The line between rockstar and worship leader seems to be getting closer and closer in our culture.
We consumers travel from concert to concert, album to album in search of the latest greatest talent.
Because of this, we can almost equate worship ministry as a talent show. Whoever has the greatest, most crowd-pleasing talent leads the best worship.
Today, we’re going to strip it all away and look at worship ministry at its foundation. What if worship ministry was more of a local, pastoral calling than it was a platform for your gifting?
My church has a strong calling to plant other churches. When we plant a church, we define a pastor who is called to serve a certain community. They build a launch team, develop relationships, and serve a city. They are called, planted, rooted, grounded in a city.
What if worship leaders saw themselves in this way? That they were called to a certain place? That they were more than just musicians who make the service more interesting. But that they were a pastor, called to pastor people?
I have a feeling that we need more pastoral musicians than we need rockstar musicians. We need more worship pastors than simply worship leaders. Worship leaders lead music. Worship pastors lead people. We need leaders ready to disciple.
3 Worship Leadership Essentials
So let’s dive into these worship ministry essentials.
1. They Lead People – Great worship pastors don’t just lead music or songs or services. They lead people. That changes how they approach a worship service. It’s not a matter of rocking out to a few songs or playing excellent transitions.
It’s about knowing who they serve. It’s about communicating well with the room. It’s about engagement and trust.
2. They Love People – Loving people may not come naturally to you. But the best worship pastors ask God for His heart for their people. They pray, “Give me a passion for your people in this city. Let me feel the burden that you have for them, O God.” As a good friend of mine said recently, it’s about “seeing the story” in people. This love then influences the way they lead worship.
Worship leading isn’t an “opportunity” for the worship leader, it’s a way to serve God’s people in their pursuit of God. When you know the pain and joy your people are acquainted with, you better know how to plan your worship services.
3. They Build People – It’s not about building a name. It’s about building influence. Great worship pastors are invested in building up the people around them. They seek to grow musicians. They seek to raise up other worship leaders. They give people opportunity. They have a “system” of discipleship. They’re not simply focused on their own talent development.
I love how Derek Webb put it in my most recent podcast:
“Great Worship Leaders should be so wrapped up and intimately acquainted with the sorrow, the joy, the struggle, and the longer narrative arcs of their local community that they know exactly how to curate the songs that are going to be sung by those people.”
Here’s my challenge: begin to focus less on your music, creativity, and innovation for now. Focus more on people – leading, loving, and building them. You may discover a pastoral passion you never knew you had.
Question: What would you say is the defining mark of a worship pastor? You can leave a comment by clicking here.
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Love this post David. I’m going to share it with a lot of people. Some may think this post is only for paid staff, but imagine a worship team where everyone embraced their role as a pastor (shepherd) of the congregation and their teammates.
You’re right, Chris. This is a mindset we all need to adopt! Thanks for sharing 🙂
To answer your question (What is the defining mark of a worship pastor?), I would add a fourth point – They are real people.
When I was a kid, I thought it was odd that folks were nervous around the pastor of our church. They stood there, smiling, hands folded in front of them, saying nothing at all. They would laugh if something funny was said, but it was that awkward “should I be laughing” kind of laugh. Eyes darted to other people to see how they were reacting/interacting with him. Sadly, most of them couldn’t tell you what he liked to do outside the church though. What are his hobbies, where does he like to go for vacation, what team does he root for? He was the “pastor”, not a real person.
I asked my Dad one time, “Why do people act so weird around Pastor George?”. I can still hear his response – “Because they’re afraid he’ll see through their charade.” That didn’t make much sense to a 10 year old, but today it makes perfect sense. Most people act differently at church than they do at home, work or at play. For some reason there are things you cannot do or say at church that are perfectly fine elsewhere. That doesn’t make sense to me. If there is anywhere you can ‘be yourself’, shouldn’t it be at church?
For example, my wife and I are huge Alabama fans and our pastor is a huge Tennessee fan. That provides ample opportunity for us to rip on each other at every possible moment, especially with college football season looming. This past Sunday he walked in wearing a Tennessee Orange button down shirt, so I said, “Dude, that’s the ugliest shirt I’ve ever seen”. He commented on how lovely it was and told me he had another one I was welcome to borrow. I was a 5 second encounter that is typical for us. Several of the people standing around gasped and gave me a nasty look. It was a look of horror, shocked that anyone would talk to the pastor that way! Really?
Pastors are real people. I think that is especially true of worship pastors, as leading music has a way of exposing our soft creamy center. In my opinion, worship pastors should go out of their way to make sure the folks in their church know that we are real people – we should be the same person Sunday on stage that we are on Tuesday at work and home. Be their pastor, lead them, but show them that I’m no different than they are. I’m just a guy/gal, same as you, I just happen to be the one behind the mic.
Granted, the main issue is that folks cannot allow their pastor to be a real person because they aren’t one. If you’re faking your way through church each week, you probably should be nervous around your pastor.
This is helpful, Damon. It’s funny how much of a conversational bomb I drop when I tell people I’m a “pastor”. They don’t know how to respond 🙂
I love this post! a Worship Pastor shepherds and equips the people and the one who is a manifestation of God’s justice and righteousness. A man whose heart is broken before the Lord. We should be transparent on other peoples’ sight so that Jesus is the only one that can be seen in us. Another thing, I remember Joel Houston exhorts about Amos 5:22-24, he stresses that we’ll be missing the true point if we’ll limit ourselves in the four corners of the church building, we have a social responsibility. It is our mission to show the world who Jesus is. This post is my favorite. More power to u Dave!
So good, Marc. Thanks for sharing this!