From Traditional and Stoic to Modern and Sublime: Reinventing Church Worship (Part 1)

For the past two years, I have been leading worship for a traditional, conservative church, and in that time, I have, I think successfully, led our church from a traditional, hymn based musical style in the service to a contemporary praise and worship style.  To be fair, without the support and constant encouragement from my visionary pastor, I would not have been able to accomplish this task.  Through the bumps in the road,  it was important that I know my pastor was on my side, believing that Providence had placed me here for a Divine purpose.  

While I believe that the best days are yet to come for our worship band, I do feel that we have created a solid and worshipful program at our church.   I’ve been thinking that I should share some of my advice and experience to those who might be interested in helping their conservative, traditional (probably Southern!) church transition to a worship style that will ultimately help them accomplish their Divine calling. I’ve decided to devote a portion of blog to this topic, and I really hope that I might help an aspiring worship leader miss some of the pits and setbacks that I’ve experienced.  I’ll also be placing some of my original music clips and tablature here so that I might help you get started.  Check back often for more discussion, and I always welcome any suggestions, questions and thoughts and that you might offer.

Reinventing Church Worship
In order to “reinvent” the musical portion of your church worship, the fundamental first step you must take as a worship leader involves brainstorming and establishing a guiding (and written) philosophy for your church worship.  The brainstorming process, for me, takes the form of sitting in a quiet room and attempting to answer a series of difficult questions, such as: 

What is worship?
Why do we do it?
Why do we sing in church?
What good does our traditional musical style add to the overall worship of the church?
What good would a contemporary musical style add to the overall worship of the church?
Is music designed for evangelism?  

Once I think that that I’ve answered these questions adequately, I try to bathe each question in prayer and Bible study as an attempt to see if the philosophy and direction I am taking lines up with Scriptural mandates and encouragements.

Once you’ve formed a fundamental statement of philosophy, you should present a written copy to your pastor.  For a Biblical Christian, it is important that you recognize that the pastor is God’s chosen leadership over you, so you must involve him in your discussion.  Many pastors are content with a hands-off approach to the church music, and they will let you pretty much do what you’d like, but you cannot be content with this freedom.  You must make your pastor a cornerstone of your church’s philosophy of music.  Meet with him regularly, and slowly discuss each compenent of your philosophical statement.  Do not rush this step. You should only proceed to the next step of the process when your pastor is fully convinced that you have a viable plan for creating a new musical direction for your church.    As an integral part of the change from traditional to contemporary, your pastor will make your job infinitely easier than it will be otherwise. 

Next:  Baby Steps to Song–the Importance of Congregational Communication

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