Being a Good Guest
•To encourage people to participate, choose songs they know. Be careful of using more than one new song in a set, and make sure it is quickly accessible.
•To enable people to sing with you, it will help to choose accessible keys. What vocally works for you might not work for the people.
•If you want people to listen to you sing, say so, and tell them why.
•To inspire people to follow you, tell them where you are going. Have a theological plan; don’t just choose songs that groove well together. And remember to look at them once in a while.
•To add some aesthetic interest, try to incorporate a variety of styles in an assortment keys.
•To help people to engage, provide several avenues of response. Do more than simply “stand and sing.”
•To get people to think as well as to feel, beware of aimless repetition.
•To arrive at an authentic response, remind people why you want them to stand, kneel, raise hands, clap, etc. Don’t assume, and if you don’t know the “why,” go do your homework.
•To lead people to marvel, rejoice, repent or praise, incorporate the Scriptures for guidance. Be inviting, but don’t demand that they feel what you feel.
•To model worship, sprinkle your prayers and transitions with the various attributes of God. Don’t just rely upon the lyrics.
•If you care more about the people than the platform, design worship for the seats, not the stage.
Got any other ideas? Want to share things you’ve learned? Please do so in the comments below.
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It is curious to me that worship leaders in contemporary churches don’t include melody with text when using overhead projectors. Many church goers are note readers and do not do well trying to learn a new song by rote. It is very disturbing and excludes them from participating in worship. It should be a simple matter to download the melody line with text from CCLI. If this was done fewer people would be leaving small churches that switch to praise music trying to attract young people. I’ve seen this happen repeatedly. Even young people benefit from seeing notes. This to me is another indication of the dumbing down of America. Can you explain why this isn’t done?
Bobbi-
It’s a bit more complicated than this, but the simple answer to your question is copyright.