Great new song from Tomlin! Comes out of 2 Kings.
2/4/13
God is in the Preparation!
Ever wonder why the Holy Spirit is moving, but you are STILL hitting wrong notes?
Building Your Rehearsals - Vertical Church Band
Worship Leading: How Are We Preparing?
Leading
others in worship can be a challenging responsibility: standing in front of
a group of people, wearing our hearts on our sleeves, making ourselves
vulnerable is not an easy job. It takes time,
patience, practice and a lot of prayer.
If we’re leading, singing, playing an instrument, serving upfront or involved
behind the scenes, then we will be helping lead people into the presence of
Jesus by what we do. All of us who
are involved need to have a sense of
ownership, commitment and responsibility towards what we do, and
all of us must see it as a holy and serious calling.
But you are
a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own
possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of
darkness into his marvelous light. (1
Peter 2:9 ESV)
1
Peter reminds us, that we are all a ‘royal priesthood’. Everyone who is a Christian
has been ‘set apart’ in Christ to help each other do
something completely remarkable and life-changing, He has brought us ‘out of darkness’ and ‘into his marvelous light’. That’s quite a privilege and quite a
responsibility to bring glory to God
and serve the people we’re called to
lead well.
There’s
something that unites sporting legends, astounding singers and brilliant
performers of all styles: the more
effortless they appear, the greater the amount of work and preparation it represents. To be effective we need to work
hard behind the scenes, preparing
ourselves for that moment when we lead God’s people in worship.
So
lets ask ourselves a simple question, how are we preparing?
Spiritually
and Practically:
1. Are we
giving enough time to prayer and private worship?
2. Are we
giving enough time to practicing and growing in our instrument or
gifting?
We
need to value both spiritual and
practical preparation. If one of these is lacking the congregation can
struggle to engage in worship. To lead worship is to take our private cry before God and to make it
public. As leaders of worship one of the greatest gifts we can give to the
church is that of being spiritually
alive and fresh.
There are no
shortcuts
to developing authentic spirituality. It comes down to the important and obvious disciplines such as reading God’s word,
spending time in his presence and a dedication to seek him through prayer. If we have no private cry, then how can we
stand in front of others pretending that we do? We live in a culture of quick fixes and instant results and it can be tempting
to apply these same principles to preparing a time of worship. We look for short cuts and ways
of speeding up the process. The practical
considerations for leading corporate worship are vast. Whether it’s
choosing the songs, the musical arrangements, organizing technical production
or the resources and rehearsals required - it
all adds up to a lot of work. Even so, short
cuts can leave everyone shortchanged.
So, how are
we preparing? I have been asking myself this question for the past few weeks.
I want to encourage you to do the same thing. It has helped me to recognize some of these failures I have
faced during the week leading up to the service. We need to get it right, right? So, let’s act and do what God has called us to do. Amen?
One Place Noodles Don't Belong
Admit it. You've done it. Here's what you should do instead.
This video applies to all instruments not just guitars.
Find Your Frequency
Ever wonder why you can't get that big sound you've been looking for? Jason's got some ideas.
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