"I Can't Worship"

“I wasn’t able to worship because…” I have been on the receiving end of more than one post-service statement, or email beginning with this sentence in my life. I know that I have to settle some things about what I believe and how I will respond ahead of time, because in the moment - depending on the state of my own heart - these statements can make me angry, sad, self-pitying, dismissive, belittling, and unkind, or they can be an opportunity to further and clearly shepherd those I’ve been called to serve - including myself!

First I need to settle that this statement from a theological perspective is untrue. No one is ever not worshiping. Worship does not turn on and off like a light switch, worship is either rightly aimed at God, or it is bent in on self. And unless God reveals himself, we are all incapable of right worship. But as worship leaders, we know that people can easily shorthand ‘worship,’ for the sung worship portion of a Sunday gathering. And so often what people mean when they say they ‘can’t worship,’ is that something in the gathering was not to their preference.

Preference plays a role for everyone in our congregation - even for those of us who are leading worship, building the liturgy, and executing the service. Sung worship is participatory in a way that other aspects of our gathering are not. And I have noticed throughout the years, this seems to give people the freedom to speak to what they like and do not like more than other elements of a church or service. Music engages our minds, our hearts, our emotions, and our experiences - so we can quickly make preference a gospel issue when certain songs, styles, and aesthetic choices have been so deeply a part of our faith journey.

I consider the source. I have said regularly when it comes to feedback of any variety, the seriousness of which I receive, weigh, and implement feedback is: first, the staff and elders, second, anyone who serves on the worship team, third, the congregation. This is not to say that anyone is more valuable or important than any other - but staff, elders, and people who serve on the team are often more aware of what we are trying to accomplish. We are all on the same team and pulling in the same direction. Their feedback is most helpful if/when they sense we are drifting from the stated direction.

Do not take it personally. This is incredibly difficult for me. I deeply care about the work that I do, and it is hard to untangle my identity, my calling, and my vocation with enough distance to not feel like these kinds of statements are not a value judgment of me as a person. Everyone has an opinion, some people feel compelled to share theirs…

Because there is only one mediator between God and men - the man Christ Jesus - there is no song, style, or preference that can thwart true worship. True and right worship is only accomplished as God reveals himself and we respond - yes, in song - but also in all of life.

Connecting the Gathering

I live and serve in the South. Cultural Christianity is alive and well in the Bible Belt. Having the external appearance of faith without a heart that grasps and truly responds to the Gospel is my short-hand description of cultural Christianity. It has the external appearance of goodness, or morality with a compartmentalized heart and understanding of the way our faith should influence and impact everything about the life of a believer:

Our desires and affections.

The way we view and spend our money.

Our thoughts and actions.

The words we speak, and the way we use social media.

Our interactions with our family, our neighbors, and our enemies.

Our engagement within our communities and around the world.

What we treasure, and what we reject.

To some extent, this is not a unique reality for Americans living in the South. Every human lives a compartmentalized life. We divide ourselves across work, family, friends, free time, money, and faith. But if we are called to be and make disciples, that is a call that must pervade every area and aspect of our lives.

When I started to see worship leading as a place of discipleship, I began to see the gaps between what we do on a Sunday, and how we live the rest of the week.

Sunday worship is the overflow of Monday through Saturday worship.

Sunday worship fuels and propels the people of God to live as worshipers throughout the week.

In gathering with the people of God are reminded that God is much bigger than we are, that we are never alone, and we encourage one another to live as followers of Christ.

In gathering with the people of God we are reminded of our dependence upon God and the gift of His Body.

In gathering with the people of God our attention and affection are refocused around the person and work of Christ rather than the desires of the flesh or the culture.

May our lives, and the lives of those we lead look increasingly less compartmentalized.

Other posts that might be of interest:

All of Life Worship.

How to respond to Current Events.

Growing as a Communicator

Connecting Songs and Sermons

Communicating With The Team

Communication is an invaluable part of any relationship. And when you are serving on a team, there must be clear, open, honest, and frequent communication to be able to move together toward a common goal. And that common goal for those of us that serve on worship and production teams is to enable the people of God to proclaim the truths of the Gospel together in song, word, prayer, and gathering.

Communication with your team should begin before you gather for a rehearsal or service. Who are the musicians who are serving? What songs are you singing? What are the keys? Are there elements outside of the service that will affect the way you move through the service? What are the structures of your songs, and transitions? Communicating these details again and again, in writing and aloud will be incredibly helpful for your team to be able to move in the same direction together.

Consistency in your communication is just as important as what you say. When can the team expect to hear from you about when they are serving, the set lists, and any changes to the normal rhythms? Will you communicate everything individually, through a Facebook group, an email chain, or Planning Center? Ultimately, you need to use the tool that makes the most sense for you and your team, but building regular rhythms of communication from week to week, as well as month to month, is essential to creating consistency of expectation for the team.

The rehearsal is a locus point of communication for the team. Again, finding a consistent way that you move through rehearsals will build familiarity and comfort for the team. Walking your team through the order of service, clarifying parts, setting expectations, and giving space for questions in regards to the liturgy should be incorporated frequently for a team to have clear communication.

Finally, clarity is a necessity with as many moving parts as we oversee as worship leaders. Holding the larger picture of the whole morning, and how every aspect of those we lead contributes to what we are trying to accomplish in a morning. Practice what and how you will walk your team through rehearsals and a service, make notes, write it down until there is clarity in what and how you are communicating.

The Holy Spirit And Leading

Last week I wrote about listening to the voice of the Holy Spirit in our preparation. That being attentive to the Holy Spirit and leading spontaneously and speaking, praying, and communicating extemporaneously does not necessarily equate to being led by the Holy Spirit - that we can in fact be led by the Spirit in our preparation. But what about the corporate gathering? What does it look like to be led by the Spirit there?

It still looks like prayer. Union with Christ, communication with the Holy Spirit. Asking Him, seeking Him, inviting Him to do what only He can do - lead people to Jesus, convict people of sin, comfort people in their affliction, transform hearts and lives. For me, I will often leave more space in between verses, or a chorus, or in between songs as I ask the Spirit to speak to me, and I press in to hear Him.

It looks like observation. It can be tempting when we are leading worship to simply close our eyes and get lost in our own private worship world. But we are there to serve people by leading them in song. As you listen to the voice of the Spirit, listen to the voice of the people - watch them, pray for them, let their response or lack thereof shape the way that you communicate and lead. Not so much in a ‘give the people what they want,’ kind of way - but as a shepherd, leading and guiding them to see and respond to the Holy Spirit.

It looks like communication with your team and the congregation. In rehearsal practice and communicate to your team the moments where you may do something different than planned. I heard Charlie Hall one time talk about how preparing for moments of spontaneity with his team was like opening a window - everyone knew where those window moments would be in the song or the setlist, and they would approach together, open the window, see if the Spirit was using that opportunity to lead them in a direction different than they had planned. I have often found it helpful to communicate to the team something along the lines of ‘when we get to this point of the song, I think we will either go here or here…’. Maybe that’s repeating something we have already sung, maybe that is tagging something from another song. But communicating prior to being in the moment so that your band can be aware, and know how you’d like them to respond is important. Likewise, we must communicate with the person running lyrics - having options ready, and preparing them for where things may change, and any kind of verbal cues you may give to help them lead with you rather than trying to catch you. And finally, we must communicate with the congregation. Leading them through, rather than running out ahead and asking them to try and keep up. Verbal cues, inviting them to sing with you, inviting them to lean into the voice of the Spirit together.

We can be Holy Spirit-led in our preparation and in our leadership. But we can be neither if we are not Holy Spirit-led in our daily lives.

Growing As A Communicator

Public speaking consistently tops lists of things people most fear. It is not often I meet a worship leader who feels comfortable or confident when it comes to speaking and communicating non-musically from the platform. Give us an instrument and a room of any size and we are fine, ask us to speak? No thank you.

There is a big difference between a song leader and a worship leader. A song leader will see communication as merely information transfer - a quick welcome, verbal cues for lyrics, prayers to transition from one aspect of the gathering to the next. Worship leaders see communication as a way to continually shepherd people during the gathering. To direct people’s attention and affection to specific aspects of the heart and character of Christ, the beauty of the gospel, the truths being sung, and invite people to respond with their whole lives.

Whether you are comfortable with public speaking, or it makes your skin crawl, we can all grow in our ability to communicate clearly and effectively as worship leaders. I believe what will have the biggest impact on our ability as worship leaders to communicate well is intentionality. This means putting thought and purpose behind when you will speak and what you will say. Where are the holes in the flow of the gathering? How can you help connect the dots for people between what has happened in the week, what is happening in their lives, what they have just heard preached, and the reality of the Gospel?

Whether you are comfortable leading verbally or not, my encouragement is always the same: write it down. This doesn’t mean that you must read something verbatim. But writing down what you will say helps you to formulate more clearly what you are wanting to communicate. It can also ensure that you won’t start down a half-thought-out rabbit trail to nowhere. Once you write it down, practice speaking out loud. You have to get used to the sound of your voice as you speak something that is not off the cuff but planned and purposeful. Practicing it out loud also allows you to fine-tune the rhythm, timing, and clarity of what you are trying to articulate in the first place.

Okay, so maybe you are slowly easing into growing as a verbal communicator. Another form of communication often overlooked as worship leaders is our body language. Making eye contact when leading up front, smiling, having a posture of openness, being available and engaging off the platform, presence without swagger, working to avoid the appearance of frenetic pace which can often accompany before and after service.

Like all skills, the more you practice the more proficient you become. If it feels overwhelming, or scary, take small, intentional steps each time you serve. Honestly evaluate, elicit feedback from people who are strong in this area. Practice, practice, practice. Our people are worth the growing pains.

Connecting Songs and Sermons

There is a critical 90 seconds every Sunday morning. That sliver of time between the end of the sermon, and the song. Part of our role as worship leaders is to connect what happens on a Sunday morning with all of life. To make sense of what we have heard in the Word preached, to fuel our worship in song and response. But many worship leaders struggle to feel competent and capable when it comes to speaking and communicating verbally to the congregation. If you struggle with knowing how to take advantage of those moments to hit home with the pieces of the sermon, and connect them to the songs of response, here are some suggestions:

Listen to the sermon. Be present and engaged, even taking notes of things you want to remember personally, and want to communicate to the congregation following the sermon. Don’t use the sermon as a time to check out mentally, or physically.

Read the text beforehand. Spend time in the particular Scripture passage being taught in your own time of preparation for Sunday morning. What do you see? What do you notice about who God is, what He has done, and how He has called us to live?

Speak with the preacher. Find out where the preacher is headed for the weekend. What are some of the main points? Any additional passages they will be using? How are they wanting to land the sermon? What is the one thing they hope people remember and take away from the weekend?

Connect everything to Jesus. Read the Jesus Storybook Bible. Sally Lloyd Jones does an amazing job of connecting every story to Jesus. How does the sermon/text and the morning point our lives, and lift our eyes to Christ?

Plan beforehand. After speaking with the preacher, and spending time in the text, and considering your final song(s), write down some thoughts about how you could connect the songs and sermon verbally. Practice speaking out loud to get used to hearing yourself connect and communicate in that way.

Write it down. As you continue to grow as a verbal communicator, write everything down. You can manuscript what you want to communicate so that you don’t miss any part of what you intended to say. Reading something that is written, will help to build confidence and familiarity, rather than trying to hold everything in your mind, and stumbling over your words.

Remember there is grace as we grow. Let’s not miss the opportunity to take those critical 90 seconds and point people to Jesus.