I remember the time when I wanted to give up. I was finished. Done.
Exhausted, burned out, tired of busting my butt for what appeared to be no reason.
I guess you could say I was wrong. In my exhaustion, God was using me to mentor – to inspire and develop young worship leaders.
When I grasped what was happening, I discovered a passion I never knew existed.
One of the most insightful sessions at Catalyst 2011 was Andy Stanley’s closing talk on apprenticing leaders. It was so helpful, I immediately knew I wanted to share some of this with you.
I can’t think of something more important for worship leaders. We want to leave a legacy. We want the work of God to continue beyond what we can carry with our own hands.
We want to raise up the next generation, engage the younger and capture the imagination of the artists in our midst.
Imagine the possibilities. When your ministry has come and gone, when you’re no longer as effective as you once were, your influence can live on in those you apprentice.
The Problem With Apprenticing
But there’s only one problem. We avoid it.
Apprenticing is scary. I know you’re thinking it. You have a hard enough time managing your own disorganized, creative self. How are you supposed to manage another?
My goal with this post is to push you to apprentice another leader. After you read this post, take a step in this direction. Stop resisting.
It’s messy, but it’s not as overwhelming as you may think. That is, if you do it right.
3 Myths We Believe About Apprenticing
There are typically 3 myths we believe about apprenticing:
1. You need to be an expert.
We all feel this tension. “Well, I just don’t know enough. I don’t know everything there is to know about leading worship. How can I apprentice?”
Let me just free you up. You don’t need to know more than Paul Baloche and you don’t need to know everything there is to know. You just need to pass along what you do know.
“Well, what if I feel incompetent?” No problem. Bring someone into the messiness of what you don’t know and be honest. Figure it out. Don’t work alone.
2. You need to schedule more meetings.
No, they just need to join you on your mission. It’s not about, “Let’s drink this latte together.” It’s about “Let’s climb this mountain together.”
Many of us avoid apprenticing because we only have time to do our job. We don’t have disposable time for more meetings with more people. That’s a mistaken notion about apprenticing.
Invite someone into your vision. Do ministry together. Allow them to step out on their own.
3. You might be out of a job.
It’s scary to ponder being replaced. What if your apprentice is better than you? As Andy says, “in a healthy organization, if you replace yourself, you will always have a place.”
Raising up other leaders is a quality of an indispensable leader. If you do this well, you will always have a place.
I remember times when I hesitated to even have another singer sing because I knew they were better than me.
It’s rather sickening. We don’t want to be replaced. We don’t want to be forgotten. We want to be wanted. The truth is, you become twice as effective as a reproducing leader.
Remember your MEDs
How do you apprentice? Take these few points from Andy Stanley:
- Model – Here’s what I do
- Explain – Here’s why I do it
- Demonstrate – Here’s how I do it.
I hope you recognize the important of spreading your legacy – raising up the next generation. What are you going to do about it?
Question: Are you apprenticing another leader? If not, what are you going to do to get started? You can leave a comment by clicking here.
Number 3 sucks. I just lived through this for the first time. It caught me by surprise and I felt like I was being fired. But now I get to see my replacement flourish with what he is good at and I am getting the chance to work on other things. Big picture is cool though as I get to serve along with the guy insolent two years raising up.
Yes! See how God has used your apprenticing to spread influence? You’ve been able to accomplish so much more by letting another step up to the plate.
Great words. Apprenticing is vitally important, but incredibly hard. I admit to resonating with the fear in #3. But, I’ve learned when I think that, it’s more about me than it is about the Lord or His bride – the church. I’ve also learned that sometimes you can’t wait for someone to say they are ready. You may have to push them kicking and screaming into being apprenticed. I think that is a huge part of my job – allowing God to use me to identify and equip people. May I do well in this as I begin my next ministry.
Praying for you, Chris. What does your new ministry involve?
It’s in a church that was recently replanted by another church. Ministry areas will include worship/media, ministry focused on younger families, admin/communication, and other stuff. It’s still kind of in flux. Will involve lots of things thought, at least initially until there is some additional growth and discipleship.
I agree that #3 is the most frightening, but also (in my opinion) the most fulfilling. I think sometimes we forget that we’re not always going to be the “hottest thing out there” worship wise and that we need to pass the baton as much as possible. Thanks for reminding us.
No problem, Travis. Are you in the midst of “passing the baton”?
Ouch, we often want to complicate things too much! Once again I a m reminded of the Apostle Paul’s words – be ye followers of me as I am a follower of Christ. The church and it’s leaders often neglect the part where we need to mentor and add apprentices to take over in our roles. In South Africa I realized that many churches just drag along with the original founder, just because the leader did not lead new leaders to leadership!
It is the same with Worship Leaders – we worry too much about who can do it better and then when we find someone we worry that they will take your job! And out of fear we try to discredit them!
Oh, how did we go wrong!
Well said, Gert. I would say if a leader isn’t planning to replace himself, he’s not leading well!
Are you a pastor in South Africa?
Exactly! and yes to the question. Teacher and worship leader – also need to take care of most of the technical stuff!
What we need to remember is that we need to share the vision with our ‘followers’ and they will need to embrace it. I am prone to say that if the the leaders that are in your group do not share a collective vision, then they should not be leaders in your group – some should in many cases not be leaders at all, as they are there only to promote their own agenda’s! I know it is harsh, but as leaders we need to be followers and our followers need to be leaders in their own sense.
Thanks for this great blog! Keep it up!