On Leading Worship - Serving Through Prayer

Someone recently suggested that I should start posting about my approach to planning and leading worship. I love the concept, but I’m not sure I’ve got a whole lot of wisdom to impart. In Star Wars terms, I’m still a young padawan learner when it comes to worship leading. So all the glory to God for anything good that I share here, and for everything else, just remember, I don't presume to be an expert.

Prayer - the connection between God's power and our service

As worship leaders and teams it is critical that we approach what we do as servants seeking to glorify God and edify our congregation, not to perform or entertain. But even if we approach what we do as an act of service, it doesn't mean that everything we do is automatically glorifying to God or empowered by Him. Peter tells us that "Whoever serves must do so as one who serves by the strength that God supplies-in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ" (1 Peter 4:11).

Okay, but how exactly do we serve with God's strength instead of our own? John Piper's explanation has been helpful to me. "We will not serve God by trying to put our power at His disposal for His good, but by doing what is necessary so that His power will be at our disposal for our good. And of course, God has appointed that His power be at our disposal through prayer" (John Piper, Desiring God). In an attempt to not do things in my own power, here are some ways that I try to incorporate prayer into leading worship.

Practical Application

Planning

Leaders, before sitting down at our desks and picking songs, deciding where communion goes in the service, finding scriptures to read, etc., we need to pray. I know that sounds obvious, but it is so easy for us to forget to do this; and even if we do pray, we can fall into a quick prayer of "God please bless what I've already decided to do." In 2 Samuel 5:17-25 we see an example of God apparently putting His power behind whatever David had already planned, though only after David prayed. But in the next battle God had specific instructions for how David needed to proceed if He (God) was going to come in power. So as I pray and plan I keep both of these possibilities in mind, initially asking God to guide me, but also trying to remain sensitive throughout the process to anything that God might want me to do differently.

Rehearsal

For the last couple years I've tried to be very intentional about setting aside at least 15-20 minutes for us to quiet our hearts before the Lord and pray as a team before we rehearse music. I believe this is as important, if not more, than the time we spend rehearsing music. It has become a great time to share personal prayer requests and develop somewhat of a small group feel. I'm also trying to encourage more of a focus on praying for the congregation and pastor." This is a document that I created to give some suggestions about how to make use of this time and specific things to consider praying over. Paul Baloche's suggestion here about how the team can pray for the congregation is really good too.

Before the Service

Typically we gather in the pastor's office and pray for a couple minutes right before we begin the service, but something cool and different happened a few weeks ago. It was the first week on summer schedule so we intentionally delayed our start in case a bunch of people were late. Instead of praying in the office I just asked the team and guest preacher to gather in the corner of the sanctuary and pray there before we started singing. The congregation got quiet and it seemed like people were more ready to begin. One of the elders told me after the service that we should try doing that for a while, maybe it will help people be a little more prepared to enter into a time of worship (and maybe they'll think to pray for us too).