I like to be different. Unique. Memorable.
As a worship leader, I balance this tension almost every day.
Every time I innovate and create in the context of corporate worship, I’m faced with resistance.
I wonder if it’s possible to be too creative, too innovative for our own good.
Why? Two reasons:
1. The purpose of corporate worship isn’t musical innovation. Quite honestly it’s not about music at all. Music is simply a vehicle to experience God.
2. A large percentage of people don’t really care. They may not like music or my style of music, so is it worth it?
The musician in me wants to create. I want time to innovate. I want to experiment with new instruments, new sounds. But how innovative is too innovative? When does it become a distraction?
Great Music Isn’t Enough
When I first started leading worship, innovation was everything to me. I wasn’t concerned with what the congregation needed or if they were engaged in worship. I mistakenly thought that great music was enough.
I now know that it is not. I’m there to serve – to blaze a trail for people to meet with their Maker.
In order for that to happen, worship leader, you need to be invisible. You need to become desperate for your people to see and experience Jesus.
You see, I wonder if our desire for musical innovation is trumping our need to be pastoral – to serve our people where they are and facilitate their encounter with God. I wonder if we’re making worship all about us – a place to shine, a career to advance in.
But we can create the most innovative music this world has ever seen and miss the point. We could create music that even Michael Gungor loves and still not be faithful to our calling.
So let’s discuss.
How do we balance musical innovation and corporate singing? When does the music become the focus in people’s minds? Let’s dive into the comments. You guys are the best at that.
Hmm.. Alright, here i go.
First off, stupendous question.
I dont really think that “innovation” is ever a bad thing when you are using the right kind of innovation. You see, creativity and innovation are two different things. Creativity is needed for innovation but innovation has to take into account what it is innovating. Creativity is more of a vast subject. If you are “innovating worship” (from a musical standpoint) than i don’t think that that is ever a bad thing because you are keeping in mind that you are still leading a congregation and need to act accordingly to the parameters set up by you subject of innovation. If everyone is getting lost in the music and it becomes hard for people to worship in one way or another than you have to face the fact that you aren’t really being innovative. You may be trying to be creative, or you may be doing a fantastic job at being creative, but like i said previously: creativity and innovation are two different things.
However it is possible for people to get lost in your innovation. Heck, people will get lost when you introduce a new song. Chances are, someone is lost in your worship the way it is. No matter how much we try to make music accessible to everybody so that they can enter into worship easier, we will still have the people who want the old music, need to use the bathroom, think they could do a better job, or just plain want to leave.
Innovation isn’t bad. The question is, are you truly being innovative? innovative in what?
Interesting perspective, Christian. So you don’t think it’s possible to be too innovative? I know we can’t please everybody with what we do, but we should aim to reach the majority, right?
To be honest, I found this site searching for help and answers thru others experience. Yesterday made 8 years since I was born again. I entered into my church worship within 6 months. I came out of a professional secular rock band, touring, radio shows and all that junk. When God lead me home, i have to admit the musicality and singing in my church was horrendous! I wanted no part of it. People divided into clicks, hidden dissention and so on. My Pastor encouraged me to help him. In the last 7 years the ones who stood with me have grown exponentially. In the process, my guitar technique and level of playing, which always seemed important before, is no longer important to me. I became a teacher, had to grow into a lead singer, and TRY to lead worship. My giant has always been public speaking. Terrifies me! Anyway, all my efforts have always had resistence. I took things in the direction of praise and worship because that is what i knew the people were capable of pkaying well. Before, they attempted horrible renditions of Pentecostal/ Black Gospel styles. Noise is what there was. My point about your innovation question is to always be sensitive to the people and their needs, but remember you are Gods leader. Moses listened to murmurring all the time, yet He, unlike Aaron, didnt let the people lead Him. I believe in the providence of God. David, or whoever you are worship leader, God has set you where you are and made you who you are for this time. As long as you are humble and hearing, the Spirit will lead. I had a friend say this to me recently: “Our jobs are to disrupt them at a rate that they can absorb it.” good councel for me at least.
Interesting quote, Chris! Do you think it’s important to constantly disrupt? Or does our disrupting steal attention away from the purpose of worship? I love innovation and creativity but I believe it has its limits during corporate worship.
Great post David.
One of the points of vision that I lead our team of worship leaders and artists from (both technical and musical) is that our worship experiences (the set lists, environment etc) must be ACCESIBLE. When it comes to the songs we lead and sing they need to be accesible. I don’t want to ever paint us into a corner of non-creativity and innovation so we don’t use words like familiar and repetitive because they tend to carry a negative conotation. But, the truth is that the music we choose based on what God is doing in our church should have a certain level of familiarity to it. With that comes a level of comfortability too, which really helps the 35 year old dad of two who works a 9-5 and can’t sing very good… engage… and that’s what it’s about for us.
Innovation is great, it’s needed in my opinion in The Church.
Wise words, Josh. I suppose the tension we need to balance is innovative yet accessible, like you mentioned. How have you done that practically?
I ask a lot of questions because I like to learn 😉
Practically here’s what that looks like in our student ministries:
– have a method and plan to introduce new songs: we introduce more songs to our high schoolers/college students than we do to middle school students, In middle school we want to teach and model corporate worship, so we make it easier by making our library of worship songs intentionally smaller and more repetitive than the other ministries. A student is more likely to engage in a worship song he/she has heard 3-4 times than they are a brand new one every week.
– worship songs should be “accessible”: everyone could (and probably should) define this differently in the context of their environment. But at the surface worship songs need choruses that make sense and aren’t extremely abstract, verses that are theologically true and sound, and form that resembles some sense of repetitiveness. All of this changes slightly depending on the age group you’re dealing with. (middle schoolers comprehend and retain less than grown adults). Students think more in the concrete rather than the abstract, as you grow up your ability to introduce the abstract and handle it with the concrete develops.
For the sake of not writing a book i’ll stop the though there and wait to hear from some others about it. I’d love to answer any other questions about it. It’s still something that we’re working through and will quite honestly be a continuing work in progress.
Wow that is an excellent strategy, lots of wisdom there Josh!
Hey there! A friend re-tweeted your Twitter post and that’s how I ended up here. I’ll definitely keep checking back for future posts and resources.
First off, I think this is a great blog post, especially for folks who just started off in a church plant. We sometimes become so obsessed with trying to fill the seats of our respective churches and with the production and innovative value of the worship service that we forget that Jesus doesn’t require any of that from us; He requires that our worship be “in spirit and in truth.” It is a trend I am noticing in most churches down here in [sunny] South Florida, and our church worship team sometimes fall into this category, as well. Yes, I love the creative aspect that comes with performing on a musical instrument (I play bass guitar) and planning a service during the week, but that creativity should not interfere with the encounter that Jesus is having with the congregation as a whole.
It is a matter of teaching your congregation the essence of what these moments of corporate worship are all about. While being “innovative” in worship is important (how you perform a song, the lighting, the sound effects, etc.), I think it is more important to use that innovation to positively add to the culture of worship you are leading His people to and to not detract from it. Ideally, you want the majority of the congregation, at the end of service, to say, “I experienced God today and I will never be the same!” That is how I see my role at my church – as a servant and instrument to a culture that seeks to worship the King of Kings and Lord of Lords.
Thanks for the post once again and have a great week, everyone!
Josh, thanks for stopping by! Nice to connect. You propose a great question we should constantly ask ourselves: Is our innovation adding to the worship experience or detracting from it? So good.
It’s my understanding that King David had such a heart to worship God…that he actually would Invent Instruments to worship God with…
2 Chron…talks about King Hezekiah in the temple and using the instruments of King David…and the psalms of Kind David…
King David was a creative inntovative worshiper…how magnificent that any sound he could make…was a sound given to him by God and could Woship God with it!…
who know…he might have just hit 2 stones together over and over again keeping a beat…and worshiping his GOD!
Makes me wonder if they were less concerned with “engaging” people then. I mean, the glory of God was so physically visible that it probably wasn’t needed. I suppose that’s what we should strive for!
Amen!
would you call Jeff deyo’s first ever Sonicflood Album in 1999 “Innovative”….i would..
and look where worship music is now…
and i guess ties in to your “future of worship music” series too! lol…
Definitely innovative. But recording artist “worship” music is a little bit different than what most worship leaders do in their local church, in my opinion. Not everyone could pull that off on Sunday. It wouldn’t connect.
Yea, I think the more there is a sense of the tangible presence of God, the less our human efforts really matter, so the tension between innovation and familiarity are less relevant.
Agreed.
Great insight Arny.
Excellent post, David. I love your two reasons – it’s easy to get caught up in the music, when really, it has to be about God and His presence. It’s a good reminder that music is just a vehicle, and helps our spirits to open, but some people don’t even like music/worship. It’s true, we need “to serve our people where they are and facilitate their encounter with God”. I love that 🙂 It’s all about His power and Holy Spirit that moves people, not about how good the music is…
Amen!
First off, thank you David for posting this blog. I think it had been a much needed discussion for the Church that has been burning in my heart as well. I am worship leader and songwriter, I am as guilty as anyone in this discussion topic. “Innovation” is a broad term for music and the church, so I want to narrow down the discussion in my comment to one aspect of “innovation” in worship, content selection.
I visited a church two months ago, which I hadn’t done in about 5 years as I have been serving faithfully and/or leading myself. This church is where a very well-known songwriter attends and happens to be the worship leader as well. As a visitor, I can’t tell you how thankful I was that he sang songs that I knew! It was like “wow! my wife and I can immediately enter into worship here.” I really appreciated the fact that even though he had probably well over 200 well-written “church” songs, he had the ability to serve the church body and me (the visitor) in the fact that he sang covers (songs we knew). I was actually really shocked by it. Honestly, I was ready to hear his great songs and prepared myself to “watch and listen” than “worship and engage.” It was a shocker! A good one, and I can’t tell you how much it ministered to me and my wife.
As worship leaders, we are called to service the Church. As a comparison, “Leading worship” is very much pastoral and edifying as say a sermon. I would maybe like to drift away the focus from “innovation” as being the lights, cameras, new guitar tones, and instrumentation to the actual content (songs) of the worship portions of our services. If we were to attend a church where the pastor preached the same message every week, let’s say about “the end times,” we would grow very weary of hearing the same message and would lose many other vital aspects of the Christian faith. Examples, being that Christ died for us, and we should love our neighbor as ourselves (HUGE aspects of our faith). I believe the same goes with the content of our songs we deliver in worship. We need new and fresh content for our church congregations (faithfully there week after week). I think there has to be a strong balance between covers and originals/new songs.
As a songwriter, it takes serious humility to cover someone else’s song. I am dealing with this myself. If you aren’t a songwriter, this discussion is more about when to introduce a new cover rather than a new song you have written. If we become focused on our agenda, we lose sight of the church body’s needs.
Now, the Church has to innovate the content within our services. What if we were singing the same hymnals our grandparents’ grandparents sang? We would be losing this generation. We as the church body would grow tired of singing the same choruses after all these years, as we would with any other song we call “modern worship” in the last 10 years. We need fresh and new content, new words, new lyrics, new sounds without losing the DNA of the church (who we are today and who we’ve been). We have to innovate for the sake of the future of the Church (it’s well-being and growth), but we also have a responsibility to respond to the immediate needs of these same people. Both can be viewed as serving, the discussion is probably more about balance than it is anything.
Growing the church isn’t about being less innovative, it’s about serving. It’s about understanding the DNA of who you are and your role within the local church. People would rather see authenticity than creativity, and I’m thinking our Creator would too. To the Christian music artists, I think if we have a sure foundation in our personal identity as artists and who He has called us to be, it really doesn’t matter how people label your art.
Jesus came to serve, and he knew his market too. Whoa. Look out. Yeah I brought a business term into this discussion. Jesus didn’t get the blind man food did he? We have to understand the needs of the people to fully serve the church. The biggest question we should probably be asking in this discussion is… Does your innovation in worship or songwriting serve YOUR local church and it’s needs?
M
I would like Paul Baloche to join in on this. He always has good things to say on this topic.
Matt, this is fantastic. As a worship “artist”, I actually anticipated you taking this a different direction. I appreciate your desire to serve people in your innovation and embracing certain limitations. And you’re right, everyone’s innovation will vary depending on their particular context. We need to be students of our people and determine what serves them best.
I heard John Piper say that worship teams should function with a certain “undistracting excellence”. Thought that was a good term to use.
Interesting topic. Heard years ago in a Willow Creek seminar – if you want people to sing, you have to have songs that are singable. That was their warning against doing things that are too technically difficult – or too far out of folks comfort zone. The standard of what is singable certainly changes with time though. I love baroque as an art form, but hate it as worship. But that was the standard bearer for old school worship until fairly recently – and still is in some circles. There are only 12 notes in a western scale, but there are a lot of ways they can be put together. Songs can have more than four chords. (Really they can) I-IV-VI-V isn’t the only song ever written (Though listen to 4 Chords by the Axis of Awesome for an interesting perspective). Isn’t the whole path of going from baroque to folk, to modern worship, to post modern worship an experiment in trying to find better ways to allow people to engage in worship? Isn’t entertainment on some level – put it in other words – the enjoyment of the music – a foot in the door to get people to engage the spirit. Then there’s that tricky balancing act of entertainment, worship, self and selflessness you’all always write about. The line of when enough is enough is largely cultural, I think, based on everything from age to geography and a hundred other sociological things. I was just at my uncle’s old school church where the music could best be described as mountain gospel or blue grass spiritual. Laughable to me, but those folks would be horrified at what we are doing now-a-days. They always say you can’t please everybody, but it seems like a wonderful challenge to try. Churches that have different venues with different styles is one way, the old hymns with the “pop hook” is another.
So, someone has to be innovating something or we would all still be hand pumping the bellows on our church pipe organ – and I’m only going back 300 years. I don’t know what they did before that.
Great insight, Ron. I guess the question still becomes…is our innovating distracting from Christ? How do we keep it from becoming an end in itself?
Very timely post. I was working with a new violinist earlier today on music for this Sunday. There was an instrumental spot in a tune and she wasn’t sure what to do. After dinkin’ around with some things, we finally decided like the melody of the chorus work great.
As someone who loves to hear great improv, I would normally fight against this simple of an approach. But most people in the congregation will love it, partly because they recognize it. I guess I’m realizing more and more that it’s easy to be “too hip for the room”. Keeping the musical cookies on a lower shelf isn’t always a bad thing. thanks, David!
That’s a cool way to say that – cookies!
I’m hungry now.
Absolutely, Jon. Sometimes I’ll work out this air-tight arrangement and think everyone’s going to love it. Not so much. People are coming to worship and if you overdo the solos and improv, it’s confusing for most people. Gotta find the balance.
Yes…I think somewhere I earned a masters degree in confusing people. These arrangements sound sooo awesome in my office with just me and an acoustic guitar…but then Sunday comes.
As always, great questions, David! Thanks for opening up the dialog. My initial thoughts about innovation in worship is simply this. Why are we innovative? Do we have an ulterior motive to our innovations? If we desire to be innovative to draw attention to ourselves, or simply because it’s the “desire of our hearts,” I think we’ve missed God’s point.
A well-known verse used among church circles is Psalm 127:1, “Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain. Unless the LORD watches over the city, the watchmen stand guard in vain.” We can labor and toil in our innovations, and yet our labor would be in vain if the Lord is not the author of it.
A prophetic word was spoken over me the other day that may apply here. The image was of a dry erase board, and I was writing on this board. It could have been my desires, goals, passions, music ideas, etc. Jesus stood there beside me with an eraser. As I wrote, he immediately erased it. No matter how fast I wrote, he kept up the pace. Jesus did not erase what I wrote out of discipline, but out of his desire to write instead of me. If I keep controlling what I write, it takes him out of the equation to be the “author and perfecter of my faith.”
When it comes to innovation, we NEED Jesus to be that author of that innovation, and we simply co-labor with him. Otherwise, we labor in vain even when our motives are well-meaning.
One more thought: The Holy Spirit is certainly capable of giving us innovative abilities. Years ago in my college days, I attended a church that had a baby grand piano in the fellowship hall. No one ever played it on Sundays since everyone left right after the service was over. During that time of my life, all I wanted to do after service was sit at the piano and worship with no one around to critique or teach. It was just me, God and the piano. As I worshiped, I actually learned how to play the piano. It was a beautiful experience in my personal worship time. Even though I had no formal training on piano, the Holy Spirit decided to be my tutor at the time. I said that to say this, the Holy Spirit LOVES to add abilities and “innovations” during our worship. As we express our adoration for him, he naturally expresses his adoration for us. It’s incredible to be in that place!
So I encourage other believers to simply stop, enjoy God’s presence, and let him do the innovating. 🙂
Beautiful.
Question – how do we ensure Jesus is the author of our innovation? Does that happen naturally because we are Christians or because we’re created in His image or is there something we need to do to earn that?
Another great question! Answer to the second question is none of the above. Don’t you just love straight forward answers? 🙂
I can answer the first question with a question. How do you know the Holy Spirit is upon you? There are numerous places in scripture where God’s Spirit came upon people:
* Bezalel son of Uri was filled with God’s Spirit to make artistic designs and craftsmanship for furnishings in God’s tabernacle (Exodus 31).
* The Holy Spirit came upon Moses at Sinai. Hence, his face glowed!!!
* God placed his Spirit on 70 of the elders to help Moses lead the Israelites with prophecy (Numbers 11).
* God’s spirit came upon Balaam (the guy whose donkey talked) to utter an oracle on behalf of the Israelites (Numbers 24).
* Joshua (Deuteronomy 8)
* Othniel, Caleb’s younger brother (Judges 3)
* Gideon (Judges 6)
* Jephthah (Judges 9)
* Samson (Judges 13-15)
* King Saul (1 Samuel 10)
* King David (1 Samuel 16)
The list goes on. When God’s Spirit comes upon people, they do things FAR beyond their own ability — it’s supernatural. It’s tightly connected to the Anointing discussion you posted earlier.
If we want to use a New Testament example, we do have Acts 2. The Holy Spirit came upon many people, and they supernaturally spoke in other languages. It’s like The Matrix & Rosetta Stone together on steroids! 🙂
As far as innovation is concerned, I think Paul makes it clear in 1 Corinthians 3. We MUST be careful how we build (ie innovate). If we use means according to the wisdom of this age, it will burn up, for what we do in our own strength will lead us to boast in ourselves. Allowing God to be the innovator, and our bodies as living sacrifices, we can only boast in HIM alone because we obviously cannot do what he can do. Just because we’re Christians does NOT mean this comes naturally. Our salvation is simply the beginning of our sanctification; Christ brings us OUT of our bondage THROUGH a land of sanctification INTO a land of promise. We’re being changed from glory to glory into the image of Christ, and since sin is still in the world, it’s just as easy for us to rebel against the Lord’s discipline.
I know it may sound convoluted, but I think we’ll all know better when we hear from the Lord himself, and hearing from him comes from being in his (manifest) presence which comes from our desire to be with him as much as possible. Hope all that made sense.
Wow, love this question and there is such great thinking in the comments!
I’d like to offer a different perspective.
Balance the pastoral concerns with the instruction of scripture.
Innovation is commanded – “sing to the Lord a NEW song” Psalm 96, 98, etc
It is about releasing fresh faith. We create because God made us in His image as creative, we’re doing what He enjoys doing. We’re in God’s playground, imo. We come as children.
Innovation with the motivation of creative artistic expression, attracting people, or being “relevant” is missing the mark. Innovation to help people enjoy God in a fresh way is giving Him glory.
Yes, you can go too far for your context and be self-indulgent, but we should still go for the highest and best we can offer.
Love this conversation David, thank you!
Without reading ANY of the comments, I’ll chime in: I think that there is 2 – maybe 3 – genuine categories of music when viewed through a Biblical worldview.
1.) Corporate Worship, or that which is written for the express purpose of being sung by the Body of Christ to God… this should be written with the Body in mind, & therefore should not be so “creative” as to be unsingable. That said, we can write for different cultures & people groups, so what will work in one missional context, may not fly in another. That is perfectly OK.
2.) Worship, which can be broken down into two sub-categories
a. Music that glorifies God, which was written with that intent – which, can be as creative as it like because God deserves our very best, & is an original God himself, so creativity displays an often overlooked – though Biblically revealed – character trait of God.
b. Music that glorifies God to varying degrees, but which was written for other purposes, such as the expressly vulgar, non-Christian, & even Satanic rock, which still – in some form or fashion – reveals partial truths, expresses the passions of the human heart (who are, though fallen, still created in the image of God), & which – at the very base level – display some sort of structure & order, which are signs of God’s creation, which underly everything that is.
Everything is God’s, & we are all worshipers… we may worship wrongly, or the wrong things, but there isn’t an action on earth that is not, in some way, an act of worship.
I think by breaking down those categories, I also answered your question!
Hope you’re well, bro!
I have been a worship leader for about 4 years now but have been on the worship team in total about 11 years. I have come to realize that all my attempts at being innovative/creative, whether in music style, different instruments or new sound effects,it never goes without some kind of challenge. I still keep trying to do my best, to get the best quality of music that I can offer, after all, if we are going to use a full range of instruments, and vocals to lead with, they had better be good or at least our very best. It is not for the sake of entertainment or being in the spotlight but bringing God’s people into a place of worship. Singers offer their voice, musicians offer their notes and beats and leaders offer their leadership. Keep it simple enough so that the other member of the team don’t get confused or frustrated, but there is nothing wrong incorporating instrumentals or solos as long as you can do it with ease and it does not distract the congregation. Just remember why your doing it and who it’s for. Practice, practice, practice! take some time to do that whether on you are on your own or with a team. God doesn’t require great performances, He just wants our hearts.
Good words, Randy. Thanks for sharing!
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