“The Minimum” Is Sabotaging Your Ministry
The worship leader put a message out to the team. It said:
“What do you think of rehearsing only on Sundays before the service? I ask this for two reasons: you wouldn’t have to take out a night to rehearse, and we can just do one or two rehearsals a month only to learn new songs.”
I get the spirit of this question. She’s trying to make it easier for her team. Perhaps people have been missing rehearsals or have full schedules. She may feel pressure from what some team members are saying. Their team is just starting to play as a full band after covid, so that context is important to note.
But here’s what comes up in me when I read this.
Making choices that violate the spirit of worship end up sabotaging your worship ministry.
Put this conversation aside and think about the nature of worship. What words come to mind to describe it?
Sacrificial. Generous. Risky. Excellent. Heartfelt. All-in.
But would you ever describe worship as giving the “bare minimum?” As “what’s the least we can do and still get by?” And don’t even get me started with not thinking we can ask more from “our volunteers.”
This thing should cost us our lives. I take serving in the ministry of worship seriously.
I’m not talking about intentionally making things harder for our teams, like not having the audio set up before they arrive or not giving them the music at least a week out.
I’m talking about trying to not let it take up too much space in their lives and schedules. What are we building here after all? A weekend shift at Walmart or a community of worshipers?
It’s like this: Without faith, it is impossible to please God, and pleasing God is at the heart of worship. So we must approach worship ministry with faith. We must be active in our faith. A faithless worship team is only a team.
What would you change if you would think through your decisions to line up with the spirit of worship?
-Dave Helmuth
(purchase my book, "Worship Fertilizer: (the first hundred)" HERE)
“The Minimum” Is Sabotaging Your Ministry (Nº 278)
