The origin story of Hillsong UNITED is a simple one, really. Joel Houston—son of the church's senior pastors—and his buddies were worship leaders for the various generation ministries at the Sydney megachurch. They served their peers and amazing things were happening.

The church essentially handed Houston & Co. the keys to the kingdom—that is, they were trusted with crafting songs that would minister to their generation. The result was revolutionary.

And now, a decade-and-a-half after Hillsong Church decided to get all its young people together—middle school, high school and college—for a UNITED night of worship, a new generation is seeing its own movement begin to form. 

In the moments before kicking off UNITED's WELCOMEZION tour in Portland, I had the incredible privilege to chat with Houston about a number of topics. In Part 1, he talked about the tour, Hillsong New York, and about what he's seen happen in worship globally during the past 15 years. Here, we talk about where worship music has been, and where it's headed—which is likely to include this next incarnation of the Hillsong youth movement. 
 

I'd say that UNITED is definitely involved, and at the same time there's a whole new thing coming out of the young people in our church that's super exciting. We've got this whole Young & Free thing, and it reminds me so much of the early days of UNITED. It's not contrived and they're not imitating. It's their own thing. God's doing it and it's awesome.
 

It goes beyond just the worship. It's the entire youth ministry. Everything they do they put their hand to there's this passion, this vigor, this sense of urgency and freedom. It's just beautiful.

 

 

Yeah. Young & Free, and it's wild. It sounds completely different than UNITED.

 

 

Yeah. They still do the UNITED songs, but they do crazy, electronic versions of them all. It's cool. I love that and we've been doing a lot of just mixing it up, because we always make sure that Hillsong is just one team.  

 

 

Yeah. Just a little bit. It's obviously a much bigger, broad project because it represents the whole church, but I'm excited about it. It's cool.

 

 

I don't know. In going forward we've also endeavored to kind of go back. It's just hard because you get to a point where every time you look at the songs you're leaving out it's really, really difficult. And then again you don't want to go for three-and-a-half hours.
 

I'm sure it's going to change. We're starting in a place tonight that I think is a good step forward from where we last were with Aftermath. I think it'll probably adapt and change much like the Aftermath tour did as well.

 

 

Yeah. Usually find a groove and pockets that just kind of work, but we're trying to figure out what songs to bring in. I wanted to do all the songs off of Zion, but we'd be here all night. We'll see.
 

 

 

I think it's hard to get beyond doing "Oceans." I think that song is just really, really special. It comes across really good. That's going to be obviously a real highlight. "Love is War" is really awesome, too. Those songs live, just singing them in this context, something I've looked forward to since we wrote the songs.

 

 

We've done the entire album as an acoustic project—really rough, though. We just kind of got in a room like this and just sung the songs with friends. It was awesome. It was really powerful.

 

 

Yeah. We're looking at releasing that soon probably as a bit of a surprise.

 

 

I've really come to enjoy good electronic music. Not the commercial stuff, not the David Guetta and Black Eye Pea type stuff. I like good, kind of chilled house music that's soulful, and there's some really good stuff out there. I always like Rudimental, which is kind of pretty intense. I love the Alt-J record and I've been listening to that more than anything over the last couple of years. James Blake and all that kind of stuff. 
 

That's the stuff that I've been listening to and enjoying. It's cool. I think there's some really good stuff kind of floating as well out of the Christian music worship scene. I think there's a real shift in people's perceptions of what's possible in music.
 

We got a lot of flack and amazing feedback with Zion. A lot of people just didn't understand it. Well, to be honest, this is exactly the same stuff people were saying when we did Every Day and More Than Life: "You can't do the songs in church. There's too much guitar." This is the music we like listening to and the songs are pure. They're written from a place that I believe is true. Our passion hasn't changed. The mission hasn't changed.
 

Drums when they were first introduced into churches people were freaking out. Of course if drums are used the wrong way, they just become annoying, but at the same time we're familiar with using them now to really help enhance the atmosphere and sing songs about Jesus.
 

I feel the same way about synthesizers, drum loops, interesting sounds and all the rest of it. It's cool.

 

 

I love never losing the wonder. I think that's something that comes from maturity, too. Because you put enough runs on the board and you start to see how God's just proved Himself over and over again. It becomes less like, "You mean I can have fun and serve God?"—which is kind of the way we started off UNITED. "You mean I can enjoy my life and we can do the things we want to do and serve God?"
 

God is faithful and He proves Himself time and time again. He's never failed. He's not going to start now. That's the testimony now. There's been times where we've fallen flat in our faces and yet God is still there. His grace is sufficient.  It becomes not just something you sing.  It becomes something that you are because you just experience the manifest presence and freedom that comes from knowing Christ.
 

That's awesome. I think if anything that's probably what translates through the songs.

 

I think, like you said, it's almost like when you started it's almost like you're at the beginning of your walk with God where it's like, "Yes. Jesus I'm so in love with you. Let's go," and then throughout life it's, "Now we're doing this together," and you just have this peace and that's what's translated now, and that's awesome.

 

 

It's interesting. I do miss the vibe when you've got people that would just start jumping like in the middle of an intimate worship moment. The passion was crazy. I do miss that. I mean that's there, and at the same time I think we're all about just people. The last UNITED record, we just wanted to write songs and create an experience that would draw people in the presence of God wherever they are, and it goes along with what we were saying about occupying our streets.
 

I just like the idea of people in the midst of whatever circumstance life throws at them just in their everyday, whether it be on the subway going to work or to school or being with friends on a road trip or someone just cruising down the street having a horrible day or someone in the car, a mom driving to pick up the kids.
 

They hear a song and they are just reminded that God is with them. The presence of God goes before them and He's with them where they are right there and then and that worship isn't limited to the four songs we sing before the announcements on Sunday, but it's an integral part of just who we are.
 

I want to write a soundtrack for everyday lives that remind people that the presence of God is with them.
 

 

 

I just love the fact that we have support all over the place. That's the most encouraging thing about these nights. Again, when you release a project and you feel like there's been radio silence for a while, people still kind of enjoy what we do, be a part of what we're doing. There's been an overwhelming kind of sense that people are still with us. It's awesome.
 

We're praying for bigger and better and deeper and stronger. I'm convinced that God is wanting to do more, so why should we limit ourselves from being a part of that? I'm just believing that God just takes things to another level across the board—in our everyday lives, our churches, our mission, everything.

 

 

My heart has always been to just see the church really just get it—what it means to follow Christ and to see that outworked in people's everydays. And just people revolutionizing the way we approach our everyday when it comes to serving Christ and representing Jesus.
 

I think there's really creative ways we can facilitate that. I get excited about mass collaboration within the Church and not just on like core Christian festivals. Take the "Christian" label out of it. Just great stuff that the church pulls off: television, whatever it might be. It might be shows, just music. I love the idea of the church collaborating all the way through the projects to help people and I think that's the heartbeat of the church and that's what Jesus has called us all together to be a part of.
 

I see it happening. I think the opportunity for the next generation really is to lift our eyes and offer just what we're doing, but to see what he's doing and to just join in that. That's the thing that fires me up and just trying to find creative ways to do that. This is a small example of that. I like the idea that we're taking worship to these places that maybe it's never been. That's killer. It's exciting.