Just a few weeks ago, I led worship and everything went wrong.
My voice was fatigued after one service, tech problems prevented people from seeing lyrics to a new song, and no one worshiped.
I was ready to quit.
I felt embarrassed, discouraged, and frustrated. My hours of preparation and rehearsal seemed worthless.
In the privacy of my mind, this was supposed to be a slamming success. I was supposed to receive eons of wonderful comments. I heard none.
I left church that morning wondering if I should ever lead worship again. Was I really cut out for this? If only I could be like Chris Tomlin and Matt Redman who never struggle.
Put It Into Perspective
I know it sounds silly that I’d want to quit after one worship service, but I’m sure you can relate.
Truth is, this is how I feel a lot of the time as a worship leader. When Sunday is a success, I start making plans for my global worship tour with Hillsong United. On a bad day, I’m making excuses to quit.
I’m learning that my success can’t rise and fall on every performance. Greatness comes on the heels of many mistakes.
I came across a short blog post by leadership guru John Maxwell that focused my weary mind. I suggest you read it here.
Why Mistakes are Good for You
The more you fail, the more you make mistakes, the more you learn.
Matter of fact, the more I talk to successful people the more I hear how many mistakes they’ve made. No one is amazing all the time.
Every “at bat” can’t be a grand slam. Sometimes you barely squeeze a single, strikeout, or get hit by the pitch.
What separates the pros from the amateurs? Your resilience to keep going, to keep leading.
Professional worship leaders don’t base their self worth on Sunday’s performance. Their vision is deeper. They’re more concerned with faithfulness and longevity than they are one amazing performance.
Behind every setback is a stepping stone to greater influence, if you allow it.
Question: When was the last time something went wrong and you wanted to quit? How did you respond? You can leave a comment by clicking here.
Boy did I need to read that today….thanks David! 🙂
It’s a great post for a Monday, David!
There’s an exercise I use in my “Keys to Becoming an Ineffective Worship Leader” teaching. One of the keys is “Tightly connect what you do with who you are” (to be INeffective). Your right hand represents what you do. Your left hand represents who you are. If they’re together, it’s trouble because when you do well, you get proud and when you bomb you feel worthless. The antidote is to keep your hands apart, since God has already established your worth, independent of your ability to produce (which is a bit of a foreign concept here in Lancaster County!)
Well said, Dave. God has established our worth. Love it.
Great post David…as musicians we always and I mean always see what goes wrong. We can stand fully assured that it will go well, only to seem unable to find the right chords. It can be frustrating…aggravating…and down right discouraging. Then when the worship seems like a total flop, there will be that one person who says that God was so real to them that day. Best worship experience ever for them. The awesome thing is that we are who God created. When my 7 year old draws me a picture, I don’t worry about whether it is worthy of a gallery. He created it for me out of love. So that makes it the greatest picture ever! Same way with our worship. We create it for God out of love. What Dad doesn’t like that?
When we feel we’ve done the worst, oftentimes, God moves the most. I suppose he wants us to know what this is all about?
Thanks for sharing this. I feel the same way sometimes, but you can’t let it get to you. Realizing that wanting to quit is not what God would desire is important.
I was reminded of this just yesterday in our worship services. I could barely make a coherent sentence when trying to transition between songs. Glad the service went as well as it did anyway.
Ahh, I hate when that happens! Thankful that God still moves 🙂
Hey David,
“I was ready to quit”.
Maybe a bit of an exaggeration, but I know what you mean. I like to remind myself that ONLY the Holy Spirit has the power to convict and transform.
What a relief!
I know we’ve all been here. You and your team have worked all week on that new tune you think will be the pinnacle of your Worship service and “it will be so great when the entire congregation is singing this chorus and clapping along”…and nothing happens! I know though that as long as our Worship is genuine that no matter what happens, it is pleasing to Him!!