that is
closest to you.
e. At the end of the sharing, invite the listeners to spend a time of prayer with the
passages you gave and with the entire lyrics too. It helps if you give two questions
 that could guide in their personal prayer and reflection, which could also be the
guide during the group sharing.
5. Please type your draft for checking. Why do we need to check your draft? It is to help you be
clear with the points you want to get across to the audience. It is helping you to prepare well the
food that you will serve, so that the listeners will have the best of what you can give, bringing
them to God and not to ourselves through our preaching. We prepare as a community, and
when you stand in front to preach, you are assured that the community is behind you.
6. Once your draft is checked, you can record it. Why video? Because it is more engaging and can
really help our viewers focus and stay the entire Praise Jam. You can record it at one go or you
can record it in bits, like two-minute long files. The whole preaching has to be ten minutes long
maximum. This is around 1,100 words.
7. But the most important detail in the preparation is to enjoy with the Lord, from the start of the
preparation until the end, and even during the Praise Jam itself when you are watching yourself
with all of us. Giving your best in the preparation and preaching is not the goal, it is only one of
the means to get closer to the God who loves you so much and wants to share His joy with you.
If we are not enjoying with the Lord, what’s the point, right?  So please enjoy with the Holy
Trinity and Mother Mary and Jaime.
8. If you have any questions or need help in any aspect, please let me and Adriana know.
9. Thank you for your generosity and self-giving and desire to share God to others.