I ran across a really insightful article for worship leaders on the Internet Monk blog. (Thanks for the link from JD Walt's Farmstrong blog) Here's some worthy excerpts I'd like to pass on to the tribe:
"The key to worship leadership is to lead as a servant of Jesus and of
God’s people. Not to entertain, self-promote, distract or dominate, but
to lead; to be a means by which worship’s direction is made clearer and
the content of worship is communicated effectively so that a
congregation can respond. ....
A worship leader should be deeply committed to the participation of
everyone, of every age and ability. This should be reflected at every
level of worship leadership, especially in directing the use of music......
A worship leader should be the first one aware of his own weaknesses and be ready to adopt changes or seek help to change.
A worship leader should not be a cheerleader, a brutalizer of sheep or a dealer in guilt and manipulation.
A worship leader should not be insensitive to the presence of guests and non-Christians, but he should lead the congregation and the people of God first, with clarity, simplicity and explanation to outsiders an important, but secondary concern......
A worship leader should know how to lead a simple, brief, direct, non-meandering, non-”uh…just” filled public prayer.
A worship leader should be an adherent of [their particular] tradition and a person with the ability to be creative and flexible. Neither should dominate at the expense of the other.
A worship leader’s own preferences should not dictate everything about worship."
You can check out the whole article at this link : http://www.internetmonk.com/archive/the-evangelical-liturgy-3-the-leaders#more-4163
That's great, Rob. His comments about explanation to non-Christians are especially interesting. This requires a balanced approach. In the end, though, I think he's right. Thanks for posting this.
Posted by: Jonathan Riggs | August 28, 2009 at 02:42 PM