Worship Pastor as King: Organized playlist eases stress of planning a worship set

Have a playlist of the current songs that you do and go through them quarterly and determine which songs should be retired and consider introducing new songs. A great way to involve your congregation in this is to make this list available online as a playlist through the iTunes music store, for example.  This allows you a resource to turn them to in order to get more familiar with the music that you are, and will be doing.

            If you are convinced of the philosophy of song selection and categorization that I presented earlier as a reflection of the biblical model of how the Lord set up his Temple, you might put together a list like this to help you in planning services:

Ones (Horizontal)	O Praise Him- Crowder Adoration- Baloche Happy Day- Fee Hosanna (Praise is Rising)-Brown Holy- Hughes Here For You- Tomlin
Twos	Salvation Is Here –Hillsong One Way- Hillsong I Believe- Moeller/McCoy Lift up the Name-Caterer Beautiful One-Hughes
Threes (Diagonal)	Here is Love- arr. Stanfill You Alone Can Rescue- Redman O The Love of my Redeemer – Caterer Hallelujah for the Cross- Rozier Lord, I need You –Tomlin You Never Let Go- Redman
Fours	Always- Stanfill The Stand- Hillsong Our God-Tomlin Stronger-Stanfill Arms Open Wide-Hillsong Mighty to Save-Hillsong
Fives (Vertical)	Revelation Song-Riddle All Glory-Rozier God, You Are My God- Ingram, Noland, Mabury Jesus, You Are Worthy- Brown Your Name- Baloche The First Place- Westerholm Lord of All- Stanfill
Communion Songs	Jesus Paid It All There Is A Fountain How Deep the Father’s Love- Townsend Nothing but the Blood Amazing Love Here is Love How Marvelous
Christmas Songs	Joy to the World (1) O Come all ye faithful (1) Etc. etc.
Traditional Hymns	Holy Holy Holy (5) All Hail the Power (1) Come Christians Join to Sing (1) Amazing Grace (3) Great is thy Faithfulness (3)

           

            Song frequency and introducing new songs

Regarding song selection and particularly song frequency of use, a general rule of thumb is, “when you (the leader) are sick of the song, the congregation is just getting used to it.”  It will be difficult to cultivate a culture of worship that is tracking along and engaging in the worship set if the songs and elements that you do are new every single week.  When introducing a new song to the mix, do it first as a special element, placed in the offertory section or pre-service, and then if it fits well, you can then “teach” that song as a response to the message.  Then do the song in its categorized spot in the service for two weeks in a row. It can then be considered in regular rotational status. This conditions the congregation to be familiar with the song or element. It is also has been my experience that, in today’s congregations, even some of the old hymns my have to be reintroduced or taught.

It has worked best in my situation and experience to have a rotation of regular songs at a frequency of around five weeks. The same songs are not being done over and over, and yet the familiarity of the music is still being cultivated. This does not mean that you have five different pre-planned, cookie-cutter, worship song sets that you rotate, it simply means that you try to space out your songs in a way that the frequency is comfortable to your congregation’s ability to learn and be familiar with the music without overuse. This is not only true of worship songs, but of worship elements as well. Start thinking of how you can change the frequency of elements and song usage to better and more efficiently cultivate that culture of worship in your church.

Worship Pastor as King: Spirit leading in organization and structure

Organization has always been the hardest aspect of the worship pastor.  We are creative individuals who don’t like to be cooped up with the busy work in an office. To be overly organized in the realm of the worship pastor is sometimes viewed as “quenching the Spirit.” You don’t want to have everything so planned out that you aren’t flexible to if the Holy Spirit leads you in a reflective time of praise. There are other circumstances, such as multi-campus, video venue, churches that are confined to time constraints due to live streaming the pastor’s message.  In this case you can’t organize and plan enough and make sure that times and cues are hit perfectly. Is this “quenching the Spirit?”

            A common misconception is that it is impossible to plan and be spirit led at the same time. I have known worship leaders who purposefully do not plan a worship set until late Saturday night before, making sure that the Spirit is giving them the right music that will best praise the Lord. In the meantime, he loses volunteers on the worship team because they are overwhelmed with the stress of going into a Sunday morning oblivious to what the music is.  The misconception here is that the only way that the Holy Spirit leads is spontaneously or “in the moment.” That simply is not true.  Yes, it can be true, but is not actually a biblical standard.  Bob Kauflin helps flesh this out:

The bigger your church, the more critical consistent planning and rehearsal become.  But even when you’re small, it’s wise to develop the practice of planning.  It’s not un-spiritual to determine ahead of time when things will take place, where transitions should be explained, how many songs to sing, what creative elements to include, or how the meeting will ended. We’ve found that the Holy Spirit’s most important guidance often comes before the meeting even begins.[1]

            Thus leading in a “kingly” role is described best as being organized, well planned for and prepared. It is amazing how easy this can be when it comes to developing simple yet effective processes and procedures regarding planning and the facilitation of the worship experience.  We’ve spent a great amount of detail discussing biblical philosophy behind the planning of an effectual worship service, so now let’s take that truth and develop very tangible and organized charts and lists to help with the process. 

Communication Foundation: God talks to us, We talk to God, We talk to others about God

Functions: Prayer, Testimony, Meditation, Scripture, Prophecy/Preaching, Confession

Possible FORM	FUNCTION ACCOMPLISHED
Worship Songs	Prayer, Testimony, Scripture, Meditation, Prophecy, Confession
Communion	Testimony, Meditation, Confession
Baptism	Testimony
Open Mic Scripture reading	Scripture
Responsive reading	Scripture, Meditation
God @ Work video	Testimony, Confession
Calling out attributes of God	Testimony, Meditation, Prayer

            This list obviously could go on and on, and I would encourage you as a worship pastor to be developing your own list and be prepared to give the reasons why you want those elements to be done in your services knowing what function they have in a worship service.  Lead your congregation and cultivate a culture of worship in your people by making this list and the reasons available to the body.  The more your people know about the theology of the greatness of God and how we can biblically respond, the more they will grow that corporate heart of praise and culture of worship.

---

[1] Bob Kauflin, Worship Matters: Leading Others to Encounter the Greatness of God. (Wheaton, IL: Crossway 2008).  182.

Worship Pastor as Priest: Discipleship = Heart over Ability

The worship pastor has the great challenge of leading a group of sometimes good, but more regularly mediocre musicians to come together in unpaid unity as a band to lead a congregation of music critics. That sounds like a gross generalization, but if you are a worship pastor or worship leader, you do know what vain of thought I’m going down. It is hard to take unpaid and a hodgepodge of mediocre and great skill level volunteers who happen to play an instrument and try to form a worship band that meet up to the unwritten standards of the people in that congregation! This can be an area of stress for the worship pastor and I want to present to you an alternative to a life of worry with this regard simply with a priority shift. The shift is not the priority of making an amazing band, but the priority of discipleship of the people that God has entrusted to you.

In the context of a worship ministry, the people who God has entrusted to you ought to be growing in the area of their personal worship so that when they are on stage playing an instrument or singing backup, they are indeed leading out of an outpouring of a heart that is consistently worshiping throughout their week. A priority is to intentionally shepherd the heart of your team with this worship-as-lifestyle concept.

This can be done a number of ways. Encourage them as a worshiper, not as a performer: To surround themselves with reminders of Christ, whom they serve; To feed on God’s word daily; To communicate with God by listening to the convictions and the nudges of the Holy Spirit; To hide away God’s word in their heart, memorizing, meditating and applying it in their everyday lives. They ought to seek to recognize Christ in every context of their lives, looking for inconsistencies of actions and represent Christ to the world. Thus worship is a life pursuing Christ as Lord over every aspect of their lives. We can, and most certainly will stumble, but we need to frequently confess and repent of sin so as to be cleansed by God (1John 1:9). This leads into another important aspect of shepherding your team in discipleship: Christian community.

Community is integral to being a disciple of Christ. They ought to be in Christian community to confess and repent of sin. This can be as simple as an accountability relationship, or as involved as a designated small group. I’d argue that both are to be pursued. Accountability and community is vitally important in making disciples, not performers. Following Christ in a fallen world is hard, and being “coached” and encouraged on many fronts outside of one’s spiritual disciplines just strengthens the disciple to be more and more like Jesus. As a worship pastor, this is your responsibility to your worship teams and volunteers: disciple them to be better followers of Christ by showing them the transparent reflection of Christ in your life.

Therefore the purpose of our disciple-making is to make disciples who then are drawn to and geared for making disciples themselves. By the grace of God, you will be shepherding people who are standing on stage leading worship out of the outpouring of their hearts geared to the worship of Jesus Christ.

As a pastor, your eyes should be in tune with seeing fruit of the Spirit evident in their lives. To shepherd effectively, you need to know your flock. This begins with an application process. A very pointed and strategically questioned application can quickly reveal useful information in knowing the strengths and weakness of your team. It can also help to prevent a wolf in sheep’s clothing to come in and cause division and devour your flock. This is where the worship pastor needs to have Spirit guided resolve. Just because an individual can play the electric guitar does not mean he should be given platform to play. There will be times when through the application process it becomes evident that the person’s unstated reason for wanting to be on the worship team is to show that he is an amazing musician and that people would see him play. RED FLAG! If you are not careful to identify and deal with the red flags, you could inadvertently feed someone’s sinful pride as opposed to growing them in humble service to our Lord.

Being a worship pastor who leads in a priestly manner means that you care more for the heart of your team members than their ability to sing or play an instrument. You have a longing for them to display more fruit of the spirit than musical perfection. You need to have a passion for their spiritual growth more than their growth in any worldly context. Provide them with resources to grow in their relationship with Christ and make it a passion of yours in understanding God’s word enough to encourage and challenge your team with it regularly. Do you show appreciation to your team? Do you compliment them on their good work. Do you provide ways for them to improve in their craft without making it seem like that is your only concern? Do you encourage your team to be in a small group? Do you do the hard thing sometimes and confront a team member with a sin that is evident in their life? Do you then provide the resource and the accountability to walk them through to see victory over this sin through the application of the gospel and the power of the Holy Spirit? It is a fear of mine that there are worship pastors who love the music more than they love the people. This unfortunately will be something that the devil will try to tempt the worship pastor with consistently throughout their career. To lead a worship ministry in a priestly way, you must lead by example. You must display a passion and hunger for God’s word and display a humility that will be contagious and be transparent with them about confessing sin. Spend time together as a team praying and seeking the Lord, confessing the idols of perfectionism and performance. To cultivate a culture of worship in your church, it MUST start with the effective and priest-lead discipleship of your team.

Worship Pastor as Prophet: 5 Element Worship Set

Let’s talk about that 5 element worship set. I use the term “element” here because the worship set is not limited to songs. Elements are forms and can include but are not limited to Scripture readings, testimonies, confessional element, personal or corporate prayer, etc. This 5 element set is intended to bring the heart of worship from horizontal to vertical. The first element will be horizontal, the third element is diagonal and the fifth element culminates the journey with vertical. The heart is now eager and excited to hear God speak in a sermon from His word. The second and fourth elements are simply those “in-between” elements that we discussed earlier that help smooth the flow from horizontal to vertical. A second element may be a gathering song that has fairly testimonial in portions of it. A fourth element may be a song that is testimonial in the verse but extremely ascriptive and vertical in the choruses. These elements are not always musical. The second element could be a time where people greet each other and share why they want to worship the Lord this morning. A fourth element could be a time of confession where after the testimonial element the people are led through a confessional exercise that is responsive to a reminder of the sacrifice of Christ and bringing our sins to the foot of the cross. This could be in the form of actually writing sins down and having the people bring them to the foot of a cross in the room. The elements are creatively endless, and with ever-evolving technology, there will be new elements of which we currently aren’t even aware. For example, I have even seen text messaging being used powerfully in a worship set.

There are elements that emphasize different functions of worship that can be used quite powerfully. Open mic scripture reading is an effective way that we have seen in terms of the diagonal or testimonial portion of the worship set. Open mic scripture reading is an element that is carefully and strategically set up by the worship leader calling the congregation to find and share short passages of scripture that the Lord has used to impact their lives that particular week. This can be themed and act as a powerful time of worship by reading God’s word, book-ended and spliced in with verses of a particular hymn or other song that fits with the theme.

Regardless of the element, the journey should go from horizontal to vertical, from the hillside of the temple to the holy of holies. When this is done, you will notice a drastic change in the culture of worship at your church. The heart is conditioned by the Word of God through the Holy Spirit to leave the baggage and stresses of life at the door and focus on recognizing and responding to the greatness and overwhelming presence of God. As a worship pastor, train your volunteers on your team to understand the philosophy behind the songs you choose and the order in which you sing them. Come up with some elements that fit in those categories and try them out in your worship services. Take notes on how you could lead these elements better or how the people might better respond to them. Please keep in mind that the numbers are arbitrary. This method works with 3 elements instead of 5. It can be changed to an entirely different order of service but still follow the goal of the heart of worship
getting to a vertical direction focused entirely on the glory that is only God’s. Being a worship pastor is founded on a prophetic basis where you ought to be able to rightfully handle the word of truth and protect your congregation from false teaching. There is plenty of false teaching you need to be protecting them from in the music industry, even the Christian music industry. Study God’s word and see for yourself the mandate we have in responding in worship to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ! Do not take lightly theology and doctrine. Make it a priority in your responsibilities as a worship pastor so that you can better lead people in doxology because of your own heart’s overflowing of theology and the greatness of God!

Worship Pastor as Prophet: Strategic and Biblical Service Order

While on staff at Harvest Bible Chapel in Illinois, the leadership of a few men helped shape my philosophy of worship in amazing ways.  Dr. James MacDonald, Andi Rozier, Matthew Westerholm, and Rory Noland have been instrumental in the development of this particular philosophy of ordering a worship experience that I’m about to flesh out in writing.  To my knowledge, nothing has been formally published on this philosophy, so I want to be sure to give credit to the above men for their amazing influence in my life and training me in this biblically based philosophy of a strategically purposed worship experience.

How many times have you gone to a church service and before you knew it you were done with the music portion of the service and didn’t realize it? Your soul was not stirred, your heart was still not in a right place, and you felt a bit confused for some unknown reason. Before I dive into a solution to this problem, I must say that no method of rhyme or reason can consecrate the heart; only God’s word and the Holy Spirit can do that.  This particular philosophy is focused on opening the door as wide as possible for the Holy Spirit to move in the hearts of EVERYONE in the context of a corporate worship service.

The goal in this strategic ordering of music and other worship elements is to condition the heart to be consecrated and overwhelmed with the greatness of God by utilizing the Holy Spirit’s working with the word of God (Isaiah 55:11).  This means the Word of God through song, readings, prayer, and other elements. If it is not a direct quotation of God’s word, it is a well prepared and thought out paraphrase of God’s truth. EVERYTHING in a worship service must correlate to the truth portrayed in God’s word.

With that said, full consecration and humility in the heart is not something that is easy to “jump” right into. We are so prone to the prideful “closing” of our hearts that at the beginning of a worship service you may not be able to genuinely sing “Hallelujah” as an outpouring of your heart. You are distracted with life pressures or sin that has clouded your vision to what is most important. This is why you don’t want to start a worship service with a vertical worship song.  Chances are you would be excluding the majority of your congregation in your “leading” them in responding to the presence of God, because they are hindered and needing to repent of un-confessed sin in their lives.  A culture of worship formed and cultivated in your church brings your congregation READY to jump right into the vertical songs because it rightfully has been the outcry of their heart all week, living repentant lives. That is worth stating plainly:  We are to be leading and cultivating a culture of worship that results in a congregation that walks into the sanctuary already with an overflowing heart of praise to our awesome God.  But the sad truth is, this isn’t the case. We do our best to lead people in conditioning  hearts to realize greater the presence of God and to respond in Spirit and in Truth (John 4:24). Following those categories mentioned above in order, from horizontal to vertical,  lead right into the sermon.  The goal is to have hearts so in tune and overwhelmed by God’s presence that they are ready and eager to hear him speak.

When you unpack this biblically, we seek to form our worship services in a similar way that the Lord commanded his Temple to be set up. A generic setup of the Temple shows the temple mount starting with the hillside leading to the courts (outer and inner), and then leading to the holy places (holy, and most holy). Think back to the categories of worship songs into the context of how the Temple was setup.  When you view the conditioning of a heart of worship for the believer, think of the journey from the hillside going to the holy of holies. I discussed much earlier how the holy of holies was the place where the presence of God was manifest in the Old Testament and in the New Testament, upon the death of Christ as the atonement for sin, the curtain was torn making the presence of God not a place, but a reality in the life of the now reconciled believer.[1]

In this model the worship leader is standing on the hillside calling out saying “Hey everyone! Come and worship with me!” (Horizontal). As people gather with him, they move into the courts and start telling each other what the Lord has done in their lives and rejoice together in the work of the Lord through Jesus Christ (Diagonal). After the declaration of the reconciliation they have in Christ and what the Lord has done for them in Salvation they are lead into the holy place and holy of holies where they are floored with the greatness of God and respond with shouts of “hallelujah!” and declaring the majesty of God! (Vertical). When heart of the worshiper has entered the holy of holies, what is happening then is between he and the Lord. The others in the room have faded into the background of his concern and he is focused fully on ascribing glory to the Lord in thankfulness for who he is and the salvation that has been given by him. What happens next is awesome! He speaks to us through his word, and we respond again with praise.

With this in mind, the order that has worked best for our church, and correlates nicely with the Temple setup model, is to start with a 5 element worship set that leads to the sermon where God’s Word is preached without apology and authoritatively, and then ending with a 1 or 2 element worship response.

---

[1] Hebrews 9 gives an amazing description of the work of Christ in being the once and for all high priest opening up the holy of holies. 

Worship Pastor as Prophet: Worship Songs: Choose and order biblically!

Another form that needs to be addressed in this discussion is in the area of worship music. Every worship pastor has probably been put under the stereotype of a “worship musician” who is hip on the latest Hillsong or Passion album, writing his own music, or digging in some of the best indie Christian music out there.  Regardless of stereotypes, I want to spend some time on song selection and ordering elements. As a reminder, song choice and service order is a FORM and not a function of worship, but to strive for excellence and a biblical standard we ought to talk about this. It is an important subject because it is sad how many churches go week by week with worship element packages that have no biblical rhyme or reason to them.

We need to start with choosing the right worship songs. There are generally (and I mean generally) three types of worship songs and then there are what I like to call “christianese” songs. “Christianese” songs don’t have any place in a worship service and are typically very man focused. These songs are heard mainly on mainstream Christian radio, and though they may be very encouraging with puffy statements of how God is our buddy, they are lyrically shallow and sometimes counterintuitive to our standing with the Lord.

It goes without saying that the style of the music or the catchy nature of the tune has nothing to do with the message of the song. It would do the worship pastor good to choose songs based on the lyrics and message before being savored by the music it was put to. In terms of the message of the song, there are three categories of God-glorifying worship music that ought to be used in a worship service:  Horizontal, Diagonal, and Vertical worship songs.

I use these directionally descriptive words as categories because of the direction that one’s heart, soul, and mind are pointed if singing the words genuinely. The first category is Horizontal songs, which can also be referred to as gathering songs.  These songs are horizontal by nature because the message that is being sung in general form is: “Hey lets gather together to worship our Lord! He has saved us, let us now come together to lift up our voices to praise!”  These songs will typically be in the third person tense and focus heavily on the body of Christ coming together corporately and declaring the intent and motivation to praise God.  You have songs that declare heavy amounts of truth of God’s work of Salvation and a plea to come and worship together because of this.  Insofar as form is concerned, the style of these songs are typically more upbeat and energy driven. The purpose of these songs is to energize and get the church body excited to praise God in song.  In these songs you are very aware that others are with you in the room and you are united together and pursuing now a greater purpose and intention to praise. A great example of a song that would fit this horizontal description is David Crowder’s “O Praise Him.”  In general when you think of a horizontal worship song, think of a song where you are singing to the person next to you, “Hey, let’s praise the name of Jesus together right now! Sing with me! Let us ascend the hill of the Lord! (Psalm 24:3, Psalm 95:6) ”

The next category is the diagonal worship song. These songs can also be referred to as testimonial songs.  These songs speak on the work of God in the life of the believer and how the believer relies solely on God and the sacrifice of Christ on the cross for our sin.  Testimonial songs still are very corporate expressions because we are declaring to one another how God sustains them in trial, forgives them of sin, and how he sacrificed his son for them. These songs recount our sinful nature and the grace of God.  These songs also state the attributes of God that pertain to the life of the believer such as God is faithful to me, God never let’s go, or Christ has healed me.  Most hymns fall into this category by nature, because most of the lyrically strong hymns have a personal nature to them about the work of God in the believer’s life. A good example of a song that is in the diagonal and testimonial category is the old hymn put to modern music “Here is Love” or even a modern worship song like “You Alone Can Rescue” by Matt Redman. Also the song “Enough” by Chris Tomlin fits in this category, and of course the song “Amazing Grace” by John Newton fits here as well.  When you think of a horizontal and testimonial song, think, “Hey, let me tell you what the Lord has done for me! (Psalm 9:1, Psalm 77:11-15)”

The final category of worship songs are the vertical worship songs.  These songs can also be called ascriptive songs that lyrically ascribe worth, glory, and honor to the Lord. Such songs may rely on the Revelation passages that declare glory, honor, strength and power to the Lord.  The focus of these songs is no longer what the Lord has done for the believer but responding to the greatness of God with words of praise. The singing of this song is now with the throne of God in view and our voices are unified directly TO God in giving him what he is most worthy of: glory.  The person who sings this song genuinely is no longer caring of the people around them, they are fully engaged in declaring praise to a one man audience: Jesus Christ.  Lyrically these songs may be more simple and repetitious in order to promote emphasis of the praise: “Holy, Holy, HOLY is the Lord God Almighty who was and is and is to come! (Revelation 4:8).” “Worthy are you, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they existed and were created (Revelation 4:11).” “Great and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God the Almighty! Just and true are your ways, O King of the nations! Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you, for your righteous acts have been revealed (Revelation 15:3-4).” And I’ll leave you to read Revelation 19 on your own to have a personal time of worship.  The point is that the vertical songs are just that: songs of praise and thanksgiving that we are singing directly and vertically to God.  The praise shall leave our lips and not be directed to anyone else except the Trinitarian God of the bible.  He alone is worthy of praise and vertical songs truly are the most appropriate songs that declare and respond to this truth.  Musically these songs are more like anthems and may have more legato and beautiful sounding melodies. They are the songs that you will most likely have stuck in your head for the rest of your Sunday after the service is over. A couple songs that fit in this description would be  “Revelation Song” by Jennie Riddle, “All Glory” by Andi Rozier, and “Agnus Dei” by Michael W. Smith. When you think of vertical songs think this, “How Great are you God, worthy of my praise and thanksgiving!”

I know what you are thinking, “Aren’t there some songs that don’t fit neatly in one of the categories?” Yes! The beauty of art is the fact that you can’t always fit good art in the confines of a categorical box. Some songs are very horizontal but then jump to diagonal in the choruses or perhaps even jump to vertical at the bridge.  The important thing is not trying to categorize songs perfectly but to make sure what you are doing fit because the categories as a form fit perfectly in the context of many of the functions of worship. Songs can be meditative, testimonies, prayers directly to God, presentations of scripture, and even confession of sin.  If the song does not lyrically fit in these categories or the message is not accomplishing a function of worship, please spare your congregation the confusion and don’t use it in a worship set. It may be a great song, but probably is not appropriate to adequately lead people to a genuine and truthful response to the overwhelming greatness and presence of God. Song selection is vitally important in terms of cultivating a culture of worship in your church as a worship pastor.  If you put no thought into it but base it on musicality, you’ve just identified and idol in your life that needs to be put to death.

So with adequate songs in play, how do you put together a worship song set that is most effectual? When dealing with order of service, you have many traditions that come into play, as well as personal preference. The phrase was already mentioned, “Theology leads to doxology.” Some people have taken this phrase in a more drastic way and demand that the worship response by song is to be done after the sermon where theology was preached in a way that motivates a response. I really have experienced powerful worship services where this was indeed the case, and I have ordered some of my church services to reflect this model. However, to say that theology only comes by means of the sermon is simply false. With adequate and careful selection of appropriate worship songs, theology is declared in song and it is responded to. It is with this vein of thought that I want to present to you a philosophy of planning a worship set using the above categories of songs but now including other elements that may or may not be musical to fill the slot of one of those categories.  I want to give a disclaimer that this is by no means the only biblical model to structure a worship service, however has proved to be one that works very well. 

Worship Pastor as Prophet: Testimony: Utilizing Media as the Form

Some of the most powerful worship experiences in my life have had some form of personal testimony given by another believer of how God has been working in their life or how he saved them from destruction or despair.  As a practical application to our discussion about forms that accomplish the functions of worship, I want to spend some time on a particular form initiative that I’ve adapted from my church and have developed for the sake of showing how each form should be well thought out in how it accomplishes it’s function. It is also important in these discussions with your team on different forms to wrestle over how and what it takes to make sure that you can accomplish this form in excellence and genuineness. It may cost the church’s worship ministry budget a substantial amount to assure the best equipment or training needed to accomplish it well. Whatever the case, does the form accomplish a function of worship on the foundations of communication to, from, and about God? If the answer to that question is no, then humbly put that form to death and move on.  Here is an example of a well thought out form initiative, focused on the function of testimony that I have begun to implement at my church after approval by the Elders.

In development at Harvest Bible Chapel Spring Lake is a ministry entitled “God @ Work.” Under the leadership of the Worship Pastor, and the production ministry, the premise is this: God is clearly at work in our church body-- let’s find out where and how, and capture it in media, sharing the stories during our worship times to distinctly draw attention to the greatness and mercy of our God! 

Let me quickly describe some background and some clarification.  The “God @ Work” concept is not new. Testimonies have been powerful ways that we worship God and ascribe praise to Jesus’ name. The testimony venue, however, in terms of realm, style, and form is accelerating in exciting ways.  Spoken or written word has been the norm for testimonies in the past.  Now with the availability and simplicity of computer programming and technology, we are able to add intensity and emotive influence to the story.  What was spoken word can now be transformed into video. What is merely a video testimony can be transformed into an artistic depiction of the work of God in a person’s life or situation, utilizing still photography, artistic “b-roll” footage, and different settings in the midst of the story being told similar to that of a documentary.

The value of the “God @ Work” initiative as a worship service element is that people are drawn into a greater realization that God is real, he is working, and he is good, leading to a response that is worshipful. If you were to think back on some of the most powerful ways that you’ve felt the presence of the Lord in your life, or perhaps powerful worship experiences that you have had, more often than not, a testimony of how God has saved someone through Jesus Christ or how He has sustained them through a trial comes to mind. Why is that? It is because people are experiential and social beings. When it is very evident that God is working powerfully in the life of someone very close to you, it sparks an emotive response in your heart that is worship, “PRAISE GOD that He is sustaining you or has delivered you out of a life of sin and into belief in Jesus as your Savior!”

Another value is in the area of community. Surface level Christian community is sometimes more harmful than good. A quick way to make a surface level friendship into an intimate God glorifying relationship is in the sharing of your testimony.  Maybe it is the testimony of how you first believed that you needed and received a savior in Jesus? Or maybe it is a testimony of how God is sustaining you through a serious health issue and you are being strengthened in your trust of an almighty and sovereign God.  Testimonies quickly grip the hearts of the hearer because of our social nature, and the combination with modern technology, similarly to the addition of music to a lyric, heightens the emotive response of that hearer in a worship setting.

Another value is in the modern ease of duplication. The written testimony can be duplicated, yes, but the filmed testimony captures the tone and emotion of the one in which God is working so powerfully. This is a value that I wish was available in the time of Christ. Can you imagine if you had a video testimony of the man who was blind at birth and was given, not healed, but given sight by Jesus Christ (John 9)!? Or perhaps we had a recording of Lazerus reflecting on how he had died and was decaying when Christ raised him from the dead (John 11)? Or better yet, hearing Mary and Martha’s point of view about that amazing work of God?

Please hear me that the written testimony that we have in the Gospels (God’s word) is not in any way demoted in terms of not having the technology available at that time. I’m simply stating that modern technology and media allows us the amazing ability to distinctly capture and distribute how God is truly working even in the fallen world that we currently live! Whether this is in the form of a video in the middle of a worship song, or on a webpage or blog; the good news of Jesus Christ, as told through the voice of the sinner saved by grace is what is able to be distributed in powerful ways in our current times. Moreover, we are called to do this in the great commission.

In order to make this possible, we need the support of our church body. Simply supporting the idea of “God @ Work” media is easy, but challenging our church body to open up and consider sharing their story of their redemption in Jesus Christ is not. As humans, sin is very embarrassing and often times hard to want to talk about. As believers, the closer we are with the reality of sin correlates with our repentance and thankfulness of our Savior.  When we can humble ourselves and open up to share our story, we encourage those who can relate to that story and then more fully trust in the Lord in their situation.  In order to gain this support, it takes one person at a time to participate in a video being produced on their story.  The more people see the testimonies of others in their recognizable church body, the more they are going to be willing to say, “hey, I have a story of how God is working in my life that I think may be able to bless someone in this family and give God all the glory.”

Not only the support of the church body, but of the elders as well as the senior pastor, who, from the pulpit, can encourage the congregation to see God at work in others lives as well as their own. The elders’ support may look as simple as being one of the first people to participate in sharing their testimony. A secondary benefit to that is a deeper understanding and trust of the congregation to an elder that is leading their church.

An initiative like this can get expensive. However, because of the availability of high quality equipment at reasonable cost, the quality of the media produced determines the cost.  I would start this initiative at a reasonably high level quality. The highest-level quality would require Hollywood grade equipment, which is not a wise investment for a church of 200.  The level we want to utilize would require a designated high-speed computer that will solely be used for video and media production. This computer would house a high quality video editing program.  It would also require an HD camera.  I want to get a full HD camera that is also a DSLR still photography camera that will be versatile in other ministry use and even Sunday morning live-feed webcam use.  Another capacity that is needed is artistic and creative people in our church body to help with the creation and production of a testimony video: story boards, what parts of the testimony are most valuable, editing and cutting edge/current graphic expertise.  

At the dollar level, we are looking at under $10,000 in equipment to achieve what would be considered a high-level quality production.  But it is surprising how starting off, this initiative can be accomplished with almost no extra cost utilizing something like a simple digital camera’s video function and the free video editing software on most computers. Seeing how this form has already impacted the worship atmosphere and culture of worship in our church, I’m seeking to put more energy and assets into it to make it better, giving the highest glory that we can to God in our excellence.

This initiative works best when the testimony is indeed true and biblical. If the testimony is man-focused on how someone kicked an addiction temporarily through a program like AA, the Lord is not glorified. When David, in Psalm 71:15 declares that even though his accusers try to shame him, “My mouth will tell of your righteous acts, of your deeds of salvation all the day, for their number is past my knowledge.” True and biblical testimony is man’s recognition of the work of God in his life that corresponds with scripture and is declared verbally.

I like these four designations of a good testimony:

            •            Biblical testimony centers on Scripture.

            •            Biblical testimony focuses on Christ.

            •            Biblical testimony results from God’s work in your life.

            •            Biblical testimony always requires response.^[1]

---

^[1] Kenneth O. Gangel, vol. 5, Acts, Holman New Testament Commentary; Holman Reference (Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1998), 438.

Worship Pastor as Prophet: Form Vs. Function

The worship wars are started because of insubordination of the “forms” of worship in a service. Music is a form; it is not a function of a service seeking to experience God in communication with him and about him. Music can fall under the category of a number of the functions, but it itself is NOT a function of worship. When the “form” of music becomes, in the mind of the congregant, a “function” of worship, you will inevitably be fighting over the correct way. The function designations are such because of the simplicity of each function and the open-ended nature of which the Lord ordained them. Although the functions are general, they are direct scriptural ways in which communication happens from God (scripture, prophecy/preaching), to God (prayer, meditation, confession), and about God (testimony, confession). It will do the worship pastor well to look at every element down to the minutest of details and see if it indeed aligns to a function which has its foundation in at least one of the three directions of communication. There are MANY forms out there that are being done that don’t, but are being done because of a fleshly human satisfaction in them. Those forms may or may not be inherently wrong, but without a function that accomplishes a direction of communication, they will inevitably prove to be futile in the context of a true worship service.


With an understanding of function being superior to form, you can see why arguments about contemporary versus traditional style of music just have no bearing to the ultimate goal of a Sunday morning service meant to amplify a believer’s life of worship. Rather, it simply distracts the leadership down the rabbit hole of people pleasing and fear of man. The devil has had a lot of success in distracting people from what is actually important to spend time and energy on. That is why, I contend, that when you prayerfully plan a service, you MUST start from the foundation and work up. You first ask yourself “how can we be sure to be in communication to, from, and about God in this service?” and not start with a discussion about “what is the latest and greatest thing being done in churches today?” If you want to cultivate a culture of worship in your church, where people are being molded more and more into the likeness of Christ and responding to it, you should teach this biblical model, and you should model this service planning rubric.

I don’t want to completely minimize the value of good forms. There are many great forms out there that have proven to stand the test of time in regards to accomplishing the function on the firm foundation of communion with God. One of these is music. Music has been a form used to accomplish the function of prayer and testimony for thousands of years. King David was a prime example of one of the first “Christian artists.” Then you have the sons of Korah as perhaps the first worship band of all time. The Psalms were most assuredly put to music originally and in contemporary time as well. Some of the best lyrical mining can happen by digging into the Psalms for material to be put to music! Again style of music has no bearing in the argument. Though I am not a fan of the popular craze in the young market designated as “screamo,” but if combined with the message that ascribes worth and praise to God because of the gospel of Jesus Christ, the style becomes moot and the message becomes superior. I may not prefer that, and it probably won’t end up in my church because I wouldn’t be able to pull it off well and I personally am not drawn into worshipful or overflowing heart with that particular form and if I am charged with leading a congregation in that overflow, I better genuinely exhibit that myself before expecting to lead well. This brings up a very crucial point in the issue of forms that accomplish functions. Maybe you do have a form in mind that will accomplish a function, but you may or may not be able to do that form justice with your musical ability, accomplish it with excellence or a genuine heart. Excellence and genuineness in the context of forms is extremely important. It displays a passion for the subject of our worship and minimizes distraction to those we seek to lead in worship. Again, we don’t lead people into the presence of God; we lead people in responding to God’s constant overwhelming presence. When this truth is realized and responded to outside of the walls of Sunday morning, we are successfully cultivating a culture of worship in our churches. That is our goal. No matter what the form, focusing on making the functions of worship around the foundation of three part communication, we seek to train, guide, and lead by example our congregations to worship every day in their own contexts!

Worship Pastor as Prophet: Sunday Morning: The Communication Structure

The Sunday morning service is what we will focus on right now in a very practical way particularly in planning in a way that leads to a Spirit filled gathering where genuine worship is amplified in spirit and truth. I’m using the word “amplified” on purpose because of the above discussion on how genuine worship is not confined to a specific worship “service” or place, it is merely amplified in the context of a church service because the external and worldly distractions are significantly lessoned and for the most part, people in the church service are unified with this same purpose to “experience God.”

The purpose of the Sunday morning worship service, I would contend, has a three-part foundation around the concept of communication.[1] One of the major aspects of the greatness of God and the direct result of the sacrifice of Jesus is the fact that we are reconciled to him. We have already spoken about the torn curtain in the temple after Christ died symbolizing the reconciliation of a Holy God to his people. We will discuss how we can culminate an amplified worship experience with this concept in mind, but the underlying result of reconciliation is the glorious and gracious ability we have in communication. The purpose of the Sunday morning service is then to facilitate communication on three levels: God communicates to us (Matthew 17:5, Hebrews 1:1-2); We communicate to God (Jeremiah 33:3); We communicate to others about God (Ephesians 5:19). These three make up a mentally structured foundation to a biblical gathering of believers.

Notice that the subject of the service is not man and it never should be. The subject of the purpose of a Sunday morning service should only and always ever be God. In the three foundational communications, many things and elements are probably popping into your mind of how to accomplish them, but I want to focus on six distinctive biblical functions that are done corporately to build on the communication foundation: Testimony (Psalm 71:15); Prayer (Philippians 4:6); Meditation (Psalm 119:27); Scripture itself (2 Timothy 3:16); Prophecy—Preaching (1 Corinthians 14:26) and Confession (1John 1:9; James 5:16). These are very general functions and are meant to be so. Some of the functions tie very closely together and can be combined, yet are distinct enough to be individual. The purpose of these distinctions is to identify the biblical means by which communication happens logically in the corporate and unified body of believers during a service. This function list is by no means exhaustive, yet is the best general representation of biblical corporate response. There are so many different ways that can be done to accomplish these functions, and that is where our discussion leads to now. We finally get to the portion of the recipe that most worship leaders and worship pastors spend most of their time trying to think up: Forms. The functions that accomplish the foundation of a worship service can be done in so many different ways. If you take the function of prayer for example, you could simply pray over the mic, have your congregation read a pre-written corporate prayer, leave a moment of silence for people to pray privately, sing songs, which are basically prayers put to music, you could have an open mic time where people call out their requests aloud to the Lord, have an elder pray, the pastor prays in his sermon, even before the service starts you can have a prayer team praying over the service, you can have a whole service devoted to prayer and set up stations and such. Do you get the idea? The forms are endless, but the function stays the same. Because of that, the function holds more weight than the form and it MUST always be superior to it.

---

[1] While on staff at Harvest Bible Chapel (Elgin, IL) I sat under the teaching of James MacDonald, Andi Rozier, Rory Noland, and Matthew Westerholm. They trained me in the Harvest Worship Philosophy which makes up most, but not all of what I am portraying in this study in written form, though the philosophy has not been formally published. It is to say that citation and credit be given in part to the above men for helping me be able to formulate these thoughts in written and chart form from their years of trial and error and extensive study of the subject passing it down word of mouth and in house printed resources. Currently (May 2011) James MacDonald is working through a sermon series titled “Vertical Church” that makes reference to Harvest’s motivation and strategy in service planning.  

Worship Pastor as Prophet: Responding to the greatness of God

Worship is not merely a “section” of a church service; it is a continual reality of the genuine believer who responds to the greatness of God with an overflowing heart of praise. We see the greatness of God in many ways and we ought to respond.

We see the greatness of God in his creative work for example (Genesis 1, Romans 1, Psalm 92:4, Psalm 102:25, Psalm 148, Isaiah45:12, Colossians 1:16, Romans 11:36). It goes without saying that when you face a natural beauty like Niagara Falls, or the Grand Canyon, or maybe even the simple yet complex beauty of a tree bursting with blossoms in spring, that something inside the believer is welled up to give glory to God. The shear complexity and perfect calculative order of how the universe was created in very fine-tuned constants that allow life to exist on this earth and not be burned up or frozen over is such that our hearts should scream, “Praise God! Wow he is amazing!” It is the greatness of God in creation that should well up a burning and holy anger against worldly claims that everything we see and the complexity of the natural world is all a result of chance and evolution.

As a worship pastor we should be encouraging and training our congregation to recognize the greatness of God in creation. I use opportunities while I pray corporately to thank God and praise him for displaying his power and faithfulness in the rain outside, as an example (Job 5:10, Psalm 65:9, Psalm 104:13). Our hearts should be so in tune with everything that points to God’s glory that by drawing attention to it before our congregation and relating it back to the sovereignty or faithfulness of God, you will be cultivating that culture of worship.

You do not have to be an environmentalist to have an appreciation for and recognize the beauty and fragility of nature. Instead of worshiping nature, where many environmentalists fall, we attribute the beauty and find joy in the provision and sovereignty of God in his creation. Using God’s creation as a means to elevate who he is, is not only beneficial for the body, but it is a biblical model. Jesus uses this model when he preaches on the subject of worrying or the provision of the Lord in Matthew 10:29-31, and paralleled in Luke 12:6-7. The Lord IS concerned and paying attention to us even to the smallest details of how many hairs we have on our heads! He then uses the example of how the Lord knows even when a single sparrow falls: how much more does he care and has concern for his most grand creation that he loves enough to sacrifice his only son for? You see how it can quickly get back into the grand mystery of the Gospel, which is our motivation as worship pastors. Our God saves, even when he was not obligated to. As a worship pastor, our job is to facilitate a corporate response to the greatness and overwhelming presence of God. The list is long of methods to accomplish this task, but one method is actually on the responsibility list of most job descriptions for worship pastors: Plan and execute a Spirit filled and contemporary worship service on Sunday mornings.