Justin Unger

Justin Unger is a rising worship leader and recording artist, but it’s doubtful many would have forecasted this career choice earlier in the man’s life. “What really drove me was meteorology,” Unger explains. Sure, he grew up also loving Steven Curtis Chapman and Michael W. Smith, but instead of watching the stars on, say, MTV, he was far more fascinated with the ‘up in the sky’ variety. “Before I even went to high school, I desired to chase tornados. I thought it’d be so cool -- as an adventure and as a career -- to study the weather and God’s creation; to look around and be able to see His glory in all that we have here.”

Unger is still enthralled with God’s glory; only now, he channels this amazement via joyous praise and worship music. Even so, the arc of his musical career has been a far less predictable than the relatively steady weather patterns of his Prescott, AZ home. Unger’s current project, Disengage, is a focused worship album, but back in 2003, he, along with Ben Kolarcik, comprised the successful Christian duo, Across The Sky. In 2004, on the strength of its self-titled debut, Across The Sky was nominated for GMA’s New Artist of the Year.

After achieving breakthrough success with Across The Sky, however, God began to give Unger a deeply sincere love for His church. And soon he found himself transitioning from the role of musical partner, to that of musical pastor.

“I’m the lead worship pastor at The Heights church,” he says. “It’s an older church. It’s been around for a long time, but in the last 12 years God’s been doing some radical things there. The leadership is so focused on preaching the truth, and music is relevant, so it’s bringing in a lot of people and connecting with the culture in a really neat way.”

This new role as pastor has changed Unger’s life for the better in so many ways. “Becoming a pastor has been so inspiring, even in my songwriting,” he elaborates. “It helps keep me accountable because I’ve got a standard and a quality to live up to now. Now I’ve got people, these sheep, looking up to me for direction and leadership. Not just in worship; but in the way I live my life. And it's not that I do it just for them, but because I just want to be a pleasant offering to the Lord in everything I do.”

Upon first glance, Disengage might strike you as an odd title for a worship album. Yet it is a word that perfectly expresses the wonderfully counterintuitive plan God has for each and every believer.

“In Luke 9:23, it talks about losing yourself,” Unger explains, “dying to ourselves so that Christ can be all in us; so that we can resemble Him. So I entered “lose myself” into the thesaurus search engine on my computer and one of the words that popped up was “disengage”. It was interesting because it’s kind of a negative sounding word. But at the same time, anyone who reads the passage without an understanding would think that that passage, in Luke 9:23, would be a negative thing because a lot of us desire the flesh. We desire the state that we were born in, to sin. But once we are brand new creatures in Christ, the whole world is viewed completely different. And in my eyes, that word, “disengage”, is something beautiful because I’m disengaging from myself and letting Christ be everything in me.”

Unger also recently released one other unique album, To Know You Love Me: Songs for the Stillness, which he describes as a more devotional project. “The goal of this project is for people to be able to sit down, listen, and to open their Bibles and meditate on God’s word and the words to the songs, and to have their devotional time,” he summarizes. Originally, many of these songs were recorded simply to play for his young children as they fell asleep at night “because I wanted to fill their minds with God’s word as they slept,” he says. “One day some friends were over and they caught on to our concept to do that with their kids. Therefore, we were inspired to release this project”

Justin Unger may have grown up fascinated by weather patterns, but instead of chasing tornados predicting temperatures nowadays, he’s watching for where the Spirit is working. And while the weather may change from day to day, Unger gladly proclaims the good news that God is the same yesterday, today, and forever. And that’s the sort of forecast we can all live with.