A Not-So-Joyful Noise

I come from a family of musicians. It’s a great way to grow up, but a problem we used to often encounter is we could not turn off that side of ourselves in church. Some of you know what I’m talking about: the band will start to play, the worship leader opens their mouth and BAM—they sing a note that is nowhere near the right key. The musician in me is inwardly cringes as the worship leader attempts to try to find the melody of the song ... and fails. I know this is worship time, but I and my family can't help but give each other looks every time the singers mess up their harmonies or the drummer gets a little ‘too happy’ on those drums.

It is often a challenge for church music directors to find willing volunteers who not only want to give up their time, but actually possess musical skill. They are often left to scramble, sometimes going outside their church membership to hire other singers and musicians to come in. Just how important is musicianship to the worship experience? What attitude should singers and musicians carry when in church?

Depending on what type of church you go to, the allotted worship time can be from 15 minutes to over an hour long in more charismatic churches. Regardless of how much prominence musical worship is given in your church services, it is up to those in charge to provide the right atmosphere for those to enter into God’s presence and leave behind the worries of the week. Worship should be a time of reverence, but commonly we settle into a pattern of familiarity with the chosen songs, the A-A-B-A structure or the calming voice of the worship leader as they invite the congregation to participate. It can easily become a ritual lacking any spiritual significance.

Yes, church music directors and praise team leaders should strive to make great music unto the Lord—the Bible says that whatever we do, we should work at it with all our hearts (Colossians 3:23-4)—but they also should understand the hearts of their musicians are more important than how many vocal runs they can produce. Worship teams are so much more effective when the love for God is evident on their faces. As I’ve heard someone say, they are not worship leaders, they are lead worshippers. When praise teams are more concerned with putting on a solid performance than with joining in worship with the congregation, there is a problem. Church is supposed to be a community, not a business. You can always work on improving someone’s musicality, but they have to come already prepared with the right spirit to worship.

We can get picky over whether our church chooses hymns over the "light rock feel" of Chris Tomlin. But it all comes down to making a personal choice to look past the music and focus on what you are actually singing about. A song that used to have no meaning for me was Matt Redman’s “Blessed Be Your Name”. I had sung that song in church for years and thought it was pretty boring musically. However, at a service I recently attended, the worship leader explained the lyrical content. The song says, Blessed be Your name when the sun’s shining down on me, and then the next verse says, Blessed be Your name on the road marked with suffering. Oh, wait, so this song is about praising God when things are going your way, as well as when you are in the midst of intense suffering? It’s about being able to say, “Yes, Lord, I will worship You, I will bless Your name no matter what my circumstances." That is a message we all need to take in. Now when I hear that song in church, it has renewed meaning for me; the music does not matter because I found a way to connect with the song no matter how proficient the musicians are.

When I was fifteen, the youth pastor of our church said something that has stuck with me ever since. He said that everything we do can be worship to God. The words “worship” and “music” have been tied together so permanently that people think worship time ends when the praise team leaves the stage. But when we pray, when we tell our friends about Jesus, when we tithe, we’re worshipping. Worship is anything that lifts up God’s name and praises Him. The way in which we live our lives everyday should be an act of worship.

And it doesn’t matter how you worship either. Not everyone is going to run around a church, singing “Hallelujah!” and not everyone is gonna stand still with their hands at their sides. I love to lift my hands toward God when I’m singing, but I have friends who don’t do that—and that’s fine. It does not matter what you do when that time comes; what matters is where your heart is at. Be present in the worship. Try (as hard as it can be) to focus on God and His awesomeness instead of how the girl playing the piano should probably be wearing pants from that angle. Blocking out the world (and its unseemly distractions) is part and parcel with being able to enter in the presence of God.My family may exchange loaded glances from time to time, but when our focus quickly turns to worship, we are able to move on. If the music is actually inhibiting your ability to worship, you better check and see what it is you’re actually praising. Don’t make music your god. Change your circumstances in order to avoid being put off by anything that may hinder you. Maybe you will even have to purposely seek out a different church. Whatever your options, make the changes necessary to take your focus off the screechy soprano and put it where it belongs—on the King of Kings.

“Whatever you do, work at it with all your heart, as working for the Lord, not for human masters, since you know that you will receive an inheritance from the Lord as a reward. It is the Lord Christ you are serving.” Colossians 3:23-24 (NIV)
 
http://m.relevantmagazine.com/god/church/blog/28730-a-not-so-joyful-noise

Staying Healthy Emotionally and Spiritually

In Worship Ministry

Effective worship ministry is a challenge that few people, other than worship leaders themselves, completely understand. Not only are most of us juggling family and career obligations while we lead our faith communities in praise each week, we are also attempting to manage the preferences and demands of our congregations, pastors, musicians, singers, and others around us who are often quite vocal about their needs. But what happens if we neglect our own spiritual and emotional health in the process of serving others? Is it possible to maintain a balanced life and still be a great worship leader?

Stress Happens

Humans were designed by God to handle stress. When he placed Adam in the Garden of Eden, Adam was given an appropriate amount of work to accomplish. He named animals and tended the garden under God’s direction. Adam and Eve enjoyed the direct, unmediated fellowship of God in their pristine surroundings. When Adam chose to disobey God’s command, sin and death (think undue stress here) entered and God’s judgment resulted in their expulsion from Eden and the edict that they would now only eat of the earth through “painful toil” (Genesis 3:17). Thank you, Adam.

Stress, then, is not a bad thing, but part and parcel with the creation before and after the fall. Just like the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco was built to carry a certain amount of traffic each day without cracking or crumbling, we are built to bear a certain amount of weight as we work through life. Yet, many worship leaders are cracking and crumbling, showing signs of excessive wear and tear as they are weighed down with much more than they were designed to handle. Although it may be argued that stress is the natural state of man post-fall, we still need to ask, “What would be considered a state of hyper stress for us as worship leaders?” and “What can we do to stay healthy?”

Perhaps we should take a step back from the burden of the week-to-week duties for a moment to consider the greater design of God in the ordering of his Church. If Jesus is the “head of the church” (Eph 1:22), then we must believe that his “yoke is easy” and his “burden is light” (Mt 11:29), as he has promised. The tip off that we are doing too much in ministry is when life becomes unmanageable and we, or the people closest to us, are suffering. Our task, then, is to yoke up with him, to be more attentive to his direction in the load that we are willing to carry and to be aware of our own needs spiritually, emotionally, and physically.

Three Battlefields
As post-Eden earth dwellers, we find ourselves engaged in three arenas of battle: physical, emotional, and spiritual. As Christian believers we have learned much of the spiritual arena, yet often neglect the things that keep us strong in the Lord (Eph 6:18) such as prayer, personal worship, Bible study, and fasting. We often default to the pabulum of popular semi-biblical jingles on Christian radio and abdicate our daily fellowship with God for drive time devotionals. An authentic Christ-centered spirituality is much more than knowing all the lyrics to current praise songs. We would do well to re-engage with ancient liturgies, texts, and the classic spiritual disciplines to accompany our bevy of praise tunes.

When it comes to understanding the indissoluble link between our mortal bodies, spirit, and soul, there may be few books that stand up to Dallas Willard’s The Divine Conspiracy (HarperCollins, 1998). Our western penchant to compartmentalize ourselves into three separate elements of spirit, soul, and body is antithetical to Scripture, according to Willard, and we are impoverished for this viewpoint. If we are neglecting our bodies through over eating, lack of exercise, or some other thing, we are neglecting the very presence of God (see Paul in 1 Cor 12:27). Many worship leaders are suffering unduly because they are neglecting themselves physically. Why not take a walk today?

Perhaps the area where stress cracks show the most is in the emotional arena. Burnout, depression, anxiety, and many other symptoms are warning signals that we need some self-care or even professional care. Like the dashboard in your car or in the cockpit of an airplane, warning lights usually come on for a reason: to indicate low levels of fuel, oil, or some other vital element. When we are feeling chronically depressed, hyper-stressed, or burned out, more prayer may not be the answer; rather, a phone call to a biblically based counselor might be more appropriate. Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional. God has placed in the Church many excellent counselors who are equipped to help you regain the emotional stability and health you need to continue to be a dynamic worship leader.

Healthy for the Long Haul

No one else can take responsibility for your health. I cannot swim laps for you or go out for a run to build your heart muscle. You have to get up off the couch, put down the fork, pick up the weights, and pump the iron. You have to open the Word, read it, meditate on it, and make it a vital part of your life. Though Adam abdicated the unmediated presence of God in the garden, God has made a way for you to re-engage with him by the indwelling of his Spirit. Now it is up to you to “draw close to God” (Js 4:8) in your own heart and seek him for yourself.

While church life and worship ministry are stressful, with the right perspective in mind and the willingness to do battle in these three arenas you can stay healthy and balanced to run this race with endurance (Heb 12:1).

Worship Leader Magazine: http://worshipleader.com/staying-healthy-emotionally-and-spiritually/

Breaking Out of the Worship Formula

Can you make authentic worship?

Growing up in a small Baptist church helped me learn something at an early age: Our gatherings as the Church tend toward formula. There are lots of reasons for it. It’s easier. It’s comfortable. It’s predictable. It fits inside of our “boxes.” It’s replicable. It allows us to attempt to recapture meaningful moments of the past.

But—like in all relationships—our encounters with God are meant to be progressive, not repetitive. That’s why I think I was so excited about the movement of a fresh approach to worship that was coming out of people like Martin Smith and Matt Redman in England in the early '90s and things like the Passion Movement here in the U.S. It wasn’t simply a stylistic change. It was something fresh in the expectation of the movement of God.

But now, 15 years and thousands of songs later, there seems to be a new homogeny throughout our churches and our worship gatherings. We’ve gotten to the point where we have made what was fresh into a formula once again. 


A familiar formula

Tell me if this sounds familiar for a worship song as played by the band at your church:

Loud intro.
 Come down for verse one.
 Hit it hard for the chorus.
 Keep it going hard up til the bridge.
 Drop out for the bridge. 
Build back into a loud bridge section.
 Come down for an ending chorus.
 Vamp low on the end (with some occasional builds).

This type of song formula takes people dynamically up for two minutes, down for one minute, back up, back down. It’s a constant roller coaster for the duration of the set.

There’s nothing wrong with this song structure, but it might point to a greater issue: Perhaps we’re relying on musical dynamics to elicit an emotional response more than we are pleading for the Holy Spirit to engage us in the spiritual realm.Obviously, the solution to what seems to be our new habitual formula is not another formula. But we should be aware of how songs really do affect us emotionally and how we can engage with God in different ways through a range of dynamics. It might help to think through what we think of as a time of “worship.” Are there times of celebration with the Lord as well as times of rest? Do we dwell on the joy of celebration and the peace of rest, or are those moments fleeting?

Who is worship for?

Ultimately, worship leaders are there to help foster moments where individuals can connect with God. And our goal as worshipers is to use that time to connect with God.

Sometimes, I think we get into the mindset that the worship is for the band—that we are present to allow the band to do what it wants or to help us hit an emotional high. There’s a time for high notes and guitar prowess, but it’s a matter of the chicken and the egg. Because those moments aren't all the time. It’s a continual balance of asking, “What is this moment calling for, and what will take us deeper?”

Music seems to be this strange thing that serves as a bridge between the natural and the supernatural. Because of that, our conversations about how to do what we do best involves both the earthly and the spiritual. It means not getting stale in what we think of as “worship.” But it also means fighting the temptation to judge whether or not the worship was “good” by criteria like, “They sang well” or, “That band was awesome.”

But the most important thing about worship is that it allows us to engage with God. It matters a lot less if everyone hits the right note, or if the band hits the right solo at exactly the right time or even if the particular song is the one you want to sing. What matters is if worship is providing you a space to connect with God—it’s not a formula or a series of easy answers. It’s letting God work through each of us to connect with Him both as individuals and as the Church.
 
Relevant Magazine:  http://m.relevantmagazine.com/god/worship/features/24146-breaking-out-of-the-worship-formula

Confessions of a Former Worship Leader

What is our worship music really pointing to?

Growing up as the oldest son of a pastor, as well as a trained musician, the use of music as an expression of worship has been an integral piece of my church experience. I can vividly remember, as an eager fifth-grader, my excitement and anticipation over the opportunity to play bass guitar in a worship band for the first time. From that point on, as I became competent on instruments such as guitar and piano, my life would become dominated by musical, corporate worship. Whether it was at summer youth camps, university chapel services, informal gatherings around a campfire or meetings at newly planted churches, I happily assumed the title of “worship leader.”

For many years I felt no need to carefully examine how I approached corporate worship in the church. After all, I loved playing music, I seemed to be an effective leader and I was happily giving my talents back to God. However, I eventually realized it was not that simple.

As a freshman at a Christian university, I spent the majority of that first year “church shopping.” I quickly became enamored with one of the church communities near my university campus; its seeker-sensitive approach, flashy light shows and blaring music created an exciting change of pace for a straight-laced pastor’s kid. The worship leader this particular morning nailed the Christian rock-star image: good looks, styled hair, faded jeans and an expensive acoustic guitar. About halfway through the second song, I noticed an unused microphone, which was set-up at approximately his waist level. “What purpose could that serve?” I wondered in a quick moment of curiosity, and then I quickly raised my hands and lost myself in the tunes. The sound was mixed wonderfully, the vocals were outstanding and the set of music was carefully constructed to serve as a powerful crescendo to the last song: “Hungry” by Kathryn Scott. As the leader belted out the final refrain—I’m falling on my knees, offering all of me—he acted on his words and literally fell to his knees. It was at this point that the aforementioned unused microphone came into play. It was preemptively placed at the perfect height and angle so the leader would be able to sing while on his knees without stopping his guitar-playing.
 
Read the rest of this article at:  http://m.relevantmagazine.com/god/worship/features/23692-confessions-of-a-former-worship-leader

The Motions

Watch this video and let your heart come to it's own conclusions.