Leaders, Mentoring, Ministry Leadership, Worship Leading, WTTU Special Public Post
Three Things for Being An Effective Worship Leader (Show #114)
#HighlyEffectiveWorshipLeader
4 min read | 30m Show
How Effective Are You?
As worship leaders, we want to be active and effective, not passive and deficient. We have a team to lead, a church to nurture and God – to give Him glory. It’s easy to look at the failures, but the Lord would rather us look to His victory.What does it mean to you in conquering the struggles, and what would this mean to your ministry and church?
3-14-17 WATCH SHOW
Is it just a habit?
I think that anyone who wants to be a Worship Leader wants to be effective. However, I believe that an “effective” Worship Leader is pretty subjective. Meaning, I think one thing, and you likely think another.
Lets say a Worship Leader is a great leader from stage, incredible talent and sensitive to the Holy Spirit, but is real crummy at leading people off stage.
Are they effective? What about someone who is 15 steps ahead of everyone else and prays for their team constantly, but can drop the ball when they get in front of their church family? See what I mean? Lets start by building an understanding of what we mean by an “effective” Worship Leader. I’ve written here before on a great definition of what a Worship Leader is from one of my favorite thinkers on the subject, Bob Kauflin, but lets get even more basic than that.
I believe that an effective Worship Leader is one that is able to get desired results in their areas of responsibility, while being led by the Holy Spirit. It’s not enough for us to be musically effective; we must be spiritually effective, relationally effective, personally effective, and even organizationally effective. This might seem intimidating or even an unreachable goal, but there are 2 things to remember: First, the goal isn’t perfection, just growth.
Second, don’t forget the 2nd part of the working definition above: “. . . while being led by the Holy Spirit.” Our job is to be obedient, to take the next right step, and to do well with what God puts in front of us. That’ll preach for anyone, not just Worship Leaders.
With all that said, here’s a (non-exhaustive nor conclusive) list of 7 habits that, if practiced on a regular basis, will help us to become even more effective Worship Leaders. Lets dive in.
Lets say a Worship Leader is a great leader from stage, incredible talent and sensitive to the Holy Spirit, but is real crummy at leading people off stage.
Are they effective? What about someone who is 15 steps ahead of everyone else and prays for their team constantly, but can drop the ball when they get in front of their church family? See what I mean? Lets start by building an understanding of what we mean by an “effective” Worship Leader. I’ve written here before on a great definition of what a Worship Leader is from one of my favorite thinkers on the subject, Bob Kauflin, but lets get even more basic than that.
I believe that an effective Worship Leader is one that is able to get desired results in their areas of responsibility, while being led by the Holy Spirit. It’s not enough for us to be musically effective; we must be spiritually effective, relationally effective, personally effective, and even organizationally effective. This might seem intimidating or even an unreachable goal, but there are 2 things to remember: First, the goal isn’t perfection, just growth.
Second, don’t forget the 2nd part of the working definition above: “. . . while being led by the Holy Spirit.” Our job is to be obedient, to take the next right step, and to do well with what God puts in front of us. That’ll preach for anyone, not just Worship Leaders.
With all that said, here’s a (non-exhaustive nor conclusive) list of 7 habits that, if practiced on a regular basis, will help us to become even more effective Worship Leaders. Lets dive in.
1. Read Your Bible Duh.
I feel like I talk about this all the time here, but I don’t think this song is ever gonna get old. If we’re not reading our Bibles, then we’re really missing the boat on being in an effective place to lead other and lead worship.I’m also on the team that has trouble with doing this regularly because I get distracted, so I get it. To keep it practical, I think there are two kinds of Bible reading we should be doing on a regular basis. First, we should be reading through the whole Bible on the regular. Not getting through the whole thing in a month, or maybe not even a year, but that we’re working our way through ALL of the Bible.
Yup, Leviticus & Amos included. Having a full Biblical diet will help inform our leadership even more. Second, we should be doing a deeper, more focused/intentional Bible study. While the first kind is intended to keep the Word fresh in our minds, this kind of Bible study is meant for us to grow in our knowledge and understanding of the Bible in a deeper way. Pick a topic, a word, a person, a theme, anything really, and learn how to dive deep into studying the Bible. Want a place to start? Look at the postures of Worship throughout Psalms. Just read through the whole book over time, write down all of the postures that are mentioned, and learn more about why they are used.This kind of study will help us to be incredible effective as we lead our teams and churches.
2. Plan Ahead & Stay Ahead
I’m a big fan of the saying, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” I feel like a football coach just writing that, but that quote couldn’t be more true. I’d dare say that 90% of us are in ministry settings where we’re working with teams that are made up of volunteers.These volunteers are Wives & Husbands, Moms & Dads, Employees, Family Members, I mean, [Insert Anything Here]. That means that while they may be committed to being a part of our team, it isn’t the ONLY thing that they are doing in their lives.
With that in mind, part of our responsibility as Worship Leaders is to plan ahead and stay ahead. This includes scheduling people, creating set lists, providing content (Charts & Music), and even setting up your physical space. Not only will this help us to be more effective, but it will help our teams to be more effective. If you give volunteers a few extra weeks to learn a new song or to be aware of a set that is coming up, watch how they flourish as you teach them how to practice at home & rehearse when you’re all together.
Personally, I schedule my volunteers 2 months at a time and then I plan 2 months of gatherings with all the music & content they need for those gatherings. Some of you might have just thrown up, but it’s going to be ok. That might not work for you, but I’ll tell you that it helps my team serve like never before and actually be able to worship when they lead our church. Find the right balance for your team, and then be consistent. We’ll talk about systems in a little bit, but the better you are at planning ahead and staying ahead, the more effective both you and your team will be.
3. Continue to Get to Know
Your Team Most of us have a plan or a process for how you bring people onto your team that includes some getting to know you stuff. Maybe coffee or lunch after church on Sunday or something, just time for you guys to get to know each other.
Why?
Because it is important for you to know those that you’re going to be leading and serving. However, I think if we’re honest, we’re not all really great at keeping that relationship building going after that initial on-boarding. Sure, we talk at rehearsal or when we need something from them, but we don’t always do a great job at keeping that conversation going.We might really get to know some of the team members, like the ones we really get along with, but part of our responsibility of leading our teams involves us being life-on-life with these people. Who are they? What do they love? What are they going through? How can you be praying for them?
My advice:
Be intentional about getting to know them on an ongoing basis. Get together with no ministry agenda or prepared outcome, just get to know them. Ask more questions about them than cool things you talk about yourself. Take the time to invest in your team members and to truly care about them. Be wise and be intentional, because the closer our relationships are with our team members, the more effective we’ll be in leading them and leading our churches.@cdenning @BranonDempsey @worshiptt
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