Well, it’s been great to take a break. I’ve had time to think and process a few things, plus it was nice to not try and come up with stuff to write about for a while!
Some highlights from the past week:
- Ministry is going well. A lot of good things are happening. A lot of good things are about to happen. I can’t even imagine where God is going to take us.
- We had a small, short gathering for Sunday’s service (since it was labor day, and since there was a community worship service at the LifeLight Music Festival). It was great. Nice, intimate atmosphere. The most fun was hearing a little guy pray out loud behind us when Pastor Wade asked us to pray with who we came with - so cool to hear that kind of stuff!
I came across a link that I think would be super valuable for families. Often we struggle with how to lead worship in our homes (which is the place that teaching about worship and Jesus should begin with). Here is a great podcast from Sojourn Church, talking with their children’s ministry director about implementing a family worship time. I highly recommend it. (My browser is having a hard time showing the audio player, so you might need to download it from their itunes feed.)
Yet again, Bob Kauflin says things so much better than I can. Here’s a great follow up to my last post about strengths and weaknesses.
One of the hardest things to do in ministry is help people find out where there strengths and gifts truly are. Sometimes some temporary pain might be caused by telling someone that wants to preach that they really aren’t very good at communicating. But the pain will hopefully be healed when we work to find out what they really are good at doing, and let their position reflect their passion.
Today’s worship leader faces several challenges. Often we are responsible for so many things, including but not limited to:
- Arranging and producing music every week.
- Spiritually leading our volunteers.
- Scheduling volunteers.
- Planning services.
- Cultivating relationships.
- Practicing our voice or instrument.
- Preparing for services.
- Leading worship in services.
- Finding new music.
- The list goes on.
We often get caught in the trap of thinking that we have to do all these things ourself. While that could be a noble task, I don’t think it’s a wise one. What happens is that you end up putting your strengths on the back burner and not developing them, while doing tasks that are your weaknesses that you don’t really do all that well. I am probably the worst at being a disciplined scheduler. But, instead of working on becoming that, I should find another volunteer who takes joy in making a schedule and let them run with it. Perhaps you have a desire to write songs, but you’re realizing that it isn’t your strength. Someone in your congregation comes along who is a great songwriter. Let your pride go and let them cultivate that gift, while you better cultivate yours.
Let’s always remember to maximize on others’ gifts, while still maximizing on our own.
