Intentionality is Key

Posted on by Tanner Royalty

The Merriam-Webster defines intentional or intentionality as something done with intention or on purpose. How often do we do things purposefully? When we act with intentionality towards someone or something we are giving them or it perceived worth in our eyes. That’s huge. To whom or what do you give worth?

Here are a few things within our ministries that we as worship leaders should approach with intentionality and allow God to in turn use for His glory:

Your Personal Relationship with Christ

This may seem like a given, but it is far too easy to get in the flow or into a routine and to become a full-time worship leader and a part-time follower of Christ. We as human beings are very good at faking things by becoming “excellent” at what we do without even thinking about why we do it. We all have the church or spiritual mask that we can put on to make people believe we have it all together even if we don’t. Sometimes I myself can be so “task-driven” or goal oriented that I forget to be intentional with Christ. Improving our ministries and getting things done isn’t a bad thing in and of itself, but if we do those things while sacrificing personal devotion then what are we really working for? I lead worship a lot… but I hope that I can be a personal worshipper of Christ even more. Let’s decide right now to never become more focused on the things that we do and how we do them than the REASON behind what we do. Take time to spend with Jesus… your congregations will thank you.

Your Communication

Communication is key! Be intentional to communicate among your leadership and your ministry. I have found that the leadership in any church loves to take time in order to find out what is happening within the body. Fill them in! We don’t have to do this alone.

This also can have another side to it. As worship pastors we are really good at spending time to create structures and worship services and then keeping our reasoning to ourselves! Let people know why you choose the songs you do and place them at certain parts of a service. Some people are better at putting the pieces together than others and I personally am very poor at providing them with all the pieces on a weekly basis.

Your Time

Think back to the last time someone or something had a problem that they approached you with right before rehearsal or a service… if it wasn’t sometime in this last week I am thoroughly surprised. It would be hard for an outsider to understand the amount of stress and last minute emergencies that we as worship leaders deal with on a weekly basis. I have just come to accept them as a part of leading within a body of believers. I also know, from personal experience, how easy it is to stay busy and yet get nothing done. Our time as ministers is limited and often times we are stretched in every direction, but in order to serve our congregations with Godly excellence we must work to be intentional with our time. It’s far too easy to get overwhelmed by all the last minute things that come up, but if we are careful about scheduling in advance and thinking ahead not only will we get more done, but we will free up more time to be intentional in other areas that are on this list. We should strive to never treat our ministries like a list of tasks or jobs that we have to get done every week, and one way to do that effectively is to have a schedule!

Your Relationships

 Jesus was intentional about building relationships with His followers. We should follow that example in order to disciple and mentor those around us. As “Worship Pastors” we need to be acting like a pastor, and that requires more than just singing or playing an instrument. Being intentional within a relationship is essential in establishing influence and developing those around us into productive disciples who can, in return, spend their lives mentoring others. Jesus walked, talked, and ate alongside His disciples. They experienced life together. It was in that way that they were able to be ministered to.

Chip Bell says, “Effective mentors are like friends in that their goal is to create a safe context for growth. They are also like family in that their focus is to offer unconditional, faithful acceptance.” There can be no discipleship without relationship… and relationships are intentional.

Making a conversation out of our Worship

Posted on by Tanner Royalty

How do you view worship? How does your congregation view worship? When we sing “ Lord, I will follow you” or “You give and take away” we are making serious statements to God. Do we treat our worship as a ritual that we do because we are told to or do we see it as a serious conversation between ourselves, our congregations, and God? Hopefully we can say we treat it as the latter.

Believe it or not the order of our songs can tend to lead us into conversation through our worship more than anything else we can plan to do. There is really no set way to plan a service or worship set… we can have general plans or ways of doing things but in the end the choice of certain songs is unique to each congregation. In worship planning there are really no right or wrong songs to use… different songs are useful for different things and while one song might provide incredible insight into God’s character and majesty another may provide simplistic but meaningful conversation about our reliance on the Lord. In the end, some songs are written “about” God and are filled with statements about His character (many hymns are written about God). Other songs make statements “to” God, as if in a conversation.

My suggestion is to sequence the songs in a revelation to response method by placing the ones that reveal things about or talk about the ways or attributes of God closer to the beginning of the service as the congregation is preparing themselves and getting in the frame of mind that congregational worship demands. When we provide revelation first it allows the people within our congregation to think and sing about God and it moves them into the mindset of desiring a conversation with the One that they know and hold dear. The method here is much like a gathering or party. Right at the outset of the party typically people aren’t willing to open up and share the personal parts of their lives with each other. Instead we start with “ice-breaker” and casual conversations… we learn about each other (jobs, relationship statuses, hobbies, attributes, etc). Conversations usually become more personal as defenses fall and authentic communication can be accomplished. Therefore, we need to do the same thing with our designed worship experiences… we first learn about God ad meditate on Him and then we can begin to open up and respond to Him through conversation.

Our revelations about God should call us and our congregations to respond. 

Hopefully with this loose structure in mind we can begin to more effectively plan and organize services that have a way of moving people into genuine conversation and worship of God. The ball is ultimately in each individuals court, but we should be good stewards of the leadership that we have been given.

Want to be a better Worship Leader? Well… who doesn’t

Posted on by Tanner Royalty

The title says it all… I’m not sure if I have ever met someone who didn’t want to be better at whatever they did. But complacency is a dangerous thing and it creeps in when we least expect it and can steal our joy and our determination and commitment to excellence and improvement. The Bible calls us to be excellent and to do everything as if for the Lord. Below I have explored just a few ways or attitudes that can help us become better worship leaders. This list isn’t exhaustive and isn’t a “quick fix” or a step-by-step method to improvement. But… if we commit ourselves to doing these few things I would struggle to say that you, and those around you, won’t notice a difference!

Love Worship!

This may seem obvious but worship shouldn’t just be a job or part of our jobs… it should be a lifestyle that we love and enjoy. Our worship shouldn’t be dependent on our circumstances, work-load, preferences, congregation size or involvement. We should be worshippers on and off the stage and all our worship should be sincere. What we do from the stage on Sunday mornings should just be a normal outflow of what we do all week… each and every day. Our personal lives should echo and resemble what we do on the stage. If we want to be better worship leaders we should stop playing games with our personal worship, because it is exactly as important as it sounds.

Never Stop Learning.

This particular point comes natural for some and is a distant thought for others. We shouldn’t stop pursuing excellence or the betterment of ourselves as worship leaders when we find a position or job. Outstanding worship leaders value training and love learning. Feel like you’re in a “rut” or afraid that you might be developing one? My response to you would be: Don’t get complacent or content where you are… continue moving forward, learning, and becoming a better worshipper and lead worshipper. This point doesn’t mean the same thing for every person in every situation, you don’t have to go to seminary to learn… there are a variety of blogs, podcasts, books, seminars, and resources out there that you can dig into for free! Let’s not become complacent, let’s not shy away from feedback, and let’s never claim to know-it-all.

Be a Team Player and Create Space for Others to Serve.

We can’t do it all on our own… well maybe you can but I’d personally like to choose not to. Within our ministries we should work hard to create a team mentality and we should model servanthood through all that we do. If we want to get better at our craft we must surround ourselves with others who are willing and able to serve. The role of a worship leader isn’t just to lead corporately, we should minister individually as well. We should be open to including others and look for opportunities to encourage and to empower. If our desire is to improve ourselves and our ministries then we must be secure enough about our own calling, position and place, to “give up” a little when it comes to leading.

Be Happy Where You Are.

Sometimes it’s easier to say that, “God has us where he wants us” than it is to believe it. But I assure you… all things occur according to His will. Never stop pursuing Him. Excellent worship leaders are grateful and excited to serve wherever they are. Our happiness and contentment should not be determined by the size of our congregation, the appearance of our building/sanctuary/ stage, the number of Facebook likes or followers we receive on our Twitter accounts or blogs. Our joy should come from Christ alone and our ability to serve Him. Let’s serve faithfully and be joyful servants where we are.

Don’t Depend on Yourself!

Often times we can depend on ourselves and our talent more than the Spirit… I’ve done it. Our worship shouldn’t be talent or performance based, it should instead be authentic and pure. If we want to be better worship leaders then we must stop banking on our own talent and experience and start relying on God and His Spirit. Remain vigilant and obedient and allow God to work through you and your team on a weekly basis. The church doesn’t need another rockstar… it needs some faithful servants.

Give me some feedback and maybe some other points that you can think of below! Thanks all! Stay safe and warm.

What are we Communicating?

Posted on by Tanner Royalty

Picture a teacher standing before a classroom full of students who are all on the edge of their seats, captivated and mulling on every word that is spoken. What a great responsibility that teacher holds! The words the say and the things they do can shape a child’s education permanently. Now picture what we as worship leaders and teams do each and every week before our congregations. We are much like that teacher we just described, we hold a massive responsibility each and every week to demonstrate, model, and educate our congregations in true “God-pleasing” worship.

Below I have listed some thoughts on how we can better communicate and model the attitude of a Biblical worshipper from the stage weekly. Be sure to note that this blog post isn’t about what our song selections communicate… that is a whole separate topic that can be expected within the next few weeks. Anyways… let’s get going! 

Is it apparent that worship brings us joy? 

I don’t know how many times I have watched back footage of myself on stage leading worship and noticed that I do not look happy at all, or had my lovely Grandma look me dead in the eye and say, “try smiling more… at least look happy to have the opportunity to lead worship.” How encouraging does an unhappy or emotionally dead worship leader or team member look to a newcomer to our worship services? Psalm 84 makes it clear in the first two verses that naturally our worship should be filled with joy.

“How lovely is your dwelling place, O Lord of hosts! My soul longs, yes,  faints for the courts of the Lord; my heart and flesh sing for joy to the living God.” -Psalm 84:1-2

We shouldn’t fake joy… our worship should naturally be filled with joy if we truly understand and believe what we are singing and who we are singing to. Do you believe the words you sing? Seek the Lord and pray diligently that you enter into worship joyfully and express that joy in a natural, authentic, and contagious way. Your congregations attitude towards worship starts with you… model it for them.

Inclusion… Worship isn’t a spectator sport.

There are several ways to make people feel included and there are just as many things that have the opposite affect. Everyone has a friend who sings loudly in the car to every song that comes on the radio… even if they don’t know the majority of the words. Don’t turn your congregations into that friend. It’s typically a good idea to not introduce too many new songs too quickly. Not every person in our congregations is “up-to-speed” by our opinion on modern worship and really the only time they may hear “church music” is when they are at church. We as worship leaders should acknowledge that and allow our congregations time to learn the songs that we sing.

Another way to connect our congregations to the songs that we sing is to choose keys that they CAN sing! Being a natural tenor I’m guilty of messing this concept up more than any other person I know… but we must remember to choose easily singable keys. I’m definitely not saying not to make your congregations put forth an effort. I personally prefer to pick songs and keys that don’t strain people, but also songs that don’t allow them to just mumble along without putting forth any effort to sing and worship at all. Most of us probably don’t lead worship for a church full of professional singers so we shouldn’t hold them to those expectations.

Are we demonstrating excellence?

We also must be aware of how we are representing ourselves and the God in which we worship from stage. It becomes apparently clear when a group of musicians, whether it’s a church band or a local group, is prepared or not prepared for a “set” or group of songs they are going to play in front of people. Do we take our corporate worship time seriously? If we do then we must pursue excellence in that area. The better our worship sounds isn’t necessarily going to please God any more or less… but it models something for our congregations. We as believers should pursue excellence in every area of our lives because we are doing all things for the glory of our God.

“Whatever you do, work heartily, as for the Lord and not for men.” -Colossians 3:23

So… what are we communicating?

Be prepared to lead worship. Worship joyfully. Bring others alongside you in worship to our God.