So much of what is written on worship blogs and in books about worship is focussed on the worship leader (or lead worshiper, if you want to get caught up in that semantic debate). I think this has caused a major problem on most worship teams. Most of the volunteers that serve on music teams in many churches view themselves as passive participants, weekend warriors looking for an opportunity to stretch their musical muscles. Many have real jobs as engineers, stay-at-home moms, accountants, bakers - the music they play in our churches is more of a hobby.
Now, let me be clear, I’m a HUGE proponent of utilizing volunteer musicians. Even if I was working in a church with unlimited resources, I would ask my band and vocalists to participate strictly on a volunteer basis. I think it does wonders for the worship environment, putting on display the idea that worship is more than music as they sing and play and serve. Where I think most worship leaders fall short is in not expecting their team members to be more than hobbyists. Unfortunately, many team members are also guilty of not expecting more from their leaders. In order to address this issue properly, I’d like to parse it out into two parts. This week, I’d like to talk specifically to worship leaders. Next week, we’ll touch on the responsibilities of the volunteer worship team.
Leaders
Having worked in the local church as a worship pastor for the last 12 years, I’ve been honored to work with a wide range of volunteer musicians and vocalists on my worship team. Some have been semi-professional or even full-blown gigging musicians, but most have been strictly amateur (in that they’ve never been paid to share their talent with the world). When I first started out, I operated with the mindset that these people are volunteers serving out of the goodness of their heart. They have full- or part-time jobs, families, and other interests and hobbies that may preclude them from putting in rehearsal time on their own at home. Often, this meant longer rehearsals and more prep time on my part in order to achieve the level of excellence that I felt we were called to on Sunday morning. And that was fine - after all, I was the one being paid to be there. It was easy for me to expect that from myself. I was also fairly tolerant of mistakes, relying on my musical training and ability to “carry” the team.
However, somewhere along the line my thinking shifted. I was certainly still sensitive to the fact that my volunteers had lives of their own. But I also became aware of two other things. One, these people were signing up for this position. This wasn’t something they were being forced to do - they submitted themselves to the audition process and understood that there was a level of ability that needed to be achieved and maintained in order to participate on this team. They were participating because they wanted to be better. There was a desire to grow musically that I had ignored early on in my career, instead keeping my expectations low so as not to offend or push away a volunteer who wanted so badly to serve. These were not just weekend warriors. These were followers of Christ who wanted what all of us want - to be a little bit better today than we were yesterday. Also, I was not only shortchanging my volunteers by not expecting more of them musically, I was ignoring one of my primary responsibilities as a leader - to push people to want to be better and to help people succeed, no matter what their level of skill or involvement.
The second thing I became more acutely aware of the longer I was in paid professional ministry was the gravity of what was going on within the church walls on Sunday mornings. We weren’t just a handful of musicians and vocalists coming together to sing five or six songs, grab some lunch afterward, and then head home for a nap and some yard work. We - every one of us standing on that platform - were perceived as leaders. Even though I was the only one getting paid to be there, all of us had a responsibility to lead the congregation in worship of our King through song. This was an expectation that was a little more difficult to convey to my team. For some reason, it was easier to expect musical excellence out of my team than it was to expect a deeper level of spiritual growth and leadership. It was also difficult for the members of my team to accept. It was one thing to ask them to grow musically. But asking them to take up the mantle of “leader”? Suddenly they were a group of hobbyists again. Somehow I had just crossed the line between active participation and unrealistic expectation. Early on, it was like pulling teeth to get the majority of my worship team to take on the role and responsibility of leadership. So, instead of expecting the same level of spiritual maturity and leadership from every member of the team, I would spread it out to certain individuals who showed a desire to be more than a great player or singer. Over time, their attitude became infectious and more and more people started stepping up until, eventually, it became part of the DNA of our team. From then on, anyone who auditioned knew from the outset that they were signing up for more than just a chance to get their musical “jollies” on the weekend. They were being called to lead people in to the presence of God, and the fruit of that expectation was evident in the richness of our worship services.
Had that shift not occurred in my thinking, would those worship experiences still have been as rich and fulfilling? Perhaps for a time. Had my only expectation been to have the best sounding church band in town, we could have met and exceeded that expectation weekend after weekend. But there is something happening above and underneath the music that I believe is tapped in to more fully when everyone on the platform is engaged in leading the congregation in worship.
So leaders, what do you expect from your teams (be they volunteer or paid)? Do you view them as simple hobbyists, finding a musical oasis in the midst of their workaday worlds? Are they simply excellent musicians that you’ve brought on to ensure that the quality of music remains at a high level? Or are you asking more of them? Are you asking them to lead people into something more than just an excellent musical event? I think the answers to these questions are key for all worship leaders and all churches, regardless of style or size.
In part two of this little excursion, we’ll look at the role of the worship team member under this paradigm of leadership. Thanks for reading...
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