Worship Leader Resolutions

1In this new year, I think all worship leaders can agree on a few resolutions that, if adopted, would dramatically improve the corporate/sung worship in our churches.

1. Wear more scarves
People are cold. Even in Southern California. They need to see their worship leaders all bundled up and warm. The more scarves the better. Oh and don’t forget the hat.

2. Brightly label our iPads
It’s not enough to hide your iPad on your music stand. And it’s not enough to have your iPad on its own devoted iPad stand. I suggest that, for the edification of our people, we brightly label our iPads with giant letters saying “I AM COOL I USE AN IPAD”. Extra points if you wear a scarf while using an iPad.

3. More of the 1980s
So apparently the 1980s called and they have some more synthesizers they want us to use in our music. I say we shouldn’t stop at the synthesizers. Let’s bring back those electric drums and make sure we stick the big poofy foam things on the ends of our microphones (color coded, preferably).

4. It’s time to re-tune the re-tuned hymns
I’m calling it right now. New worship music trend: re-tuned re-tuned hymns. It’s like twice-baked potatoes or double-stuffed Oreos. It’s like dipping a deep-fried Snickers back into the deep fryer and then frying it again. These re-tuned hymns need to be re-tuned again. You heard it here first.

5. More retweets
If it’s one thing worship leaders need to do more of, it’s retweet any and all twitter mentions. There is a severe shortage of worship leader retweeters, and 2014 must be the year we begin to retweet, and then retweet the retweeted retweets, while eating twice-baked potatoes stuffed with double-stuffed Oreos while wearing scarves made out of iPads.

6. Incorporate holograms
I’m tired of my congregation having to settle for me leading Chris Tomlin songs. I want him to lead his songs via hologram at my church. Let. The. Future. Begin.

7. More catchphrases
Worship leaders need more catchphrases to really engage the congregation. There are different levels.

Beginner: Come on, get your hands together!
Intermediate: Shout it out, church!
Novice: Now put those worship cookies in the oven and watch them bake!
Expert: You are now free to move about the cabin of praise!
Advanced: Giddy-up, giddy-up, giddy-up, let’s go!

8. Bring back the hand motions
Can I get a “you came from heaven to earth to show the way”? That’s what I’m talking about.

9. Point the microphone to the congregation when you want them to sing
I learned this technique from Carman, (i.e. America’s first worship leader). You want the crowd to sing? Point the mic at them. Ignore your sound engineer’s advice on this one. Wave the mic around, and in as many directions, as much as possible. The more microphone pointing, the louder the congregational singing. Add on a catchphrase and you’ve got solid gold.

10. Move beyond the octave jump
Octave jumps are so 2013. It’s time to take it to the next level in 2014 with the octave MONSTER jump. The octave MONSTER jump isn’t just one lame octave up. It’s two octaves up. That’s right. You want to take that bridge and third chorus to the next level? Then take a deep breath, tighten your scarf, turn on your iPad, crank your synthesizer up to 11, put down your double-stuffed Oreo, get ready for some Twitter mentions, push the Chris Tomlin hologram out of the way, yell out an advanced catchphrase, get that hand motion cued up, point that microphone back to your mouth, and let that octave MONSTER jump rip. Your people will never be the same.

Here’s to a great 2014, worship leaders. Get busy and stay warm.

Don’t Pull a LOST

1The ABC drama “LOST” had it all: great acting, lots of suspense, beautiful beaches, and high ratings. Its fans were devoted, many to the point of obsession, and for a few years it was impossible to get away from the cultural phenomenon of this show, even in church. Many churches all over America had sermon series that were titled (you’ll never guess it) “LOST”. It was a really big deal.

Until the writers started throwing in random bits of nonsense.

Smoke monsters. Polar bears. The hatch. The countdown. The backwards whispering. The flash forwards and the flashes backwards. The crazy time traveling lady. The “others”. Sometimes it was good. But a lot of the time it was all incredibly random. And it didn’t connect.

What happened? How did this top-rated show lose its way? It might have something to do with the fact that the show’s writers and creators never knew how they were going to end it. They were just making stuff up. Throwing in these random bits of nonsense with no idea of how the bits came together.

And soon, the fans began to notice. Questions went unanswered. Mysteries unresolved. Storylines abandoned. The writers had to make up an ending that didn’t really make an awful lot of sense and didn’t really make anyone that happy.

It’s not a good idea for writers to just make stuff up without a master plan. You might get some good ratings to begin with and attract some buzz, but the proof is in the pudding, and people will eventually want to know that there’s something “there” there.

Sometimes I see worship leaders who remind me of the writers of LOST. There’s some good stuff, which should be commended, but then on occasion there are random bits of nonsense.

Strong theology one song, then terrible theology the next.

Sing with us, now sit there and watch us, now stand and sing again, but now stand there during this killer guitar solo.

This song has a plain background, the next song has a candle background, and the next song has us flying through the clouds (on a 10 second predictable loop). Why am I flying through the clouds? Am I hiding from the smoke-monster?

This Sunday I’m chilled out and low-key and pretty accessible, but next Sunday I’m going to bring the fire down from heaven and make this place rock!

The sermon was about the humility of Jesus but the song we sang right after it was about heavenly storehouses laden with snow.

You get the point. What you see are things that don’t make an awful lot of sense. There’s not a thread running through everything, connecting different elements, creating consistency from week to week, providing security for your congregation, and crafting a narrative that’s clear, communicable, and gripping.

And that’s what separates good books from bad books, good stories from bad stories, and good TV shows from TV shows that lose their way.

If you don’t have a core conviction/plot/theme/narrative to which every scene, chapter, character, and surprise points back to, then you’re in trouble.

Because it’s not so much that random is bad. It’s that nonsense is bad. You can have things (anthems, songs, instrumentation, etc.) that appear random at first, but actually end up making sense because you know that they connect, and the congregation eventually says “aha! That connects!”

But you can’t make nonsense work. Nonsense results in confusion.

So, with whatever authority you have over a worship ministry, a service, a team, a choir, a small group, or whatever it is, do what you can to keep the core from being compromised by random bits of nonsense. It might mean saying no to a persistent soloist, a weak song, a good idea at a bad time, or that persistent pull to compromise. It might mean devoting more time, prayer, and preparation to making sure you’re engaging people effectively.

The integrity of your ministry largely rests on your ability to maintain a faithful consistency to the Good News, week after week after week. Tell the old, old story in as many ways as you can, connecting your songs and services together to point back to the Gospel.

For Our Salvation

1Yesterday I let you know about the worship album we’ve released that I’m thrilled about. Today I’d like to announce that our Advent EP, “For Our Salvation” is also available at tfcamusic.org, iTunes, and Amazon. I posted the opening track last week as a free download.

I’m so happy with how this EP came out, mostly thanks to my friend Joshua Spacht for his incredible string orchestrations and my sister-in-law Caroline Crocker for conducting and arranging the youth choir who sings on it.

The EP features six tracks:

1. Once in Royal David’s City
2. Let All Mortal Flesh Keep Silence
3. O Come, O Come Emmanuel
4. Lo He Comes with Clouds Descending (my favorite hymn of all time)
5. And There Was Light (an instrumental piece by Joshua Spacht)
6. Beautiful Baby Boy (an original piece that I wrote)

The EP comes in at just over 30 minutes long and my prayer is that it helps you enjoy Jesus more this Advent.

Here’s the recording of Joshua’s instrumental track from when we recorded it in Nashville this past August:

We Will Proclaim

Today we’re thrilled to be releasing “We Will Proclaim: Live Worship with The Falls Church Anglican”. If you’d like to watch this short video about the heart and vision behind the project, I think you’d enjoy it:

You can buy the album at www.tfcamusic.org (if you place your order before 4:30pm EST we’ll ship that day), or it’s also available on iTunes and Amazon.

I pray that this album is a blessing to you!