Visiting other churches, Part One
I make a habit of visiting other churches as often as I can, usually once or twice a month, just to gauge the worship experience I help to craft, against other worship experiences that are happening out there. I think that it is important for worship leaders as well as team members, to experience how worship is done in other churches. This is what helps to keep us, and the worship services we help to craft, fresh and engaging. This is what helps to keep us relevant to the congregations we serve, and to a world that desperately needs the grace and love that God through Christ has extended to us.
Having said all that, I have to tell you that my experiences, if they are the norm, are very discouraging. I have talked to a lot of other worship leaders, and so I’m reasonably certain that what I’m about to say is accurate, and that deeply saddens me.
Between 60% and 75% of the churches I have visited, (and this percentage holds true for the other worship leaders I have talked to) just don’t do worship well at all. They do it very poorly. There are many reasons why this is so, but the fact that it is so is very troubling.
I will be sinking my teeth into this topic in the coming days, because I have some ideas that will help to reverse this sad trend. More to follow…
1 Comment »
Leave a Reply
-
Recent
- What do you think?
- My First Fishing Trip
- Checking In, Part Two
- Checking In
- Visiting other churches, part two
- Doing the “Shuffle”, Part Three
- Doing the “shuffle”, Part Two
- Doing the “shuffle”, Part One
- I visited my old church (update)
- My “Elvis” Impersonation
- Visiting other churches, Part One
- Merry Christmas
-
Links
-
Archives
- May 2010 (1)
- November 2009 (2)
- May 2009 (1)
- February 2009 (3)
- January 2009 (3)
- December 2008 (5)
- November 2008 (8)
-
Categories
-
RSS
Entries RSS
Comments RSS
Smitty,
Thanks for adding your blog to the Community. Yours is the first I’ve visited other than Russ Hutto’s site.
I love your tag line, “Trust me… it’s supposed to sound like that!”
I’m going to borrow that line when the critics come to attack.
Along those lines, I find that I agree that visiting other churches to experience their music services is a good idea. My pastor encourages us to do the same thing. We will start this practice very soon, hopefully (we are a new church plant). But I hope that I can go to other churches with an open mind, understanding that I am not in the shoes of these other worship leaders. In many places, there are not a plethora of well-seasoned, super-skilled musicians and singers available to every church and every worship team. In these situations, I imagine that it’s possible that a worship leader is driven to compensate for lack of talent by pushing his/her team members beyond their skill set. This, in my opinion, can result in a music service that seems like a bad “performance”. On the other hand, I have witnessed worship services provided by novice musicians/singers that were the most Spirit-filled and meaningful experiences I’ve ever had. I think sometimes we, as worship leaders, are too hard on the music, and the technical aspects of the service.
At all times, worship is in the heart of the worshipper, not in the hands of the guitar player or sound man.