Leading a worship team – Page 8

The Perseverance of the Worship Leader

A few nights ago our bathroom sink got clogged. Really badly. Some food accidentally went down the drain and nothing – I mean nothing – would unclog it. I tried, in this order: the cheap plastic “snake” you buy from the grocery store to go deep into the pipe, two bottles of Draino, a plunger (well, my Dad actually tried this one), and super-duper-high-powered drain cleaner that is “guaranteed” to break through the clog. Well, I should ask for my money back because it didn’t work. Nothing worked.

So yesterday I broke down and called the plumber. He said he’d be happy to come by today and fix it. I asked how much it would cost. He said $150.

I don’t particularly enjoy flushing $150 down the drain (literally and figuratively), so I endeavored to persevere and fix this stupid clog myself. You have to understand that I’m about as handy as a three-week-old baby, but when we’re talking $150 I’ll give it a try.

So I went to Home Depot and bought a $20 manual drain snake. And this morning I spent an hour on the bathroom floor doing everything I could to fix this problem myself and impress my wife with how handy I’ve become. An hour had passed and it wasn’t looking promising.

So I prayed: “God, you know I don’t have $150 to just give away to a plumber. I’m here on the bathroom floor, breathing in a deadly combination of three different kinds of toxic drain cleaners, wearing grocery bags and gloves over my hands to protect my flesh from melting off, I bought a manual snake drain from Home Depot, and all I need you to do is help me fix this stupid clog.”

I tried one last time to jam all fifteen feet of the manual drain snake all the way into the pipe, not allowing the resistance of the clog to sway me. Sure I was making a ton of noise and our daughter was taking her nap just one room away. I didn’t care. I had $150 on the line.

Soon the clog broke and I beheld the most glorious sight: water pouring down the sink and not backing up. I called the plumber and canceled the appointment in triumph. And yes, my wife was very impressed. After all, she’s due to have a baby any day now and it’s awfully nice to not be breathing in toxic fumes.

This all made me think about those “clogs” we face in ministry. The difficult people who never seem to change. The rut we can’t seem to get our services out of. The attendance number that just won’t budge. The congregation that doesn’t seem to ever grow in worship. Bad equipment. Low morale. Small repertoire. Repeated disappointment.

Whatever the clog is for you, the temptation for all of us is to, at some point, call the plumber. To give up. To let someone else do it. This might mean just giving up or it might mean looking for another job.

And sometimes you do just have to break down and call the plumber. But most of the time, and as was the case with me this morning, I had been given all the tools I needed to do the job if I just stuck with it long enough.

God has placed you where you are. He has given you the gifts (i.e. tools) that you have. Those clogs that you’re encountering might seem impossible to break. But what’s really the problem – the clog or your commitment to persevere?

Let me paraphrase (roughly but I hope faithfully) James 1:2-3: “Count it all joy, my worship leaders, whenever you meet clogs of various kinds, for you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.”

Too often we’ve got all the tools we need to do the job. But we don’t persevere. I think God clogged my bathroom sink for a reason: to encourage me and to encourage you. Get your hands dirty. You’ve been given good tools and God wants to use you to break through some stuff.

Using Humor to Get Your Team to Read Your Emails

I’ve lost track of how many times we’ve encountered a problem at a worship team rehearsal or a service that would have been avoided if people had read the entire email I had sent them in which those potential problems had been addressed. Maybe it’s a schedule change, a room location, an arrangement heads-up, or whatever. People either just read the beginning of the email, scan it, or don’t read it at all.

Maybe they’re not committed enough. Maybe they don’t take leading worship seriously. Maybe they don’t care.

Or maybe your emails are too long and boring.

One way to get your teams to read your whole email is to keep it short. Another way is to organize it well, using short paragraphs, headings and boldface (in moderation). Another way is use humor.

I’ve recently begun making sure the emails I’m writing to my team are as short and organized as possible. After all, many of the people on the team receive several hundred emails per hour. They don’t have time to read a missive from me. Short and clear is the main thing.

Then I’ll go back over it and add some jokes.

I’ll rib some people who are good sports. I’ll say that on the back of the worship team schedule they’ll find a hidden treasure map. I’ll tell them that if they miss our monthly meeting on March 28th that they’ll get the hives. You get the point.

There isn’t a person on your worship team who doesn’t like to laugh. Everyone loves to laugh. They’ll read your emails if they make them laugh and you’ll have accomplished your goal.

Showing Grace to Your Worship Team When it Matters

Have you ever gotten a bit frustrated with members of your worship team? Maybe really frustrated? Of course you have.

Have you ever actually let this frustration show? Maybe been a bit of a jerk to them? No way. A worship leader wouldn’t do that.

Yeah right. Of course you have. We all have.

Maybe your worship team consists of one middle-aged man named Leroy who plays a mean acoustic guitar. Oh, and his guitar also happens to be named Leroy.

Or maybe your worship team is larger. Whatever the case, in the course of working with volunteers (most of whom have an artistic temperament) and working under the pressure of the congregation’s glare, you’re bound to get frustrated and tempted to show it.

Bad idea. Every time. Why? Because we’ve been shown more grace than we ever deserved.

If God’s grace really has been “lavished on us in Christ” (Ephesians 1:9) and is immeasurable in its riches (Ephesians 2:7), then we really have no excuse for not showing grace to our worship team. Really.

The people who serve on a worship team are real people. This means they’re sinful just like you. They run late, they don’t practice, they have annoying habits, they make mistakes, they get cranky, they have issues, and they aren’t perfect.

They also don’t get shown grace an awful lot during the week. The world is a grace-less place full of expectations, pressure, meanness, criticism, brokenness, speeding tickets, and lots of bills.

They need to know the good news of grace – of redemption and forgiveness – that has been shown to us all in the person of Jesus Christ.

But you can show them that grace too. And when it really matters – like when they mess up or show up late or are unkind to you – you showing them grace is not only good for their soul and yours, but it’s good for your worship team too.

This all sounds well and good in a blog post and we’d all agree in principle that it’s important to show grace. But when those moments of frustration come – a late rehearsal, a drummer who won’t stop playing when you’re trying to talk, a persistent squeal in the monitors that the sound engineer can’t fix, a vocalist who totally messes up the big Christmas Eve solo, or a pastor who asks you to cut that song you’ve rehearsed fourteen times just before the service starts – is when this will need to be put into practice.

This isn’t going to come from self-determination. It’s going to come from daily preaching the gospel to yourself. When we remember the punishment we deserved but the grace we received instead because of Jesus, then everything else comes into perspective.

Show grace to your worship team. It’s a good idea for worship leaders and it’s the good news of the gospel.

Feeding Your Worship Team (Literally)

A dozen bagels from Panera: $8-12.

A coffee traveler from Starbucks: $12.

One large, two-topping pizza from Papa John’s: $10-12.

A worship team that isn’t hungry: Priceless.

Sometimes taking care of your worship team isn’t so complicated or expensive. It’s as simple as picking up some bagels and coffee before a long morning of rehearsals and services or ordering a pizza for a late evening meeting when people are coming straight from work.

This shouldn’t come out of your pocket. If you oversee a budget of any kind at your church, designate some funds to be used for food for your worship team over the year. Make sure there’s enough for a nice meal for everyone who attends a worship conference, for a Christmas party and end-of-year cookout, and other things in between.

But if your church doesn’t have money for that, devote some time and energy to getting people in your congregation to cook meals and bake goodies and brew coffee for you and your volunteers on long mornings or late evenings.

You don’t always have to provide food for your worship team. Obviously, people can take care of themselves and remember to eat something before they come to church!

But I have been amazed over the last year or so at what a huge difference it makes to team morale and energy level when there is something to munch on and something to drink.

We’ve installed a little refrigerator in our back room and keep it stocked with mini-soda cans. We also have some bite-sized candy and breath mints in bowls on a counter-top. On Sunday mornings, we’ve contracted a local bakery to deliver a little tray of food on Sunday mornings at 8:30am. It changes a bit every week, but usually has an assortment of cheeses, crackers, fruit, pastries and bagels. The musicians and pastors who are serving on a Sunday morning now swarm the food tray and devour it in a matter of hours.

When we gather as a team for a mid-week meeting in the evening, I’ll do my best to make sure food (usually delivery pizza) is provided, since this will sweeten the deal for people coming straight from work.

You might be surprised by how much providing a little bit of food and drink seems to honor people and keep them fresh. Sometimes leading and feeding a worship team can be hard work. But other times it’s as easy as pie. Literally.

Encouraging Your Team to Be on Time

On Monday I shared Ten Ways to Make Rehearsals More Fruitful. One way is to not tolerate persistent tardiness. It’s normal for people to be late from time to time, since people have busy lives and traffic gets in the way. But when it’s persistent and not just a problem with one person, it can be helpful to gently remind your worship team that it’s important to be on time.

I recently sent an email to the worship team at my church with the subject “a little bit of gentle prodding…” I thought you might find it helpful to read how I communicated this to my team, so here is what I wrote:

Hi everyone,

I just wanted to send a quick note in the hopes of encouraging all of us to try to make more of an effort at starting our rehearsals and pre-service huddles on time.

I know two things apply to everyone on this list: First, your lives are incredibly full and your schedules are incredibly busy. You have jobs, families, other responsibilities, and unplanned events that spring up. Second, you are at the mercy of Northern Virginia traffic. I don’t need to say any more about that last one!

But I’ve also noticed a gradual trend over recent months that if a rehearsal is scheduled for 3:00pm, we’re not actually ready until 3:20 or later. Or if a pre-service huddle is scheduled for 10:15am, it never really happens. We end up missing out on valuable rehearsal time, prayer time, and preparation time.

Because I know how busy your lives are, I always schedule a rehearsal or pre-service huddle at the latest possible time I’m comfortable with. I’d probably prefer an earlier time, but I want to give you as much time at home as possible, so I pick the latest time I can see working.

I would be incredibly grateful if we could all make a renewed effort at being ready to start rehearsals and meetings on time. This means planning on arriving 10-15 minutes early for rehearsal to set up and tune, and arriving 5 – 10 minutes early for church to park and get to the vesting room in time for us all to be ready at the same time.

This note is just as much for me as it is for anyone else! And please know I understand there are just going to be times you’re running late. I want to be full of grace. But having said that, we can all do a better job of being on time and I hope this little note provides a little bit of gentle prodding for all of us.

Gratefully,

Jamie