Easter morning. Always my favorite worship service. The highest attended service of the year means we’ll have a lot of guests, some who will encounter something of God’s presence for the first time. What a thrill! Several people gave their lives to Christ Sunday morning.
… All this to say that it was hard for me to lead. Even staying on pitch was difficult. It’s like for 20 minutes I stood on the edge of just about losing it. Though I don’t understand and to sort of quote Ricky Ricardo, God has some ‘splaining to do. Or maybe not. Job demanded an explanation but received far from it. …
Sunday morning I had a little extra time at home. Instead of drinking my coffee on the 20-minute drive, I relaxed a bit, sipped my java, and checked out the news on my phone. I saw the headline and read the brief story of how a Christian church service in China was shut down. (You can read it here.) I immediately felt compelled not only to pray for them personally but also to lead our church in praying for them. So I did.
Return to Sender, our youth band, led this past weekend at my church. Primarily, RTS has led every other week at BigGroup, the Sunday evening gathering for youth. The songs we use for the occasional Sunday mornings we lead are the ones we use on Sunday nights, but it seemed the band wasn’t ready. Normally, on Sunday nights we rehearse for about two hours, but on Sunday morning we have 45 or so minutes.
Too much of a good thing? Our set went very well this past weekend. Not only did we have some great songs, but the band members were well prepared. With this particular mix of musicians, I like to feature very upbeat tunes, but we might have included one too many.
The difficult thing about playing in a worship band at church is that the musicians change from week to week like a game of musical chairs. I often try to pair up musicians, particular bassists and drummers, but because of scheduling, it doesn’t always work out. The best bands, however, are those that play together often and for a long time. At church, we’re seldom afforded this luxury.
Musicians are always subject to their sound techs. That’s why when you can find a good one, you hang on like a pit bull—or something like that. When you’re onstage and have your own monitor mix, you really have no idea how things sound in the “house.” All you can do is hope they share your vision for the sound you’re wanting to achieve.
The whole morning just seemed odd. I realized halfway through our set that the houselights seemed quite bright. Usually we bring them down and maybe even more for an acoustic set. I noticed no one on our media ledge manning the light board—a no-show apparently. Bad lighting sure can be a hindrance, like trying to lead worship in the frozen foods aisle at a grocery store.
Worship Community friends, I highly encourage you to invite young musicians to lead with you. In my years of ministry, I’ve seen many kids not only get involved (and stay) in the church but develop a deep relationship with Christ as a result of playing in the band. And that’s really what it comes down to. Otherwise, as is par in the church today, we’ll lose them when they go off to college.
I can’t say enough about Joellen’s humility. It’s not easy for a musician to admit, You can play this better than me. In truth, though she’s been playing piano a lot longer than I have, I’ve been playing in the style longer, and she wants to learn from me. I love musicians who want to keep getting better. For most of us, once we’ve “mastered” something, then the style changes and we have to keep working.