Then the talented guitarist told me one Sunday after church that he was leaving. The local Willow Creek Church Clone was offering him more money.

I was livid. Not at him – he was a super-nice guy but really just a hired gun with no ties to the church. Did the big Willow Creek Clone really need yet another guitarist?

Ironically, the Clone hit a financial bump a few years later, stopped paying musicians, and every last one of them quit (including the guitarist.)

Fast forward ten years to a new era of stealing. A Ginormous Church has sprouted in town and has hired away a young 20ish guitar prodigy from a new church plant meeting in a movie theater.

The Ginormous Church isn’t being malicious. They are what they are: a big church who values quality music and believes a musician is worthy of his/her hire. More power to them – the world would be a better place if The Church supported the arts instead of letting Hollywood gobble up the talent, wouldn’t it?

And I don’t blame the young 20ish prodigy. The Ginormous Church pays each musician in their band $300 a week (can you imagine that budget!) His role will be much like an intern where he’ll play music he loves with top musicians while learning about recording (they have a recording studio,) loops and other technology. It’s almost like being paid to get a music education. He’ll probably make more part time at the church than he would at a full-time McDonald’s job.

But what happens if you’re on the losing end of this deal – a church plant who can’t compete with the big bucks? Pray.

When I lost our guitarist to the Willow Creek Clone I had dinner with one of our lay worship leaders. We decided to pray and ask God to send us another guitarist. After we prayed he suddenly said “Oh, I just thought of the perfect person!”

This perfect person turned out to be another talented guitarist – in fact, still to this day one of the best guitarists I’ve ever heard. He and his wife had been away from church for years, and his playing for us brought them both back to the Lord. He was more than merely a “hired gun” (we paid him what we paid the other guy) – he and his wife had an amazing spiritual transformation and eventually became members of the church. After I left that ministry he actually took over as the music director!

Bottom Line: Let the big churches steal your musicians – God will provide.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

 

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.

A lot has been said about worship leading, about the responsibilities both musically and spiritually a person has when leading a congregation in corporate musical worship, and whilst most points are relevant to all members of the band and creative arts, often they’re specifically referring to the vocal worship leader who is chiefly leading the band and congregation.

Today, however, I want to specifically talk about a section that can often feel a little less important or even slightly overlooked in a worship team – and that is the backing vocals.

The Backing Vocalists or BVs as they’re commonly called (although now we call them “Frontline Vocals” at church; it’s all in the semantics…) are an integral part of the team and go a long way into helping the general sound of the worship as well as supporting the worship leader and leading the congregation. They’re so important in fact; my first point is actually this:

Know your worth

When BVing, it’s often easy to think that no one can hear you and that no one will notice if you give a bit less effort and take it easy. But when worship leading I know how aware of the BV’s I am and how much I rely on them to back me up and help me drive the service. From every other perspective it is so integral to the team, so if you are BVing please take everything you do seriously. Your body language makes a huge difference to the presence on the stage, and when the stage is setting the vibe for the congregation, every little thing is crucial.

Prepare diligently with warming up your voice, memorising lyrics and harmonies, and even being ready to sing different parts if the service needs it. Don’t set your level of expectation to what the bare minimum is that others expect of you, know your full ability and within yourself set that level of expectation of the very best you can possible give as the bare minimum for what you’re bringing to the service as a BV.

Continue reading.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

 

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.

• Probably more than any other day of the week, leaders get discouraged on Mondays.
• Your message didn’t quite elicit the response you hoped it would.
• That one nasty email stole some much needed sleep last night.
• You think you’re not making nearly the progress you hoped you would.
• You wonder whether anyone actually appreciates what you’re doing.
• That person who left also discouraged three other people on their way out the door.

I don’t know whether this is apocryphal or not, but it’s said more ministry leaders resign on a Monday than any other day. If you’ve been in ministry for any length of time, you’ll understand why.

A few weeks ago I caught a breathtakingly fresh glimpse of how I think God must feel when he sees the discouragement present in his people on days like Monday.

My wife Toni and I were on a hike in the woods.

I like to take pictures, and I was heading to a stream to take some shots of a small waterfall when I almost stepped on the flowers above.

They were incredibly small. They were barely visible from 6 feet up, but I caught them out of the corner of my eye.

I had to get down on my stomach to take this shot. I got as close as I could to snap the photo. (The picture makes them look so much bigger than they were, even without a macro lens.)

As I looked at them, it occurred to me that I might actually be the only human to ever see these flowers.

It made me think…

That doesn’t really matter to God.

He created them, and he absolutely delights in them.

Continue reading.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

 

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.

Continue reading.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

 

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.

So what about when someone completely drops the ball? We all have experienced this as leaders. I know I have. So how do you respond?

You give a big assignment or project to someone on your team, and they lay an egg- totally drop the ball and don’t get it done. We’ve all been there. I know I have…..both as the goat who goofed up, as well as the one in charge trying to figure out how to handle the situation.

So how do you handle it? Let’s look at this situation from both sides, both the one who dropped the ball and the one in charge.

1. As the one who dropped the ball, just own up to it. Don’t make excuses. Be self-policing and self aware. Be accountable. And be mature. And realize that your leader or your boss or the person in charge is trying to figure out how to deal with your mistake or lack of action- lean into that and bring it up first and tell them it won’t happen again. Don’t wait on them to have to confront you. Be proactive. Leaders would always rather find out from you that you laid an egg, vs. finding out from someone else, many times when it’s too late to do anything about it.

Own up. Grow Up. Shut up. And don’t be the goat again.

2. As the leader, four things to think about: 1. confrontation; 2. conversation; 3. restoration; 4. affirmation. Got these from Kevin Myers in a talk he did a couple of years ago at 12 Stone Church. The key on this- confront, and then move on. Get through the confrontation and onto to the conversation and restoration as quick as possible. If you have the right kind of person on your team, they feel terrible anyway, so spend very little time confronting, and way more time on restoration and affirmation.

Continue reading.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

 

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.

The report from the bipartisan advisory body divides violators into three categories. Fifteen “tier 1″ nations, marked red on the above map, have committed “particularly severe” violations that are “systemic, ongoing and egregious.” That includes all the countries you’d expect, as well as a few worsening problem areas, such as Egypt and Nigeria. The “tier 2″ countries are said to be “on the threshold” of meeting tier 1 status and include states that might have serious problems but, often, are at least making an effort to address them. A small third category of nations under “monitoring” for violations includes, among other states, some in Western Europe.

The report isn’t just about documenting abuses: The tier 1 countries can be officially designated as “countries of particular concern” by the U.S. State Department, at which point the president is legally required to follow up with some sort of action, recommended by the report. It might suggest, for example, engaging with Burmese civil society groups to promote tolerance or working with Pakistani lawmakers to improve legislation.

As the report itself notes, though, “in practice, the flexibility provided in IRFA has been underutilized. Generally, no new Presidential actions pursuant to CPC designations have been levied, with the State Department instead relying on pre-existing sanctions.” In other words, the red countries are usually already under some kind of trade restriction or sanction, which the president can use to say that he’s already meeting the commission’s requirements. In some cases, the president uses a waiver to avoid punishing countries that are important to U.S. foreign policy, such as Saudi Arabia and Uzbekistan.

Continue reading.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

 

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.

They’re switching from church to church, powered by a mix of dissatisfaction and yearning, according to the study by LifeWay Research. The organization is part of the publishing arm of the Southern Baptist Convention, the nation’s largest Protestant denomination.

But 42% of the people say they switched because another church offered more appealing doctrines and preaching or the preacher and church members’ faith seemed more “authentic.”

“We may believe in the same doctrine, the same God and study the same Bible, but we are also imperfect human beings who mess up, who are not always living out those beliefs,” says Scott McConnell, associate director of LifeWay Research. He adds in the rise of “consumerism and narcissism” — when people expect to customize every experience to personal taste.

More than half (54%) of switchers changed denominations as well. Fewer than half (44%) said denomination was an important factor in choosing a new church.

The study, conducted in December, surveyed 632 Protestant adults who said they switched churches. For findings on the 415 people who had not made a residential move, the margin of error is plus or minus 3.9 percentage points.

The study follows LifeWay’s 2006 research on 469 “formerly churched” Protestants who quit church altogether.

Continue reading.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

 

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.

2 Lord I Need You
By: Matt Maher Arr: Joel Mott

3 10000 Reasons (Bless The Lord)
By: Matt Redman Arr: Dan Galbraith / Brad Henderson

4 Great I Am
By: New Life Church Arr: Dan Galbraith / Brad Henderson

5 Cornerstone
By: Hillsong Live Arr: Joel Mott

6 Holy Spirit
By: Keith Getty / Kristyn Getty

7 One Thing Remains
By: Passion Arr: John Wasson / Grant Wall

8 Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)
By: Hillsong United Arr: Dan Galbraith

9 Crown Him (With Majesty)
By: Chris Tomlin Arr: Dan Galbraith

10 Jesus Only Jesus
By: Matt Redman, Passion Arr: Dan Galbraith

 
Sign up to receive the top 25 worship song list every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

We respect your email privacy

//

Do you think brass and woodwinds can effectively be used in a modern worship setting? I sometimes I feel there is a big disconnect in what the style should sound like because of the brass.

Because of the complexities of today’s contemporary worship the answer isn’t an easy “yes” or “no” but rather, “it depends.”

No, brass and woodwinds are not heard in modern worship, or modern pop music for that matter (strings are another story – a good pop string arrangement can fit almost any modern worship song.) I can remember ten years ago when the local Willow Creek clone was paying a full brass section every week (can you imagine managing the charts for that!) I was joking with a friend that he should expect brass in worship again since you hear it in Justin Timberlake’s current hit (if the brass trend picks up it’ll probably take a year to trickle down to the Church.)

If your church wants a pure pop sound true to the style of the original recording and you’re production driven, don’t use brass or woodwinds. A jazzy brass lick doesn’t really fit into a Hillsong United guitar driven worship tune, does it?

Some churches are more interested in seeing people of various instrumental talents participate than they are with the resulting sound. However, understand that the typical modern ear of the average person in your congregation will, unfortunately for orchestra players, be more tuned to electric guitars and drums.

There’s a church in town that has quite a nice, folksy praise set with fairly contemporary songs utilizing just piano, acoustic guitar, flute, cello, violin and a few other instruments here and there. I like most styles of music and enjoyed the service. I asked a friend of mine if he had ever considered attending this church. He, being that typical congregation demographic, replied “I liked the preaching but the worship just didn’t do it for me. They had flutes and stuff.” This surprised me – my friend was brought up conservatively and even he wanted to hear some guitar riffs.

If you’re in a ministry where you want to use orchestral instruments (or are required to) yet still want the feel of contemporary worship, here are a few ideas.

The arrangement must fit the style of the song. The brass and woodwinds shouldn’t dominate – otherwise you risk sounding like a high school band concert. Instead, allow your praise band to carry the arrangement and let the orchestral instruments provide color – a line here and there that can cut through the mix. Heavily orchestrated Camp Kirkland-type arrangements are more suited to a First Baptist-type church and muddy the mix in a praise band setting.

In my HymnCharts arrangements I often double the strings with other instruments to add more punch to a melodic line. A violin by itself might not even be heard over a praise band, but doubling it with a flute or clarinet gives the line added strength. Modern worship is linear – I don’t want a bunch of intricate instrumental parts complicating the band groove.

The instruments themselves must fit the style of the song. In medium to smaller churches you run into the problem of a mishmash of random instruments. Don’t attempt to include wildly different instruments like a tuba and flute into your praise set. If possible, use instruments that complement each other – flute/violin, trumpet/clarinet, etc., and let the other instruments take a break that week (frankly, I don’t think I could ever find a place for a tuba on a Chris Tomlin song!)

In the olden days orchestral instruments in church were a weekly feature. In our more contemporary, praise band-driven world orchestral players usually provide occasional sonic icing to the electrified sound.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

 

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.

My first experiences with church sound level complaints was pretty flippant. I thought, “Seriously? Have you nothing more important to think about?” However, the truth of the matter is, church volume is something that cannot be ignored. If you have people in your congregation that complain about the volume being too loud, their volume with continue to increase until something happens.

When someone complains about the volume being too high, what’s your first reaction?

• Do you think those at the battle of Jericho complained about the volume?
• Wow! Really? We’ll have to re-check our levels next weekend.
• I’m sorry, let me turn that down for you.

I recommend the second reaction. There’s no need to start a battle. We’ve got more important things to do in the church than bicker about the volume like an old married couple.

Continue reading.

Sign up to receive weekly WorshipIdeas every Tuesday morning in your email:

First Name:

Last Name:

Email:

We guarantee 100% privacy.
Your information will not be shared.