Today’s post was going to be on the importance of being healthy as a worship leader (both physically and spiritually) but I need to put that on hold.  Look forward to those things tomorrow.

Today, however, I wanted to ask a question: How does your example (especially in ministry) affect how others worship God?

Desiring Invisibility is Much More Possible than Actually Being Invisible.

When we get up to lead worship, my hope is that our prayer and desire is to disappear so that God will be made more clear in people’s minds.  We study about who He is so we can give an accurate picture of the God we’re worshiping to the people we’re worshiping with.  We study encouragements from Scripture so we can encourage those who are worshiping with us and make them feel at home and welcome in God’s presence within the church.  But if we do all of those things and make unwise decisions or run over those we’re working with (even unintentionally) – we will not disappear.  Try as they might to get past the distraction that they see in us, the people that we’ve hurt or misled or ignored won’t be able to see anything but our mistakes.  Even if they put the best construction on things that they possibly can – in the back of their minds they’ll remember what happened.  As much as we want to disappear and make God the only thing visible through us, we’re always in the spotlight – faults and all.

A dear friend of mine in ministry and I just had an email exchange where my friend openly admitted that there was a struggle because of the way some parts of the music ministry was being handled.  My friend was very courteous and gracious (and very right, I might add) in addressing an issue that needed to be addressed.  I hope that I responded with humility and as much grace and courtesy as my friend showed me, but it got me thinking:  What we do affects how others worship God.

As much as we’d like to be invisible, it’s just impossible.  And as mature as many people within the church are to be able to forget about faults for a while and just worship God – more than likely even a small issue will nag at us when we see someone in leadership who we’re struggling with.  Even more so if it’s someone you see every Sunday or multiple Sundays (in the case of worship leaders and pastors.)

We Can’t Attain Perfection – But We Can Discipline Ourselves with Humility

We could spend our lives trying to make sure we never hurt anyone.  That would be impossible.  Even something that we feel wasn’t a big deal in the least could be a huge stumbling block to someone.  We are human, and we will fall.  But, God calls us to humility in everything we do – including our relationships.  He also calls us to think of others much more than ourselves.  Philippians 2:3-4 says this:

Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

It goes on to talk about having the attitude of Jesus – God Himself coming down to earth in the must humble form possible: the Creator of the Universe becoming a human.  Not just a human, but a human that came to serve us!

We can pray for humility and pray that we can look out for others’ interests much more than our own.  In everything we do, let’s do it as Peter suggests:

Whoever serves is to do so as one who is serving by the strength which God supplies so that in all things God may be glorified through Jesus Christ, to whom belongs the glory and dominion forever and ever.” 1 Peter 4:11 (emphasis added)

Let’s live our lives as worship leaders (especially in ministry) “so that in all things God may be glorified.”

Well, I have kind of veered away from the ultimate purpose of this blog within the last few posts.  That purpose is to share teaching, tips and training on leading worship within the local church.  Even though it’s been fun to build community (which I love, by the way, so please keep joining in the comments) I miss just pouring out my heart with what I’ve learned in leading worship and raising up worship leaders within the local church – so it’s time to get back to it.

Building a Worship and Music Ministry

At my former church, I was blessed to be able to be hired into a pretty well-established ministry.  I just needed to continue to work with those who were already involved and recruit some more volunteers who wanted to be involved.  Currently, the situation’s a little different.  I’m in a church plant that’s about five years old that has had kind of an on-again, off-again worship ministry going on.  So basically, I’ve jumped in with a little bit of a ministry, but not much.  There’s been some great growth, but now I’m stuck.  Why?

Instead of taking small steps to build things up gradually and consistently over time, I’m wanting to take huge steps to have a full-fledged ministry right now.

I sent out a Twitter post a couple of days ago asking for some advice on building a worship ministry.  Billy Chia sent me this:

Do Less – fewer songs, fewer people, fewer “extras”. Keep it basic and add one new component at a time.

I think he nailed it.  When we begin to build a worship ministry, or any ministry for that matter, we need to look at the big picture slowly.  Yes, it’s good to have a huge vision, but don’t get discouraged when that vision doesn’t happen over night.  My roadblock has been just remembering to take the small steps, the fifteen minutes a day that doesn’t seem like much but will ultimately have me going, “Wow, how in the world did this ministry grow so quickly?”

Slow and Steady Wins the Race

So, make a point to take things slowly, yet with persistance.  Take one small step at a time.  Soon that small step will lead to a bigger step yet that bigger step will seem as small as the original small step.  So, what’s the next small step you need to take in order to persistently build the ministry?  Mine is setting up a meeting and making a few phone calls I’ve been putting off.  Let’s get to it.

What I Blog About – From Wordle

Since Billy Chia just confessed that he is a “church addict” after entering his blog into wordle, I wanted to see what would come about if I did the same thing.  Here it is:

The best thing about it – every time I refreshed, the words “worship” and “happened” always showed up prominently.  Thank You, Lord, for reassuring me that “worship happened” every time we have gathered!

Blog Love – Some Links You Should Check Out

Shannon shares a great series on Maturity in Christ.  I’d highly encourage reading all parts.  Part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, a bit more, and a bit more!

Brad Loser (loh-ser, not loo-zer!) is going through Worship Matters. If you want some detailed thoughts from some folks going through the book, definitely check it out.  He shares quite a bit, so be prepared for some reading, but it’s worth it.

Billy shares a really fantastic post on complaining and feedback to follow up his humorous post that he posted in response to Ragamuffin Soul’s “you-asked-for-it” question. I think I’m one of the few people that actually recommends not reading Ragamuffin soul, but I thought Billy eventually turned this around quite positively. *EDIT* Los contacted me directly with a very positive comment asking why I said this in the comments.  I really appreciate it and explained why I said this below.  I shouldn’t have said it and should have let people come to their own decision about his blog.  I do apologize for that and hope we can all be at peace.  The power of words are quite incredible at times.

Russ has a fantastic story about his privilege to be Fred’s guest at National Worship Leader Conference and hang out with some of the more famous worship folks.

Lorie King has a featured article on The Worship Community on how to enhance stage presence. I think her perspective is right on with all of these tips.

Finally, Fred has a wonderful post about making sure we focus on good things happening and celebrate victories.

Have a fantastic weekend, everyone!  More thoughts from my teaching this Sunday will come next week.