worship leading

For those of you who don’t know, I have been leading worship at our church, Elston Heights, for some time now. I really enjoy playing guitar and singing, but above all else I enjoy giving God the glory that He is due. In the last few weeks my view of my role as worship leader has changed significantly…

I’ve always viewed my worship leading as a ministry, but I’ve never really focused on the “leading” part of it. I had the “worship” part down, but I was still lacking the part of leading people in that worship. Playing my guitar and singing to God with my eyes closed was comfortable and easy. Looking back on it, this habit of isolating myself probably stemmed from “leading” in churches where there was little excitement or energy from the other worshippers. It was often depressing to look at the somber faces of people who obviously were not listening to the words that they were singing. I know, I know…why did I not encourage them or prod them like a leader should? The answer was simply my ignorance and inexperience in leading. However, our current church is far from lacking in excitement or energy in our times of musical worship. So, there was no longer a need to clam up and pretend I was the only one there. Yet I still found myself doing it. Lindsay had encouraged me for awhile that I should open my eyes when I lead. She told me how refreshing it was to see people praising God with actual smiles on their faces. I tried occasionally, but I would always find myself closing my eyes and not paying attention to what was going on in the congregation.

It also didn’t help that our senior pastor is quite good at leading worship. Before Lindsay and I came to our church he effectively led the worship every week. So, for a long time I never felt like the real “leader” of the worship. This resulted in me showing no confidence and very little leadership. However, a few weeks ago our pastor was gone for three consecutive weeks. It was hard for him to do, but he left the entire responsibility of worship leading in my hands. Knowing how hard it was for him, I took the responsibility very seriously. I did my best to exude confidence to the church and to really start to pay attention to what was going on around me. From what I can tell, these times of musical worship went extremely well…God seemed to reward my attempts to “lead out”.

This past Saturday Lindsay and I had a meeting with pastor Randy. We discussed a lot about the worship team and our responsibilities as the leaders. Randy expressed how he wants us to view the worship team as a small group in which we, as leaders, facilitate growth in whatever areas are needed. He also wants us to raise the bar of excellence and professionalism in our musical worship. As our church grows (which it will), we will need to be more prepared and more equipped to do whatever is needed musically. We’re having a meeting this Saturday morning to discuss and work on some of these things. We hope to learn some new songs, work out some sound board kinks, discuss the future of the group, etc. Randy also emphasized that he wants Lindsay and I to view both of us as leaders. He thinks that God has gifted us both in worship and that we will be able to effectively lead our group. I think that I have already viewed myself as the leader, but it will be interesting to see how Lindsay responds. In the past she has just seen herself as more of a member than a leader. I think she has a lot to offer and will do a great job as she works with me.

All in all we are very excited about leading the musical worship at our church. We have lots of talent and enthusiasm and very little pride or selfishness. It’s a good combination that will really help as our church grows.