Watermark's Nathan and Christy Nockels have a long history in worship music. The husband and wife team began leading worship ten years ago at their Oklahoma church. They moved onto Houston's First Baptist Church, leading worship for 2,000 people at the weekly Metro Bible Study.

In 1998, Watermark released their first CD with Rocketown Records. Besides recording, Nathan produces for Phillips, Craig and Dean, Point of Grace, downhere, Charlie Hall, Tim Hughes, Matt Redman and Passion Worship CDs. Christy also sings on Passion Worship CDs.

Their recently released fourth album, The Purest Place, brings them back to their original roots as worship leaders. Two weeks before embarking on a national tour with their children, four-year-old Noah Luke and 18-month-old Elliana Noelle, the couple spoke with us about the main catalysts for their newest project.

You've gone from church worship leaders to recording artists. What has the transition been like?

Nathan Nockels: As we look back, we see how certain things have changed. Our lives compared to a church worship leader's look different with all the travel. We've tried to maintain the same goals. I guess there's a conflict of interest between a recording artist and worship leader—it's almost an oxymoron. It's been a challenge to maintain a worship leader's heart versus a recording artist's heart.

Christy Nockels: A lot of the switch happened when we felt God calling us to travel. When you're traveling, you go from place to place and can't invest in the people. Even now, we're trying to figure out how we can invest as worship leaders. With this record, we really tried to steer back to those roots.

You juggle parenting, songwriting, recording and touring. How do you balance everything?

Christy: Staying involved in a church has been a great way to stay grounded. We met with our church to let them know what we're doing. They are our umbrella. We communicate through e-mail and keep accountable with friends. Nathan makes a huge point of having us pray together every night. He makes sure we stay connected to God. We have a team around us that believes in us and loves God. These are the vital things that help make it work.

How do you find inspiration for songs in your everyday activities?

Christy: Our songs come through everyday situations. If God speaks to me, I'll write it in my journal or whisper it into my tape player. I piece these things together and create songs. It's about being diligent to search out, ponder and keep those ideas organized.

Is it difficult to focus on the desire to be in "the purest place," as your CD title implies, rather than focusing on good reviews, sales figures and radio spins?

Christy: Absolutely. That's exactly where the title song came from. As artists, it's easy to focus on those things. We lost our manager, who had a different agenda from ours. That brought us back to where we started, when God put in our hearts the desire to create songs that would connect people to him. We prayed that God would let this be our most Jesus-focused record. I believe it happened. The title song was our prayer to remember that it's not about being in front of masses and on the radio. It's about being in the center of where he is.

The Passion of The Christ inspired this album. How did you translate what you experienced in that movie to your songwriting and album creation?

Christy: Worship is a response to who God is and what he has done. After seeing the movie, I had to respond. I came home that night dwelling on the images of that movie and I started singing, "The perfect lamb that was slain. There's the glory of your name." We worked on the song for two nights. It was the catalyst for the record, so the whole record ended up being a worship response. We had been having writer's block and wondering if we should just not make a record. We asked God to do a new work in us and not let us put out a mundane record. He happened to use that movie to inspire us.

Was your song "Mended" written out of a life experience?

Christy: About ten years ago, we led worship with Charlie Hall and his wife, Kimber. We traveled together in a ministry called Sons and Daughters. Kimber and I were inseparable. But, we were very young, had a lot of responsibility and it was hard. God was moving Nathan and me to travel, but Charlie and Kimber felt God wanted them to stay in Oklahoma City. The relationship became very wounded and we went our separate ways. I carried that for years, feeling like the enemy won, then gave it to the Lord. Two years ago, Kimber came to me and we were mended. It blessed my life like I never could imagine. I didn't know how much it wounded me until we were mended. It was one of the most freeing experiences in my life. It was another catalyst to do writing.

What's leading worship like now with mended relationships and a renewed vision?

Christy: Worship intensifies when you come with a grateful heart, and we are grateful for the new work he has done in us. It's been very freeing, like chains have been lifted. Our prayer has been that God would get this album into the hands of people who need to hear what he has done, not "God, let us sell as many records as possible." That prayer has spilled over to when we lead worship. For the first time, we're at a place where we've asked God to release us from all of that. We'll always struggle with getting caught up with things, but we feel relieved to let God do what he wants.

It sounds like your old roots have given you wings to soar now that God is working in your hearts more.

Christy: We now want to leave a mark, to be more accessible to people, to build bridges with churches and coffeehouses and colleges. We don't want to go on big tours, sing, get on the bus and go home. We want to go to places that don't always have big Christian artists coming through.

What are your thoughts on the growth of modern worship in recent years?

Christy: We were a bit young for the Keith Green movement, but we feel like forerunners in this latest worship movement. I remember getting bootleg copies of the Survivor Church in England with Martin Smith and Delirious that were cutting edge. Songs such as "I Could Sing of Your Love Forever" started becoming popular, but we had already been singing them for years. When we signed with Rocketown, they weren't connected with the worship movement. So, we started on a different note than if we had stayed independent. We were doing radio-tweaked records instead.

Nathan: A couple years after a record comes out, bigger known artists record the songs and there is a new wave of worship songs. God's put us in a place where he lets us see this whole movement from the inside out. We get to work with Matt Redman and Tim Hughes, to produce their records and be part of it all. God is moving in these worship leaders, in the Passion movement, with Survivor Records in the UK.

What are you trying to accomplish in your own worship writing?

Christy: We're steering away from doing radio-tweaked songs. It's not who we've ever been. In our concerts, we'd love to teach our songs. Rather than doing a concert where everyone just watches, if you teach your songs as worship songs, they will be perceived that way. Our biggest prayer is for people to participate, so we want our own music to be a tool of worship. This fall tour will be about making that switch.

How are you going about worship writing that's different now from before?

Christy: We tended to write more complicated melodically in the past. Simplicity helps people to digest things easier and can be used more in corporate settings. So, on this record, we tried to simplify. There were only about three songs that really should have made our last record. But, that's where we were at the time. We were brand new parents, and weren't in the mode of digging in the Bible to write worship songs. With this new record, we were at a point of being desperate for that. We meditated on things more, and tried to be more disciplined. We want the very best melody and lyric to fit together and to do the best we can.

What did you bring to this CD from your experiences producing for others?

Nathan: Working on other projects fuels the fire. The creative process is like working out. The more you use the creative muscles, the more they develop and the more ideas come. In March and April, we were finishing projects for Matt Redman and Tim Hughes while starting ours. It really inspired me. The songs they wrote were amazing. It raised the bar.

How will you begin your new one-on-one ministry to encourage worship leaders?

Christy: On our tour, we will share a meal with area worship leaders before the concert. That way, we can feel like we're investing in people and being more hands-on. We're also incorporating a Q&A time with worship leaders and meeting with new artists. Our basement now has a studio, bedroom, bathroom and lounge so people can come over to write and do their records. Several people have done that. We want it to be a haven for worship leaders, especially those from England.

What is your prayer for this CD and for your music ministry in general?

Christy: We pray for the wisdom to live a life that is worthy of the calling that he's placed on us as believers and as worship leaders and that we would stay connected to that for the rest of our lives. That wisdom can only come from God and his Word. If we do that, we know that God will take care of every other facet in our lives.

For more about Watermark, visit our artist page for the husband and wife team. Click here to read our review of their latest effort, The Purest Place. Be sure to visit Christianbook.com to listen to sound clips and pick up your own copy.

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