“Dear God — Many of my worship planning friends have worked hard this past weekend. They’ve spent hours in blood, sweat, and tears to tell others about what Christ did and still does for our world. As they look forward to another week, Lord, smile on them. Encourage them. Give them strength. And most of all, may You continue work in the lives of those they’ve influenced this past weekend. Amen.”
Great prayer via Bryan Nelson
If worshipers leave a [worship gathering] with no thought of becoming more godly in their lives, then the purpose of worship has not been achieved. If they walk away from [a time of worship] without a conviction that they need to conform their lives to Holy Scripture, even if it means changing their lifestyle, then worship has been perverted somehow… The clear teaching of Scripture is that genuine worship is life changing
– Allen Ross
If you believe that worship is life changing then pray for it, plan / prepare for it, and expect it.
I came across this great post from Karl Verkade that is very worthy of being shared.
Here is a portion of the post, which refers to a worship team making a musical mistake:
Yes, no one noticed that things were wrong. But had they been right, I can almost guarantee you they would have noticed. Often times in performances (yes, I’m referring to church as a ‘performance’…there’s a stage, we do solo’s, and we create a production…), church and otherwise, we have a mindset of thinking that if we can get it good enough to where no one notices that it was wrong, then we’re okay. But is that really our goal? To be just not wrong enough to where people don’t notice? Because in reality, people probably are not going to notice enough to say something unless it’s a complete train wreck. All the stuff in between train wreck and amazing? More than likely, no one will ever notice enough to say that it was bad. But. If it was amazing? You can be sure that it would touch people. And that is the goal. Not to simply not have people think it’s wrong; but to touch people when it’s right!
I hear this all the time when it comes to tone. Statements like, ‘Come on…who’s gonna notice the difference between a Tim and an SD1?’ And the answer is, of course, no one. No one’s going to come up to you after you play an SD1 and say how bad your tone sounded. And after playing a Tim, no one’s going to come up to you and say how good your tone sounded. But after playing the Tim, they might come up to you and say how good the music overall sounded, although they won’t know why. (Nothing against the classic and lovely SD1.) That’s what we’re going for. Not ‘no one said it was bad’, but ‘people were moved.’
There is nothing wrong with times when the music or your tone is just simply, ‘Well, no one noticed it was wrong.’ Those times happen, and in a church situation, many times God still works in spite of us. But in giving our absolute best into everything we do, we cannot leave that thought that incomplete. We cannot be satisfied with ‘they didn’t notice it was wrong.’ Because when it’s right? They notice. They may not have noticed it was wrong…but they will notice when it’s right. When it touches them. When it takes them from indifference to impassioned.
They won’t notice when it’s wrong, but they will notice when it’s right.
This is great food for thought, for musicians on any instrument. If our goal as christian musicians is to touch/change people using music, then we always have to strive for nailing the material, not just getting through it. All of the small details and nuances do matter.
@lyledenton 