Follow Through On Stuff That’s New

Posted on by

1I am oftentimes guilty of teaching a new song to my congregation on a Sunday, without either committing myself or making sure it’s possible to use that same song the following Sunday. I’ll teach a song and the congregation will hear it and join in towards the end, and then will either decide to dump the song, or let several weeks pass before I use it again. Bad idea.

If you (and by “you” I mean “me”) are going to teach a song to your congregation, then you have to commit  (and make sure it’s possible) to follow through with that new song and use it again, if possible, the next Sunday. This helps people learn it. This helps them feel confident enough in it to start to sing it. Better yet, if you do it a third week in a row, a critical mass of people will actually “know” the song and sing it out.

It’s not fair to your congregation to teach them a new song, then let a week or two (or more) pass before doing it again. It gives them whiplash. You’ve known it for months, they haven’t. You’ve practiced it, they haven’t. You’ve gone through it with your team and worked on getting it right, but they haven’t. They need time with a new song to get acquainted with it. Give them that time.

And don’t do what I do, which is do a song once, and make a decision based on that one usage of the song whether or not it’s worth using again. You can’t tell, after using a song one time, if it’s a keeper or not. Maybe you butchered it and need to try it again. Maybe they just couldn’t hear the melody clearly enough. Who knows. If a song seems to be a dud the first time, I still suggest you follow-through, since you took the time to teach it in the first place, and let people attempt to get to know it.

It’s not often when a song catches on the very first time. It usually takes 4 or 5 times for people to hear it and sing it to get comfortable with it. So give a new song several rounds on a Sunday morning before you decide if it’s a regular or not. This is advice I need to hear!

Pray Like a Normal Person

Posted on by

1I once heard Jack Hayford say “how can we expect people to pray at home if we don’t expect them to pray at church?” This is a really good question that makes a really good point. If people don’t see and experience heartfelt, genuine, authentic prayer on a Sunday morning, then the odds of them feeling comfortable praying at home, or with their family, are very low.

You may not realize this, but whenever you (or anyone else) pray into a microphone on a Sunday morning, all of the “normal people” in the room are taking notes. Probably not actual notes on a piece of paper, but mental notes. And they don’t even realize they’re doing it. They’re studying how you pray, what you pray most often, how your voice sounds, if you sound like you’re faking it, if you sound like you’re comfortable, etc.

Feel nervous yet? If you don’t, you should. It’s a big responsibility to pray publicly, simply because you are shaping how the people in the pews are going to pray privately.

If I could make one suggestion to worship leaders (myself included) and pastors about praying publicly, it would be this: pray like a normal person.

Yes, make sure you keep in mind which person of the Trinity you’re addressing. Yes, make sure you don’t meander and wander and say “um” or the infamous “Father God” five thousand times. Yes, make sure your prayer makes sense. Pray carefully. But don’t pray robotically.

The normal people in your congregation can tell when, for some reason, you raise your pitch when you pray as if you’re talking to a baby. Or if you get really breathy as if you’re in a library and don’t want to get dirty looks. They can tell when you’re using words you don’t normally use. And all of this not-normalness contributes to them not feeling like they can try it at home.

Step one: use your normal voice. Step two: use your normal vocabulary. Step three: don’t think too hard. Just pray, even if it’s a bit messy, just pray from your heart. Step four: keep it short and sweet and to the point. Step five: do not, under any circumstance, assume a faux-British accent.

Model careful, heartfelt, authentic, normal prayer to your congregation. They’re taking notes.

Learn to Read a Hungry Room

Posted on by

1Yesterday morning at my church, our 11:00am service went long. And when an 11:00am service goes long — you have a room full of hungry people to deal with.

By the time our pastor got to the end of his sermon, it was 12:40pm. That might not seem too late to you, but it seemed too late yesterday. The song I had planned for after his sermon was a long-ish one that we had spent considerable time rehearsing, but as I sat on the front row yesterday, it became increasingly clear to me that, while people were engaged with the sermon, they were hungry.

(In the past, I might not care that people were hungry and wanted to eat. “Too bad!”, old me would say. This is church, and we’re here to worship, and nothing is more important, and your belly can wait!)

But that’s immature. And it’s foolish. Learn to read a hungry room. And if the room is ready for lunch — then unless the Holy Spirit comes down in literal tongues of fire and everyone forgets for a moment how delicious Chipotle sounds — you cannot overcome the dynamic of a hungry or fidgety room. Just go with it, and be willing to adjust your plans.

So, as his sermon came to a close, and the band and I took the stage, I led us briefly in singing the doxology and then people were on their way to lunch. And it’s amazing… I didn’t get a single person who complained that we skipped the last song. They were grateful I was clued-in enough to skip it. And we all got to eat our lunch about 5 minutes quicker. And there was much rejoicing. And there always will be.

Ten Worship Leading Non-Negotiables

Posted on by

1There is so much good and helpful advice for worship leaders out there that I thought I’d try my hand at condensing it all down into 10 non-negotiables.

  1. You are not the center.
  2. You make Jesus the center.
  3. Your priority is helping the congregation sing with faith.
  4. You support your pastor.
  5. You choose songs that are full of truth.
  6. You use musicians who are gifted and have soft hearts toward Jesus.
  7. You tailor the keys and arrangements of songs to serve the people in the room.
  8. Your family comes first.
  9. You’re never alone with someone of the opposite sex who isn’t your spouse.
  10. You won’t ever compromise numbers 1-9.

May we be worship leaders who, at our core, love Jesus, love our congregations, and love our families.

How to Start Off a Worship Leading Career

Posted on by

1Yesterday I received a question over email from someone who asked:

I am helping a young friend who is just working a “job” right now and leads worship at our church every third week.  He is musically talented (singer, drums, guitar, other percussions and harmonica that I know of.)  He needs direction on the qualifications he might need to be useful to a church body as a part time or full time worship leader as his calling/career.  He feels called but doesn’t know how to get started.  I do not know where he should start or how to advise him.  Can you help?

Here’s what I shared:

To be useful to a church body as a part time or full time worship leader, your friend needs to demonstrate consistent dependable leadership. He needs to find a venue, whether it’s a small Sunday morning service somewhere, or a week night thing, or a bible study, or a mid-week service where prove he can lead a worship team, choose songs, do the necessary administration, be dependable, and help people worship God.

When I was in your friend’s shoes, I began to lead weekly for our youth ministry, quarterly for church worship celebrations, sometimes for healing services, on men’s retreats, for Alpha, for weddings/funerals, and for VBS (vacation bible school). Get as much varied experience as possible to be well-rounded. Then a church will look at you and know they can trust you with responsibility.

I wrote a post several years ago with more thoughts on this called “Getting Experience Makes You Experienced“. For worship leaders who want to have more responsibility and opportunity, and even a full or part-time position, there’s no other place to start than by saying “yes” to as many offers that come your way.