Category: Lessons learned

Ten Worship Leading Myths

There isn’t a worship leader in the world who doesn’t struggle with regular, persistent, frustratingly silly (but still dangerous) moments of doubt/fear/anxiety/self-consciousness/jealousy. We start to believe myths that tell us we should be different, or we aren’t talented enough, or we shouldn’t uphold certain principles. These myths weaken our ministry as worship leaders.

Here are ten common worship leading myths that come to mind:

1: Every week you have to be more creative than the last. Wrong. Every week you get to point people to Jesus again.

2: Don’t waste too much time thinking/praying about songs for Sunday. Wrong. This is your most important job.

3: You need a great voice. Wrong. If God calls you then you’re the man for the job. Sing with abandon.

4: You have to stay up-to-date with all the new stuff. Wrong. None of the stuff changes lives. Jesus does.

5: You’ve really arrived when you get famous. Wrong. The Church needs servants not celebrities.

6: if people aren’t into it then something’s wrong with your leading. Wrong. That’s the Holy Spirit’s job. Be patient.

7: Anyone with a willing heart should serve on the worship team. Wrong. Look for heart AND giftedness.

8: The Holy Spirit only shows up on the 4th song. Wrong. Don’t create formulas. Magnify Jesus in whatever time you have.

9: You’d be happier at another church. Wrong. You’d just have different challenges and different reasons to be unhappy.

10: You should speak before every song. Wrong. The more you talk, the less they hear what you’re actually saying.

I know I missed several hundred more myths that worship leaders believe. If you’ve got any to share, I’d love to hear them.

Give Yourself a Break

For many years, too many years in fact, I led worship way too often.

Starting in the Fall of 2006 when my church started a Saturday service, I was the primary worship leader for the Saturday 5:00pm service and the Sunday 11:00am service. Two services a weekend. I would get a free Sunday the weekend after Easter when our student worship team would lead, and I would take two weekends off somewhere in the summer. Three weekends off per year.

So, I was picking songs, leading rehearsal, up front, and leading worship 49 weekends a year. And since we were doing two services each weekend, that means I was leading worship 108 times a year. This doesn’t count monthly healing services, Wednesday staff meetings, and other services and events. But you get the idea. It was way too much.

It was unhealthy for me. It burns you out after leading that many times in a row. You don’t feel fresh anymore. You don’t lead fresh anymore. Everything starts to blur. You get tired of choosing songs. You get tired of leading rehearsal. You lose energy. You fall into ruts. You get predictable. You get safe. Worst of all, you start thinking that your church would fall apart if you were to leave.

It was unhealthy for my worship team. It didn’t give other worship leaders in the church a chance to lead. There might have been an occasional spot for them for a men’s or women’s ministry event, but I wasn’t giving people an opportunity to get experience leading worship in the context of a service. I was hogging 108 opportunities all for myself.

It was unhealthy for my church. Whether they realized it or not, I was fostering an unhealthy dependence on me leading worship, so that when I did rarely get a service off, it was more disruptive than it should have been. If I really did mean what I prayed – that I would decrease and God would increase – then why wouldn’t I take a very practical step toward decreasing and get myself off of the platform more often?

I have resolved to push other worship leaders in my church into at least half of the 108 yearly opportunities. I lead worship very seldom on Saturday nights now. Other worship leaders take turns, sometimes by themselves, and sometimes with a band. I lead healing services very seldom now. Other worship leaders get experience by leading those. I still lead most of the time on Sunday mornings, but this year I’m planning on taking at least 6 off.

You can’t do this if you’re insecure. If you think your church really needs you, or if you’re concerned that if someone else leads worship then your congregation might forget about you, then you’ve fallen into unhealthy thinking. You have to be secure enough to step back and push others into the spotlight, so to speak. It’s more healthy for you, for your team, and for your congregation.

And you can’t do this if you’re needy. Without realizing it, you can begin to need to be needed, and if you’re not leading worship you feel like you have no purpose. This isn’t a good thing.

I remember meeting a worship leader at a church I visited while on vacation a few years ago (during one of my two weekends off). After a brief conversation with him, I said “I hope you get a couple of weekends off this summer”. Sadness fell over his face. He said “I wish”. It turns out that he was allowed – maybe – one weekend off per year.

For your sake and your church’s sake, make sure you’re getting regular breaks from worship leading. Even if you’re not going on vacation, schedule yourself to get a break. Your substitute might not be as polished, or they might even be better!, but just do it. It will keep you from getting burned out and it will keep your congregation from getting too dependent on you too.

Worship Team Mechanics: Auditioning

I want to spend a few posts this week on issues that worship leaders face with growing, managing, and maintaining their worship teams. Whether you’re in a small church with only a handful of musicians or a large church with a bunch of them, it’s important that you have a clear and thought-through process for how to steward the gifts and people that God brings before you.

I am not the expert of any of this. I am still learning, still making mistakes, and still trying different approaches. But I hope that some of what I say will be helpful. Today we’ll look at how to audition people well.

Why audition?
God gives different people different gifts. No two people are the same. Every church is made up of different people with different gifts for different purposes. If you’re a worship leader in a church, one of your roles is to steward these gifts, and help people with musical gifts discern how and if they are called to serve the congregation.

Set dates
I used to say that if people were interested in exploring serving on the worship team, they should email me. I’d then set up a time to meet with them. The problem with this was that I might have 5 or 6 different people all wanting to meet on different days and at different times. It was unmanageable. Now I’ll pick one Saturday afternoon every 3 or 4 months and announce that auditions will be held on those dates. I’ll schedule auditions a half hour apart, assuming each one will take about 20 minutes. This way I’m only giving up 2 or 3 hours.

By the way, I would strongly encourage you to carefully word your audition invitations. I wrote a post on this a while ago and you can read it here.

Email questions
Once someone gets in touch with you and expresses an interest, the very first thing I would encourage you to do would be to (1) thank them, and (2) ask them a few important questions about themselves. This is not an exhaustive list, but generally I find these 4 questions helpful:
– (1) Tell me your story of how you came to trust in Jesus Christ.
– (2) Tell me your story as a musician.
– (3) In what ways have you served in worship leadership in the past (if at all)?
– (4) Why do you feel called to this particular ministry.

Asking these questions over email is a good idea. This way you have it in writing. People start to blend in after a while, and this way you can remember who said what. Further, it keeps your auditions brief, since you don’t need to spend a ton of time with each person asking them detailed questions about themselves. They also have time to think it through.

You’ll learn a lot from these questions, particularly if you see any red flags (I wrote a post on red flags to watch out for and you can read it here). Be on the look out for people who can’t really articulate a faith in Jesus Christ (they’ll need some discipling before joining the team), or people who just want to play music because it’s fun (they’ll need to catch a passion for worshipping God and leading others in engaging with him).

Schedule auditions
I’ve found it helpful to then schedule people about 30 minutes apart. This gives me time to (a) meet them, (b) chat with them to make them comfortable, (c) ask them a few questions to get to know them, (d) audition them, and (e) get a few minutes’ break before the next person.

Explain to the people over email that you’ll be singing or playing through a few familiar worship songs together. If they need the music in advance, get it to them. If not, pick really familiar songs.

Interview the person
You’ve already asked them a lot of questions over email. Their answers might have given you some things to ask them about. I’d encourage you to ask them what brought them to your church, and to make sure they’re a committed member of the congregation. If they’re not, you need to communicate why that’s important, if it’s not already a requirement.

If it’s a singer, ask them if they normally sing melody or harmony. Can they make up harmonies on the spot? Can they learn by ear? Do they always start singing on the first word of the song? Do they wait until the chorus? What’s going through their minds?

If it’s an instrumentalist, ask them what they’re thinking. Is the bass player listening for the kick drum? Is the drummer listening to the bass player? Is the pianist stuck playing in the middle?

Whether it’s a singer or instrumentalist, explain to them that while skill is important, what’s more important is their heart, and what’s most helpful to you and to the congregation is to have a worship team of people who are clearly engaged in worship. You’re not looking for backup singers and musicians. You’re looking for worship leaders.

Set up the audition
First, put them at ease. If it’s a singer, ask him/her if they want any water. If it’s an instrumentalist, let them set their stuff up and offer to help. Make a joke or two. Most importantly, let them know that this is just a chance for you to get a feel for their gifting, and that they can just be themselves and not worry.

Second, explain that you want to respect their time and help them by being honest with them about whether you think their gift would lend itself to being used on the worship team. Ask them if that’s OK. Hopefully they say yes.

Run the audition
I find it helpful to tell them something like “I’m going to start this song, and you just come in where you usually would if we were doing this in a service”. This way you can get a feel for whether or not they have really good instincts, or whether they just jump in without much thought. Play through a song or two, sometimes stopping and letting them play or sing on their own, and take enough time to hear them sing or play for several minutes.

What to say if they’re gifted
If they’re gifted, affirm them. Tell them you’d like to explore finding a place for them to serve.

What to say if they need work
If they need work, affirm them. Tell them what was good. Tell them what wasn’t so good. Then tell them what was good again. This is what we call an “affirmation sandwich”. Then tell them a number of things they need to work on, and that you’d like to keep in touch with them as they improve.

What to say if they’re not gifted
If they’re not gifted musically, affirm them. They have taken time of their day to come meet with you. They are seeking to be obedient to a prompting they feel to serve the church. Thank them for their heart to serve the church. But then kindly tell them that it’s your impression that this is not the right place for them to serve. Be specific, be kind, and keep smiling at them. Let them ask questions. Understand that this will probably be awkward and that’s just the way it goes. Affirm them again, offer to help them find other places to serve, and let them go.

For some more of my thoughts on how to say “no” to people, you can read a post I wrote here.

Why you shouldn’t allow everyone who auditions onto the team
For some churches, the idea of auditioning musicians, much less turning some musicians down, is unheard of. A certain level of chaos reigns, where anyone and everyone who expresses an interest is allowed to come to rehearsals, allowed to stand on the platform, and allowed to play on Sunday mornings.

I know that the heart behind this is to give people a place to serve and to avoid a culture of perfectionism, but it completely rejects the commands in scripture to play skillfully (Psalm 33:3). It ignores the fact that not everyone has the same gifting and that the body of Christ is arranged with different parts and different members (1 Corinthians 12). The standard will differ depending on the church, but there must be a standard.

Be slow to add someone to the team
It’s much harder to ask someone to step down from the team than it is to ask them to join the team. If you think someone is called to serve on the team, try to find a small venue for them for a while and see how they respond. If they’re reluctant to serve in children’s ministry because they really want to be up front on Sunday morning, I would avoid using them.

No lifetime passes
Finally, communicate to all new and existing worship team members that no one has a lifetime pass to the worship team. Everyone serves for seasons. You might find it helpful to follow a school-year type approach. Each September you kick off a new year. Each June you have an end-of-year celebration. In the summer you keep using people, but you give people a chance to reevaluate whether or not they want to commit for another year. This also gives you a chance to reevaluate whether certain members should continue or not.

Leading Worship at Weddings

This afternoon I have the privilege of playing piano and leading the singing at the wedding of some friends at my church. It’s always a joy to be a part of a wedding, but it’s even better when you actually know the people! Leading worship at a wedding can be tricky, so I thought I’d share ten lessons I’ve learned over the years.

Make sure they’re Christians
 When I first started getting asked to lead worship at weddings, I always said yes. Then I showed up at a wedding when I wasn’t even sure the bride and groom were Christians. The Mother of the Bride knew me from church and asked me to sing, and I accepted since I was flattered and eager for some extra cash. But I should have declined, and now I always make sure the couple are Christians and committed to a church.

Be clear about what you will and will not sing
At the same wedding I was just talking about, I was asked to sing one of the worst songs in the history of the world. I don’t even remember the name of it, but it was a John Tesh song with the line, “there’s nothing I wouldn’t do to make you my wife”. Could there possibly be a more awkward line to sing at a wedding? Well probably. But who am I supposed to look at as I sing that line?

Needless to say, now when I’m asked to lead worship for a wedding I’m clear from the beginning that I will only sing hymns or worship songs. If they want a song outside those genres, I’ll have to read the lyrics first and think about it. And in both cases, I need to be able to approve or decline their choices. (It’s helpful to give them a list of 15 – 20 hymns/worship songs that are most well-known, Gospel-filled, and wedding appropriate.)

Be honest about what you can and cannot play
I cannot play classical piano. If a couple asks me to do the music at their wedding, I tell them up front that if they want particular classical pieces for the seating of the family, bridesmaids procession, or bride’s procession, they’ll need to find someone else to play those pieces. I’m happy to play hymn tunes or make something up that sounds classical, but I can’t play the real deal. Most couples are OK with this. Some are not, and they want some genuine classical pieces played, so they find a friend or someone else to play those.

Talk about money
It is standard practice for the musician(s) at a wedding to be paid. You don’t have to be paid, of course, and you can tell the couple this when they ask. But the default is that you should be paid, anywhere from $100 – $250 or more depending on the situation and your experience. It can be awkward if you wait until the last minute, when the couple is dealing with a billion details, to talk about this. Just mention it at the beginning and get it out of the way. You’ll be one the least expensive things they have to worry about.

Don’t assume they’ll have sound reinforcement covered
I’m continually amazed at how people overlook the need for a sound system and a qualified person to run it. I also can’t understand how people think a microphone – on its own, no cables, no sound board, no amps, and no speakers, just a solitary microphone on its own – will magically project sound into a room. This is one of life’s greatest mysteries to me.

But people do overlook it, especially couples planning a wedding. Make sure they’re aware of your needs, whether it’s for a sound system, a sound engineer, equipment, etc. Don’t show up to the wedding and be surprised.

What about the lyrics?
Similarly, I’ve had occasions when I’ve shown up to the wedding, picked up the program, and been surprised by the lyrics the couple chose. Either they’re wrong, they’ve thrown in extra verses, or they’ve left random parts out. Send the couple the lyrics you want to use, and ask to see a draft of the program before they all get printed.

To attend rehearsal or not to attend rehearsal?
Should you be expected to attend the rehearsal and the rehearsal dinner? This depends on three things.
– First, do you want to? If yes, then go. If not, then…
– Second, does the pastor expect you to be there? If so, then you’ll probably want to go. If not, and he’s mainly going to run through procedure and placement with the wedding party (which is the case most of the time, in my experience), then you don’t need to go.
– Third, is it necessary? I’m usually comfortable showing up a couple of hours before the wedding, connecting with the wedding coordinator, talking with the pastor, and running through the songs, leaving plenty of time to get comfortable without having to give up my Friday night as well (and make a bunch of small talk too).

Going out of town
If you’re asked to lead the music for an out-of-town wedding, you’ll need to really consider whether or not it’s wise for you to accept. If you know the couple well or feel compelled to, then by all means do it. But if not, it is an awful lot of time, energy, miles, gas or airfare, hotel reservations, and hassle. You will also oftentimes end up losing money. To avoid this, if you accept an invitation to lead music at an out-of-town wedding, you would be wise to communicate up front that you’d appreciate an honorarium (be specific), and your expenses covered. And yes, this is totally appropriate unless it’s immediate family.

When it’s at a different church
There’s a rule, whether it’s written or unwritten, that the music director(s) at a particular church has “first dibs” on weddings at that church. Also, depending on the church, they will have certain rules about what kinds of songs and instruments can and cannot be played. If you’re invited to lead worship at a wedding at a different church, either you or the couple will need to contact that church’s music director and make sure he or she is comfortable with you doing the music, and with the music you all have planned.

Have realistic expectations 
Weddings are unique affairs. This is the day the couple has dreamed of their whole lives. Friends and family, many of whom don’t know one another, have all flown in from around the world and are sitting in one place. There are family dynamics that you might know nothing about. The ladies are in fancy dresses. The guys are in fancy suits. It’s an unfamiliar venue for most of the people. Many may not be Christians.

So have realistic expectations when you’re leading worship at a wedding. Some will sing, and others will stare at you with hostility. Some will seem genuinely engaged, and others will be taking it all in since they’ve never stepped foot in a church before. Don’t expect a huge response. Just serve them as well as you can, faithfully point them to Jesus, and don’t take it personally if you’re one of the few people singing. Just no John Tesh songs.

Worship Leading Tricks (Or Should it Be Tips?) – Pt. 2

Yesterday I shared some basic worship leading “tricks” (although “tricks” might not be the best word, but I’ll just go with it. Don’t judge me…) that don’t require months and months or years and years of experience to pick up. These range from how to handle bad singers, jitters, mistakes, etc. Here are some more worship leading tricks. Maybe “tips” is a better word. Oh well. Tricks it is.

When you don’t know how to end a time of worship, sing the Doxology
Everyone knows it. It’s easy to sing. It’s Trinitarian. It ends with “amen”. Don’t do it every time, but many times when we have an extended time of worship at a service or smaller group meeting, I’m not sure how to wrap it up. Stop playing and just sing the doxology acappella. Beautiful.

Your pastor is your insurance
Here’s an example: in the Anglican church we have a “rule” that during Lent you can’t say “Alleluia”. You have to wait until Easter. I get this, but I also think it’s a little bit silly. I asked my pastor if he cares about this rule. He said he didn’t. So I use songs during Lent that have the word Alleluia. When I get comments/complaints, I tell them my pastor said it’s OK. Bam. Use your pastor for cover.

A good recording goes a long way
If you can avoid it – don’t teach your worship team a new song by singing it to them at rehearsal. Unless they’re really good at making up and picking out parts and arrangements on the spot, you’re guaranteeing a long slog of getting everything sorted out. Find a good recording online somewhere and find a way to get it to your team a few days (at least) in advance. Your drummer should pay attention to how the drummer plays, your singers pay attention to the harmonies, etc. You do yourself and your team a favor when you do this.

Unplug your guitar cable from the direct box first
Check with your sound engineer about this – but if you’re unplugging your guitar during a service, to avoid the loud pop of doom, unplug it from the direct box first. Only unplug from your guitar if you’re 100% you’ve been muted, or if you have a pedal tuner that mutes your signal pre-direct box. If you don’t follow this rule, and you send a deafening pop through the speakers, your sound engineer will officially hate your guts because the congregation will give him the dirty looks. Help a brother out.

Flip flops are a no-no
Unless (1) you’re leading worship on the beach or (2) you’re leading worship on the beach, don’t wear flip flops while leading worship if you’re a guy. For some reason, this rule doesn’t necessarily apply to women. Their flip flops and fancier and their feet are generally considered to be less gross.

Getting the right tempo matters
Don’t just launch into a song in a hurry. Take a few seconds to hum a section of the song in your head to make sure you get the tempo right. Don’t let your drummer or keyboardist or guitarist start off the song unless you’re confident they’ll start it off with the right tempo. If you are having someone else start off the song, decide the BPM during rehearsal, and if they have an iPhone or some other smart phone, make sure they have one of the many free metronome apps that are out there. It can silently blink the tempo at them. Doing a song too slow or too fast can ruin it.

It’s easier to correct the tempo with your voice than with your instrument
If the song is too fast or too slow, the temptation is to start strumming or playing the keys more rapidly or slowly in order to give the rest of the band a hint. Not a terrible idea, but in my experience, it’s easier to get the band to speed up or slow down to the correct tempo if I just stubbornly start singing faster or slower. Try it.