Worship Leading – You Are Not The Show, So Just Faithfully Sow

As worship leaders, our central aim should be to proclaim Christ and Him crucified when we gather each week.  Our goal should not be to make much of ourselves (our songwriting, singing, musicianship, preaching or any other kind of service).  We don’t gather to preach ourselves.  We are not mighty to save.  We are not the hope of any man.  We are not the Christ.  But we are called to point others to Him and His salvation, as we boldly proclaim the marvelous things He has done from generation to generation.

God’s Word is the seed we’ve been entrusted to sow each week into the hearts of all who gather in our churches.  We must be faithful to freely scatter the seeds of God’s Word in our worship gatherings.  It’s not for us to be concerned with the composition of the heart “soils” that have gathered to worship.  We are called to sow and trust God to produce an abundance of fruit for the glory of His name.  Just like the farmer in Jesus’ Parable of the Sower who freely scattered seed abroad, we sow in all types of soil (Luke 8).  As we faithfully proclaim God’s Word in our gatherings, we affirm our trust in His strength to produce a great harvest of righteousness.

God is calling us to make a countercultural commitment to His Word.  We shouldn’t water it down, even if we fear some people will not “get it.”  The people gathered to worship are not irrelevant, but neither are they sovereign.  God’s Word must determine the message of our gatherings instead of people’s responsiveness (or lack thereof).

God’s manner of ministering the gospel is through servants who are faithful to proclaim His Word. As shepherds of your congregations, you will lead best when you’re most like a servant.  Don’t try to be the show.  We are pointers, not the point!  Let this declaration of John the Baptizer be one of your chief confessions of faith: “I am not the Christ!”  

The message we proclaim is that Jesus Christ is Lord!  He has authority over our lives so we don’t proclaim ourselves but Christ crucified.  With every gathering of your church, aim to make light shine through your verbal proclamation of the Truth, because the god of this world has blinded the minds of unbelievers.  But as we’re faithful to proclaim God’s salvation in our gatherings (as we freely scatter the seeds of His Word), some people will behold the glorious Christ and believe.  His sheep, who hear His voice, will “cling to it, and patiently produce a huge harvest” (Luke 8:15).

This post was inspired by a sermon titled “Faithful to Proclaim” recently preached by Kevin DeYoung at WorshipGod 2013, a conference hosted by Sovereign Grace Ministries

Why And How Evangelicals Can Follow The Church Liturgical Calendar

Why would, say, a Southern Baptist church follow the Christian Year – especially a Baptist Church that has more 20-something members than members in any other age group?  Isn’t the liturgical calendar just for Catholics? Or isn’t it an out-of-date, awkward intrusion on our modern sensibilities?

Our young, Baptist church doesn’t think so, which is why we are always moving in the rhythms of this calendar, from Advent to Pentecost. More and more Christians are rediscovering this historic practice, and growing in the truth and knowledge of Christ. As author Lauren Winner has said:

“I want the Christian story to shape everything I do, even how I reckon time. I want it to be truer and more essential to me than school’s calendar, or Hallmark’s calendar, or the calendar set by the IRS. I want the rhythms of Advent, Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, Easter, Pentecost to be more basic to my life than the days on which my quarterly estimated taxes are due.”

 

We shouldn’t treat the church calendar as if it were commanded in Scripture, like baptism and communion are commanded. It is simply a practice of historic Christianity that continuously stirs reflection, anticipation and action in the hearts of God’s people for the whole, big story of the gospel.

How To Observe The Christian Year

Here are three resources to introduce you to the Christian Year. The first two will help you plan corporate worship services during each season of the year. The third will help you prepare your church members for moving in the rhythms of the Christian Year during the week:

• The Worship Sourcebook, by the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship (ed. John Witvliet)
• The Services of the Christian Year by Robert E. Webber
• Living The Christian Year: Time to Inhabit the Story of God by Bobby Gross (preface by Lauren Winner, from whence comes the quote by Winner in this blog post, above)

For a quick description of each season of the Christian Year, see this article I wrote for worship service planners and songwriters.

We encourage ministry leaders and all of our community group leaders to lead their people in the rhythms of the Christian Year as well. Many of our community groups have done things like Epiphany Feasts, Easter cookouts and group Advent calendars. Teach your people about the themes of each season. Then let them dream up ways to commemorate these seasons in their groups and families.

Answers To Common Objections

1. Seriously, isn’t this a Catholic thing?

By the 2^nd century, Easter was celebrated as a 50-day season. The full Christian Year was developed by the 4^th century. As our Worship & Arts Pastor Mike Cosper wrote in Rhythms Of Grace: How The Church’s Worship Tells The Story Of The Gospel,

“To many Protestants, the church calendar may seem like an arbitrary regulation, a testimony to authority and micromanagement from Rome, but for it’s authors, it was designed pastorally. The church calendar was designed to walk believers through the story of the gospel every year, from the incarnation to the ascension. If we allow historic prejudice to color our perspective too heavily, we lose sight of the brilliant, pastoral creativity that shaped some of the church’s inventions.”

Since the Reformation, many church leaders have found the Christian Year to be helpful for their congregations – Baptists, Methodists, Presbyterians and other denominations and movements.

And ironically, the “civil” calendar of 365.2425 days from January to December can be considered a “Catholic” calendar just as much as the Christian Year. This civil calendar, instituted by Pope Gregory XIII in 1582, is officially called the Gregorian Calendar.

2. Aren’t seasons like Advent and Lent too dark, requiring us to plan worship services that treat the cross and resurrection as if these events haven’t already happened, and Christ isn’t already victorious?

We would never live and worship as if Christ hasn’t come, or ask people to refrain from basking in this good, good news! Remember that Christians began worshiping together on Sunday because it is “the Lord’s day” – the day Christ rose from the grave. Every Sunday, regardless of the season, is a “little Easter.”

In fact, the Sundays between Ash Wednesday and Easter are not counted as part of the “40 days of Lent.” We do craft our services with a “Lenten focus” because corporate worship on Sundays should, in part, prepare people for worship Monday – Saturday. But our Sundays always include Communion, and always include celebrations of assurance that Christ has died for our sins and is risen from the grave, seated at the right hand of the Father.

 Photo above from Boston Public Library, used via Creative Commons license

New Article At Gospel Coalition Worship Blog

Friends,

Bobby has written a short new article for the worship blog at TheGospelCoalition.org, called Common Grace Is Great, But We Can Sing About Something Greater. This is a helpful article for pastors, worship leaders and songwriters. Here’s an excerpt:

“Common grace is a wonderful thing to sing about, and we have no shortage of worship songs that help us to do just that — praise God for the common grace He bestows upon all mankind. But Christian worship must go far beyond this, and must center on the special grace that God has shown to His Church.

What? Common grace and special grace? If you’re new to these terms, here are brief definitions:

Common grace: God’s common patience or forbearance with sinners … the non-saving, sustaining grace of God that benefits all humankind.

Worship songs celebrate common grace when their lyrics praise God for things like:

• Giving us the sun, the stars, the moon, the wind and rain.
• The beauty of mountains, oceans, fields and streams.
• Breath in our lungs.
• All forms of health that we enjoy, until the day of death.

These are good things to sing about …”

Read the rest here.

The Worship Leader’s Role – Lead Receivers And First Responders

Leading worship is a stewardship in which we’re privileged to participate and serve, caring for what belongs to God.  We are primarily receivers and responders, not worship creators, designers, innovators, architects, producers, engineers or visionaries. As children of God, our primary identity is receiver of His grace as the Author of our faith.  This leads us to respond in worship.  As a worship leader, you are a lead receiver and first responder.

Consider this: You can’t be a Christian if you can’t receive a gift.  To be a Christian is to receive God’s gift of grace to believe in the finished work of Jesus Christ on behalf of all sinners.  We are not Christians if we have not received this grace.  And we cannot mature and grow as Christians if we are not continually receiving all that we need from Christ, who is all and in all (Col. 3:11).

In the same way, our calling to receive from the Lord is the basis of our worship.  Worship begins with God who initiates and calls us to worship Him.  Jesus told the Samaritan woman at the well that God is seeking those who will worship Him in Spirit and in Truth because “the hour has come when true worshipers will worship in Spirit and Truth” (John 4).

Here, Jesus announces Himself as the Messiah, the new and perfect Temple of God by which we can now boldly enter God’s throne room and worship Him there.  The hour of Christ’s death and resurrection and intercession for us before God’s throne has come!  To worship in truth is to worship this Jesus, who is the Truth.  To worship in Spirit is to worship from our hearts, through the Spirit of Christ in us.  We can only come to God through Jesus.

Our worship of God results from something God does: He seeks us who are lost, saves us by the merits of His own unblemished blood, and calls us to worship Him for His glory and grace. True worship emerges from the Father’s pursuit of us, not from our pursuit of Him.  (Read that again and let it sink in.)  We are beneficiaries of His salvation and love. We do not manufacturer worship of God.  No, we worship in response to our adoption, our salvation by God and our imperishable inheritance with Christ!

As worshipers and worship leaders, we need to be far more aware of God’s pursuit of us than we are of what we think is an “appropriate” worship response.  When we focus on receiving from the Lord we will naturally respond by magnifying His grace.  This should be the aroma of our worship gatherings.

We shouldn’t be able to contain our astonishment of what Christ has done for us!

Giving great attention in our gatherings to what we have received from Christ will yield humble awe and joyful worship.  The truth that we have received (what we know about God), animates our worship and stirs our souls to sing.

God has called His people to be faithful.  He’s graciously given us His Spirit who inspires us to faithfully follow the way of Christ as we persevere in loving and serving our Lord and His Church here on earth.  No matter what particular area(s) of service God has called you to, you will not be able to effectively serve if you have not first learned to receive salvation and grace from the Lord.

Child of God, remember who you are.  Remember whose you are.  Remember who you have received and what He has done for you.  Remember to receive from the Lord and call your congregations to receive from the Lord.  Remember that worship does not originate with us but it is our God-inspired response to His glorious gift of grace!

This post was inspired by a sermon titled “Faithful to Receive” recently preached by Craig Cabaniss at WorshipGod 2013, a conference hosted by Sovereign Grace Ministries.  

How To Deal With Criticism As A Worship Leader

I’ve been serving the church as a worship leader since I joined my first worship team as a 12 year old keyboardist under the oversight of my parents, the worship pastors at the time.  I benefited from their direct leadership for the first 10 years of my service, and am thankful to have had the privilege of being shepherded by them at home and at church.  What they taught me in word and deed about serving the Lord with gladness and submission has helped me to grow as a believer and worship leader.

My parents taught me to care most about the honor of the Lord and to treasure His Word above all else.  They showed me how to be teachable and open to criticism and correction from those in authority over them, and from those they were serving in the congregation.  There was rarely a worship service they led that was not followed with some criticism, complaint, or suggestion from someone in the congregation.  I saw them wrestle with these things, as they sought the Lord to discern and do what was right.  They allowed the Lord to humble them as they submitted to His correction and direction. As a result, their ministry to the Lord and His church became fruitful.  They gained wisdom and respect as they grew up under the discipline of the Lord.

As a whippersnapper worship leader, I also needed lots of teaching, correcting, and admonishing.  I didn’t like it. I wanted to be mature and right already, without any correcting or changing.  I observed mature believers all around me (including my parents) and could easily mimic them.

What I really needed though (and on more than one occasion) was the loving rebuke of a righteous person.  I didn’t realize at the time that the constructive criticism I was receiving from my parents and other leaders was a kindness to me.

“Let a righteous man strike me—that is a kindness; let him rebuke me—it is soothing medicine. Don’t let me refuse it.” Psalm 141:5

I didn’t like to be wrong about anything, so I didn’t like to be criticized about anything.  I was overly sensitive to all criticism (in every realm of my life) and struggled to hear and receive rebukes as kind, constructive and helpful.

• I needed to learn that worshiping God was not all about me. 
• I needed to know that hearing myself in my monitor or playing a piano solo was not the most important thing. 
• I needed my instrumental and vocal techniques to be critiqued.  (I thought more highly of my skills than I should have!) 
• I needed my flaming pride to be exposed and extinguished through constructive criticism. 

God’s Word showed me that the wisdom and maturity and respect I wanted came after humbly accepting correction and listening to advice.  My stubborn refusal to accept criticism was only leading to my destruction, disgrace and poverty.

Worship leaders, we are wise to submit to the discipline of the Lord, to listen to His advice and accept His instruction.  He chastens those He loves.  God, in His great mercy and grace, searches His people’s hearts and points out anything that is offensive to Him.  He is faithful to correct and lead His children along the path of everlasting life.  He is able to save us from ourselves and keep our hearts aflame with passion for His honor and fame.

“Listen to advice and accept instruction, that you may gain wisdom in the future.” Proverbs 19:20

“Only a fool despises a parent’s discipline; whoever learns from correction is wise.” Proverbs 15:5

“If you ignore criticism, you will end in poverty and disgrace; if you accept correction, you will be honored.”  Proverbs 13:18

“Whoever stubbornly refuses to accept criticism will suddenly be destroyed beyond recovery.” Proverbs 29:1

“If you listen to constructive criticism, you will be at home among the wise. If you reject discipline, you only harm yourself; but if you listen to correction, you grow in understanding. Fear of the Lord teaches wisdom; humility precedes honor.” – Proverbs 15:31-33

• Top photo by Anonymous 9000, used via Creative Commons license

Worship Leaders Are Not Rock Stars – The Proof Is Here

Last weekend I read a new book in one sitting, because I couldn’t put it down. Fortunately it’s just 125 pages so I wasn’t lost in book-world all weekend long. The book is Worship Leaders, We Are Not Rock Stars by Stephen Miller, Worship Leader at The Journey Church in St. Louis.

Long-time readers at My Song In The Night may remember I interviewed Stephen Miller in 2012 after he’d released his record God & Sinner Reconcile. Since then he’s released two more albums, including a companion piece to Worship Leaders, We Are Not Rock Stars — a 13-song record called All Hail The King. And, if you buy Worship Leaders, We Are Not Rock Stars on Kindle, you can download All Hail The King for free! Here’s how:

When you buy the book, there is a link on the page directly after Darrin Patrick’s foreword. Type that link into your web browser. It will take you to a page that asks (at the bottom of the page), “Already Have the Book?”

Follow those instructions and you will get an email with your free copy.

Stephen wrote Worship Leaders, We Are Not Rock Stars to be an accessible, succinct look at what a worship leader is, and what a worship leader is not. The 9 chapters each focus on a different aspect of the worship leader’s calling — everything from “We Are Pastors & Deacons” to, simply, “We Are Christians.”

The “We Are Storytellers” chapter describes the worship leader as “liturgist.” It takes the mystery out of this technical/scary sounding word, and provides a good template for designing your Sunday liturgy, using Isaiah 6:1-8 as a model.

Songwriters will find plenty to chew on as well, such as this section from Chapter 5: “We Are Theologians”:

“If we are to worship God, we must know who he really is.

“My wife is a petite, green-eyed, blonde-haired, gorgeous woman. She is kind and compassionate, loves our children, and is an incredible mother and wife …

“But what if I were to come to her and say, ‘I wrote this song for you to tell you how much I love you’ — and then went on to sing about how much I love her brunette hair and brown eyes and how I can’t wait to marry her and have kids someday? She would be confused and would maybe wonder if I wrote the song about another woman.

“Or what if that song was actually all about me? A tribute to myself, how she makes me feel, and how I must be so great that she would love me? …

“We do this very thing to God when we blatantly or unintentionally disregard the prominent presence of God’s Word in the songs we sing and are flippant about the words that we sing to Him and about Him.”

I could quote lots of other parts from the book, but why not read it yourself? You can get it on Kindle here, or paperback here. This is a great primer for young or aspiring worship leaders, and a helpful teaching tool for your entire worship team.

One final note:

Moody Publishers is running a special for worship leaders who want to take their whole teams through the book:

45% off when purchasing 5 or more books.
*Discount applied at checkout.
Offer valid until 8/1/14

Be Mentored By Pioneer Christian Musicians In Your Home

A couple weeks ago Kristen and I became acquainted with Rebecca Friedlander, who has just completed the Pioneers: Mentoring Series 2-disc DVD that you see in the video preview above. The premise is intriguing: young, independent musicians, singer-songwriters and worship leaders ask questions of those who have gone before, like Phil Keaggy, Dennis Jernigan, Babbie Mason and Dallas Holm. The film does not disappoint — I watched all four hours (a two-disc set) over two days, and highly enjoyed it.

Topics include:

• Solo Artist issues
• Songwriting
• Worship
• Music Business
• Personal Life
• One Thing (“What’s the one thing you want every young artist to know?”)

The entire two-disc set lasts four hours, during which these veteran artists answer a lot of questions. From the “worship” section alone, the young, independent artists ask questions like:

“What do I do when people start applauding while I am leading worship?”

“What are your thoughts on the direction that CCM and modern worship music has taken?”

and many more. It’s an enlightening education from those who have spent decades writing, recording, touring and leading worship in local churches. If you’re a young artist or a parent or youth leader to young artists, you can learn more and purchase Pioneers: Mentoring Series here.

You can also buy a 90-minute version called Pioneers: Documentary that includes the Solo Artist and Songwriting categories.

Check out Rebecca Friedlander’s other products as well. She’s released several CDs, as well as a book and DVD. She has a big heart for serving the Church, as well as the Church’s artists.

Kristen And Bobby Gilles Featured On Christian Music Blog Podcast

The Christian Music Blog with Nate Fancher has quickly become one of my favorite blogs on the web. Besides the text-based blog, Nate also publishes a podcast episode each Friday. Today, Nate has published a podcast interview he conducted recently with Kristen and me. We were honored to get to know Nate and to converse with him about worship, songwriting, and life. We answer questions like:

• How we met
• Plans for Kristen’s upcoming full-length worship record
• Our thoughts on the state of contemporary worship music
• Co-writing and collaboration
• The songwriting and music culture at our church, Sojourn.

and more. You can stream or download here from the CMB website (and read the podcast notes), or subscribe to the Christian Music Blog podcast in iTunes.

How To Bear With Loss … And The Waiting

“I don’t like losing things!” I playfully shouted to Bobby on a recent evening after misplacing a new tube of Chapstick.  And then my heart came pouring out unexpectedly as I uttered,

“I don’t like losing babies and I don’t like losing my Chapstick!”

Tragic losses make little losses more difficult. I’ve felt the same way about plants withering and dying under my care.  “I can’t even keep this plant alive.  My son died in my care; it’s no wonder this plant did too.”  I’ve been tempted to believe this lie many times since our son Parker was stillborn In 2012.

Tragic loss changes the way you relate to everything.  There is nothing in my life that is not presently touched by the absence of my son.  I am reminded at least 100 times a day (it seems) that I am separated from my son, that my womb is empty, that something is missing in my life here. Conversely, every found object and every flourishing plant greatly encourages my heart.  In light of the tragic loss, these little victories are a much bigger deal than they normally would be.

But I’m tempted to credit myself for these wins, in the same way that I incorrectly attribute the losses to my inability to sustain life. When I forget God — that He holds everything together and has written all of our days in His book before a single day ever passes — and when I forget that He is the Author and Giver of Life, I’m tempted to think that I can and should hold everything together.

• I’m tempted to believe that I failed as a mother to give my son life. 
• I’m tempted to believe that I didn’t measure up as a mom and that’s why my son isn’t here and why my womb is still empty. 
• I’m tempted to fret and worry about the outcome of my life and the future of my family. 
• And I’m tempted to believe the lie that God is not for me and working everything together for my good.

But when I remember God — that He holds everything together, and that He authored Parker’s life and saw him before he was born, and that He carried him safely to live forever in heaven — then every reminder of Parker’s absence here becomes a signpost of the salvation God has accomplished and the redemption and renewal that He has promised.  Every resemblance of the loss reflects the reality of Heaven and the life that we have now and forever in Christ.

He has taken my son to live forever with Him there.  He has promised to return and take me home too. This is why and how we praise the Lord who keeps track of all of our sorrows, treasures our tears and makes us fruitful in this land of suffering.  God is with us.  God is for us.  God has promised to keep us ever in His care.  God has promised to return for us.  God has promised to make everything new.

So while we’re tempted to believe the lies of our enemy as we groan and wait in this dying world, we must remember our God, who cannot lie and who will not fail to prove all of His words true.  We must remember God, our help in ages past and our hope for years to come!

Losing someone you love is hard. Waiting to be reunited with them is harder. We have all lost something precious, and we all long and wait for restoration, redemption and rejoicing.  We can’t control what we’re given or what we lose.  We can’t control how long we wait for such gifts to be given, for wrongs to be righted, for Christ to return.  We are not the Author of life.  We are not sovereign.  But we are carried by the Sovereign God, the Author of life, the Giver of all good gifts.

We have been carried by Him from before we were born.  We will be carried by Him until the day He wipes away all of our tears.

I don’t like losing things.  But I’m thankful for what God allows us to gain through loss.  As I think about tragic loss, as I’m reminded of my son’s absence at every turn, I also think about gaining fellowship with Christ and experiencing the power of His resurrection.  When I think about losing my life, I will think about finding it in Christ.

I will think of Jesus who for the joy set before Him gave up His life and endured the cross, despising its shame, for me.  I will think of the Good Shepherd who seeks and finds lost sheep and promises not to lose any of those God has given to Him.  And as I ponder all of these things, I will praise the Lord who carries me and holds everything together by His Word.

“Listen to Me . . . I have cared for you since you were born.  Yes, I carried you before you were born.  I will be your God throughout your lifetime – until your hair is white with age.  I made you, and I will care for you.  I will carry you along and save you. . . . Do not forget this!  Keep it in mind! . . . Remember the things I have done in the past.  For I alone am God!  I am God and there is none like Me.  Only I can tell you the future before it even happens.  Everything I plan will come to pass, for I do whatever I wish.”  (Isaiah 46:3-4; 8-10)

How To Broaden Your Songwriting Range

How do you keep from composing music that sounds just like every other song you’ve composed, especially given all the strictures of congregational song?

First, if you always write in the same key, try writing in a different one. Try different tempos and rhythms, too. Most contemporary worship songs are in 4/4 time – try 3/4, 6/8, or 7/8. And broaden your range of listening experience by searching for music outside of your immediate preference. In an interview here at My Song In The Night, Stephen Altrogge of Sovereign Grace said,

“I listen to a lot of different music — Coldplay, the Beatles, Matt Redman, Mumford and Sons, the Police, Mutemath. I’d say that the main thing I’ve learned is that a good song is good no matter what the production and a bad song can’t be saved by good production. When I listen to the Police, they have a distinctly 80′s sound. But their songs are just incredible. So if you’re going to write songs, make sure that they’re good songs. Don’t count on the music or the production to save you.”

In another interview here, Bruce Benedict of Cardiphonia added,

“It truly is amazing how many different tunes have been written to the major hymn meters such as Common Meter (8.6.8.6) and variations on 8.7.8.7.  The two main things I do to keep things fresh is to write music to as many different kinds of meter as possible and to research and explore the various ‘countries’ of folk music that have fed into church music.  Each of these worlds has a different body of melodies that feed off of major or minor keys and various time signatures (3/4, 6/8, 4/4) which all produced very different sounding melodies.

“Like in most art, you tend to produce the richness of what you take in.  If you are serious about writing great congregational songs then you have to familiarize yourself with all of the various musical traditions that have produced great congregational music.”

Explore the world of hymnody, as well as popular music and the folk music of the past. Don’t get too crazy with obscure time signatures and difficult intervals or your song will not be singable, but feel free to experiment.