i am an offering

Sunday Recap

Yesterday was a great day - full of family times, which I really loved.  It was also a good, albeit, slightly stressful day at Living Word.

Our service starts at 9:20.  I had the day off from leading worship yesterday but of course, like most of you out there, I was still keeping an eye out for anything that might be amiss.  Well, 9:20 comes and I realize that no one is sitting at the projection computer.  I quick find Pastor Wade and ask if the person who usually sends the file for projection had sent it or if she was coming.  Minimal panic ensues.  When I say minimal, though, I really mean it - it was quite amazing how much peace I ended up feeling, even knowing that we might not have any words for the screen.

So, after a phone call and a few minutes we realize we have the words on Pastor’s laptop, but no jump drive.  He makes a transition into announcements and calmy asks if anyone has a jump drive.  Someone does and we’re able to get up and running with all of the lyrics with a few, but not many hiccups.  The worship service goes well and God was glorified.  However, He could be glorified even more with a little bit better planning and communication.  Moral of the story - always, ALWAYS have many people in the communication loop when you’re all at different locations.  I’m really looking forward to being in our building early next year so some of these problems will hopefully go away - but at the same time, we need to work harder to make them go away now, so that we don’t face the same problems in the building.

But God was good, and blessed us anyway with great music and great teaching on “You shall not Murder.”  We sang:

• We are Called to Be God’s People
• Bless That Wonderful Name
• Knowing You
• Thou Art Worthy,  CCLI  14789
• The Wonder of it All

And Pastor Wade led us in two choruses of “I Have Decided” after hearing the pianist playing it as a music bed under the prayer time.

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This past Sunday at Living Word we had a bit of a minor technical difficulty where the wrong song was put into the schedule for the day and we didn’t have a backup of the correct one.  Although it was humorous and everything else went well, there was a bit of an awkward moment and it would be good to know how to avoid any awkwardness when things like this happen.  So, what do we do to avoid the awkwardness?

Plan Ahead

The first thing to do is to make sure that you’ve planned well enough ahead of time.  Check and recheck things.  Very often there are several worship songs (or even hymns) with the same title.  Check with the data entry volunteer, the volunteer who proofs and/or runs projection and yourself that you have the right song entered in.  Remind the volunteer who enters the songs that when they are in doubt which is the right song they should put in both (or all five) with the same title.  That way, if the wrong song is on the screen the right song can be found quickly (with the use of decent projection software anyway).  It is especially vital to triple or quadruple check things when you are working in a church plant and several different people in several different places are putting the elements of the service together.

Teach Everyone What To Do

It won’t really help much if you as the main worship leader know what to do when a situation like this happens but the rest of your team is clueless.  Teach them some simple ways to keep a musical flow going while you lead the congregation through the distraction.  Teach the team to:

• Keep playing through the verse of the song that isn’t up on the screen (or the chorus, if that’s where the team is currently playing)
• Be ready to keep playing through that song if the worship leader feels led to use it as a solo
• Be ready to find an ending point if the worship leader feels led to go to the next or a different song

Main worship leaders need to be able to do these things while the team is doing the above:

• Recognize that the song is not correct.  If you can see the projection screen or if you have a confidence screen or monitor that will be an easy way to tell.  If you can’t see the projection screen, watch people and see if they’ve stopped singing.
• Don’t focus on the problem.  Quickly and gently inform the congregation that the correct song is not on the screen, then move on to what you feel the Holy Spirit is leading you to do.  A short, “It looks like we have the incorrect song up at the moment” is sufficient.
• Use this as an opportunity to let the congregation pray and worship on their own.  After you’ve informed them that the wrong song is up, you could say something like “While we see if we have the right song, take a few moments to pray and worship God silently or with your families.”  Lead them through a couple minutes of corporate prayer or praise.  This also gives the projection volunteer time to find the correct song and get it up if they can.
• If the projection volunteer can’t find the correct song, it’s obviously time to either move on or inform the congregation that just the worship team will be singing this song and the congregation should worship by listening to the words.  Only do this if you know beyond a shadow of a doubt that the vocalists are always clearly understood through the sound system. If you sing with no words on the screen through a muddy, unclear system, no one will be able to worship without being distracted by the fact that they can’t understand the words.
• If you feel led by the Holy Spirit that having the congregation listen isn’t the right fit for the moment, decide to move on to the next song for the morning.  Hopefully you’ve taught your team to keep playing the verse or chorus for a bit while you’re waiting to know what to do next.  Give them a cue to end the music at an appropriate spot (not in the middle of a verse!) and then lead the congregation into the next song.

The absolute best thing to do would be to plan ahead well enough to avoid these situations but if they do arise these are some simple things you can do to help minimize the distraction and keep people’s hearts and minds focused on Jesus, not on the technical difficulty at hand.

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.

Well, today has been full of interesting comments and laughter because of the fact that there is a mouse apparently living under the Ministry Director’s mini-fridge in his office! It’s amazing how something so small can create such a different atmosphere.

It’s good to think about as we think about ministry. Small things can affect an entire church, even though we might think about it.

Negative effects:

• Small sin - Which in truth doesn’t exist. No sin is small. When there is unconfessed, unrepentent sin in leadership ugly things happen.
• Small vision - We cannot even begin to comprehend the vastness of God. Why do we limit the vastness of what He could be doing through the local church?
• Small attitudes - Even a tiny bit of negativity towards each other can influence people much more than we realize.
• Small planning - Ministry is hard work and needs to be prayerfully planned. While we definitely want to be open to the Holy Spirit’s promptings, we can’t blame our lack of planning on “waiting on the Holy Spirit.”

Positive effects:

• Small pride - “He who neglects discipline despises himself. But he who listens to reproof acquires understanding. The fear of the LORD is the instruction for wisdom, and before honor comes humility.” Proverbs 15:32-33 Humility is so important in ministry.
• Small view of ourselves compared to God - Without Him, we can do absolutely nothing.
• Small details - Quality is very important to have in a church. Pay attention to the detail of small things that could influence others to respect the church more and eventually come to a love of God (bulletin design, worship team training, publication design, Scripture readers that read with passion, many more)