To the frustrated worship leader…
Thank you for serving the people of God week in and week out.
Thank you for choosing songs carefully and for singing your guts out.
Thank you for the hours invested in making your band sound great.
Thank you for caring about the local church – loving what God loves and prioritizing His priorities.
I know you may not feel appreciated.
It’s possible you receive more complaints than compliments.
You may not be proud of your financial condition.
The stress of ministry can be annoying.
You wonder if you made the right choice in investing so much time into this thing called worship leading.
But allow me to remind you of the difference you’re making.
You’re not simply a resident entertainer – a “warm-up” to the message. You’re not simply making music or fulfilling your boyhood rockstar fantasies.
You’re pointing people to Jesus. You’re creating an environment where life change is happening.
The presence of Jesus is what people need. The Word of God sung, declared, and internalized is what your congregation needs more than anything in the world. And you are making that happen.
You’re raising up other musicians and worshipers around you. You’re making disciples.
You’re pleasing the heart of God. He loves your voice, your musicianship, your songs. He loves your hard work, your prayers that no one else sees. He rises in honor of your passionate worship behind closed doors and loves your heart that beats for His glory.
While others may not notice or see all that you do, God knows.
He’s appointed you as a herald of His honor – a spotlight to shine upon His perfection. People may not always notice you because you’re doing a good job highlighting the One who is worthy of all praise, adoration, attention, and glory.
Isn’t that the beauty of it all?
While you may feel alone and without appreciation, you have the rapt attention of the greatest Audience in the universe.
Don’t give up. Don’t allow frustration to overwhelm you.
The work you are doing is important. The work you are doing is necessary.
You are appointed by God and we need you to lead us.
Question: What are your current frustrations as a worship leader? How are you keeping yourself focused? We would love to hear your story in the comments. You can leave a comment by clicking here.
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Thank You, this really spoke to me today.
Glad to hear, Mark!
If I add only one thing, it’s this>> For GOD’s glory. (It’s in a lot of what I’m reading right now and I frequently overlook this)
Yes indeed!
Great blog and so true! About a year ago I let many of those discouraging things get to me for the first time in my entire life of being involved in worship ministries and leading worship.
I’ve taken the last year off to do some soul searching as to why it was I had ever wanted to lead worship to begin with. After a year of praying and not singing (publicly) I have come to the conclusion, as I am now going to be on a team again, that all of the complaints, compliments, frustrations, stress or feelings of possibly being unappreciated pale in comparison to the heart of worship that God has undeniably given me and the honor of standing before Him, bringing glory to His name and worshiping Him.
Such a privilege I will never again take for granted and will never again let the stress part of it weigh heavier on my heart than the honor of leading people to join in with me as I worship God!
So, thank you for the reminder! š
That’s encouraging, Amy. Glad to hear your getting back into the saddle! š
Amen for this! Im so encouraged and reminded
I too needed to read this today. Thank you for the encouragement.
David – oh how I needed to hear this today! I sent it to my whole band plus the pastor. These are words for all of us who serve Jesus week after week, year after year. It is a deep breath of encouragement, desperately needed. Thank you!
Glad to hear. Thanks for sharing, Paula!
Hi David. You’ve got another great article here. I recently stepped down from my position as music director at my church. I had a career-changing opportunity come up, and I felt it was time to move on. I have played somewhere on Sunday mornings as a volunteer or leader since 1998.
For these last 15 years, I’ve heard every complaint imaginable. I’ve also received some praise, and it took me a while to learn how to re-focus that onto the giver of the gifts. So it’s not all bad, but the attitude of complaining really got me down. It just felt like half the room hated every new song we sang. Most of my time playing has been in blended services, except for my time playing at Bridgeway with your brother. (That was awesome to have so many people on board with the moving of the Holy Spirit.) I grew up in a traditional service, and my home church was really stepping out to even move in the direction of contemporary music.
The last church I served at was in a similar boat, and it was so difficult to get that complaining half to acknowledge that worship was not about them, that worship was not supposed to divide us, and that the Holy Spirit does not require an organ to invite it to be a part of our corporate worship. One of my friends pointed out that as long as the church was divided on Sunday morning fighting about the music, the world will continue to burn itself up, hungering and thirsting for the gospel that it can’t hear because the people with the message are fighting about what kind of song to sing.
Wow, Marcus. That was a convicting last sentence! But so good for us all to hear. We need to be unified about what really matters.
thank you… i can say nothing but thank you :'(
Thank you, Kai!
For me, a recent disapproval from a close friend over my vision for the team was quite a frustration…only for the Lord to encourage me that it was He who appointed me and the need to focus on the mark!
Thank you for this post, David. We all need a response sometimes to the burning question of “Is this worth it?” The Lord usually reminds me that it is every time I see someone come to Christ! Sometimes we do need posts like these though, verbal affirmation that yes, this is worth it. I think every time someone needs one of these reminders I will point them to this blog post.
By the way, I came across your blog from Christian Music Blog. I really enjoyed your interview on the podcast, and that’s what drew me here. I’m finding a wealth of great information and encouragement. Thank you so much for your hard work and dedication to what God has called you for, in all aspects of your ministry, not just this blog, book, and podcast.
Chris – thanks so much for stopping by. I love what Nate is doing at CMB. I look forward to connecting with you further! Blessings.
In answer to your question: “what are your current frustrations as a WL:” I am frustrated by so many Christians today not being used to confrontation and thus have been allowed to be proud. Then when it comes (from me or anyone else in our church) they are shocked by it. So many poorly led churches are doing a dis-service to Christians by avoiding confrontation or even constructive criticism, which is Biblical. How else can we grow in our service to Him? I recently had an old friend come into our team to sing. (I actually begged him to come for a few years and he finally did) His voice really added to the blend of harmonies and I was so happy to have him. We had plans to eventually put him on drums. a few weeks ago during practice, he sang something with a piercing edge and I told him to try to change his tone and make his singing style less “rock”. (he sang in heavy metal bands) This input didn’t go over well with him at all. He over reacted and was offended. No matter how much I tried to re-affirm my opinion of his great voice, he was beyond mad and quit the team. He didn’t think I had the right to say what I did. What?! Had no one ever confronted him before? I’ve been seeing this too often now a days.. One little input and their gone! I’ve touched their sacred cow! Too many proud musicians and singers who will not listen to input. Our greatest strength can be our greatest weakness. I am weary of trying to find humble, spiritual and gifted Christians to serve with.
Lou, I understand your frustration. This is common among all musicians and I’m not sure it will go away š We’re a sensitive bunch. My advice would be to reach out to him again and tell him how much you care about him and appreciate him. It might just take a little time for him to come around again š
Recently I have been struggling with attitudes on the worship team. I know as the worship leader I should be the one to help bring up the attitude and atmosphere of the room, but sometimes there are personalities that are just hard to work with. We don’t require as much time as many worship teams for rehearsals, but even the time that we do ask people to serve it seems like we are pulling teeth. I am not sure how to change this attitude and make people actually want to be there and realize it is an honor and a privilege to be part of a worship team and have the opportunity to worship God together the way we do!
Today I discussed with my husband about quitting. Maybe now I won’t.
Thank you so much for this!!! You do not how much this meant to me and how much I really needed this!!!!! THIS SPOKE DIRECTLY TO MY HEART!!!!! Thank you for allowing God to use you to lift up others! Your blogs are my favorite to read! Thank you for all you do!
That means a lot, Adrianna. Thanks!
Thank you so much for this post.
I am in both shoes – sometimes the worship leader and sometimes in the congregation while another leads worship. And sometimes the songs are not my favorite but no matter what I choose to worship because God deserves to be worshiped and He also rewards us when we do! How I wish the people in the congregation would recognize this – how I long for them to understand that worship is about GOD and HIS glory and not about THEM!
We try to meet their needs by picking familiar songs most of the time but I have heard many complaints (though there are also encouraging words). I fear that in western society (North America) our church is filled with spoiled believers who are almost impossible to please.
Honestly I much prefer leading worship (or singing worship songs to/with) a group of non believers from outside our culture for example from Asia. They often get deeply touched by ANY worship song (and they are never as nit picky as the locals who have been Christians for a long time) and start to want to know more about Jesus.
Why is it that non Christians appreciate any worship song (even those they do not know) and are touched by it more easily than those who were Christians for many years? IMHO I personally wish those who were believers for a long time need to all re-examine our hearts to be willing to return to our first love when we loved all worship music (as long as it pointed to Jesus)
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Just posted a minute ago. I am certainly not quitting. Just vented a bit š But God will reward.
God bless you and thanks again for your article.
I’m currently frustrated with the band I’m leading. They don’t seem to practice at home the songs I give them beforehand. When we do gather for practice some members are clueless even when I have handed out song sheets the week before. It’s so frustrating!
I suspect they are busy trying to learn rock songs in their homes. Sigh.
I searched the net for worship leader frustrations and it got me here. Thanks, I was thinking of quitting. Now, maybe not anymore : )
Thank you. Very timely.
Frustrated is not a strong enough word to describe it. A more accurate word would be “crushed”. I loved doing worship ministry itself at my church, the presence of the Lord was wonderful and the people seemed to (for the most part) appreciate it. But I was harshly scolded by the pastor for starting late (about 2 minutes) due to my having to use the washroom after pre service prayer before starting to lead worship , even though he had previously promised me that would be ok and there would be grace for that. I went to talk with him about that, gently and respectfully and was harshly inundated with abusive accusations that attacked the core of my identity. I was in shock and horror. I tried to gently ask him to take those things back and he would not. I told him I can no longer work with him and I got further accusations. I had to leave the church for my own well being’s sake, some people from church have contacted me to say they really miss me or my singing… and I have not told them why I left. I feel guilty for pain of the congregation that I left without them knowing why. But I cannot tell them why because I believe it would be wrong to do so, I don’t want to cause a church split. But I cannot stay there though I choose to forgive the pastor and I do know and believe Jesus is still the same, He is still on the throne. Trying out a few other churches here and there but it is going to be a long while before I have the courage to be involved in worship ministry again, though I have “led” worship not long ago in my friend’s livingroom, informally. and I am choosing to try to live a lifestyle of worship… though there is so much pain right now.