Worship Podcast & Blog
[Are you new here? You might want to consider subscribing to my posts via RSS or Email. You may also want to follow me on Twitter.]
As I mentioned last week, songwriting retreats are the cat’s pyjamas. More specifically, collaborative songwriting is the best way for worship teams to identify with their particular community and produce the best songs they can.
Are you doing it?
Writing your own songs is not a life or death issue for your worship team.
You don’t need it to be successful. It’s quite OK to sing the great songs of worship leaders like Matt Redman, Paul Baloche, Tim Hughes, Israel Houghton, Kari Jobe, and others.
The presence of God can still be present in your gatherings and the favor of God can still fill your ministry.
But I think you should give songwriting a try. And, I think you should consider hosting a songwriting retreat with some members of your worship team.
OK. Are you ready?
Fire up your computer.
Or pull out that notepad.
Or sling on your guitar.
Write a title. Anything will do for now.
Start writing.
Congratulations.
Treat yourself to a Starbucks Quad Venti Cinnamon Dolce Latte for overcoming the greatest hindrance to successful writing: starting.
Ever since I released my first independent worship album I’ve been asked a lot of questions on how I created it, how much it cost, what first steps I took, etc. I think when someone takes action on their dream rather than just, well, dreaming about it, it inspires people.
And that’s what I want you to do. It’s time to stop dreaming about your dreams and start taking some action.
[Are you new here? You might want to consider subscribing to the RSS feed. You may also want to follow me on Twitter.]
Aside from the fact that I may never see you in person or physically hear your music, I still may never sing one of your worship songs. To be honest, other worship leaders may never sing your worship songs either.
I wish that wasn’t the case.
Before you leave my blog, labeling me a total jerkface, let me explain. On the one hand, this is OK. We as songwriters should be writing for our local congregations and investing our lives there. That’s what truly defines success.
Faithfulness in the small things over time pays off in the end.
But that’s not what I’m referring to. Actually this post has nothing to do with that. Even if I was your captive audience for an hour and you shared your songs with me, I still may not lead them.