It seems that many local church gatekeepers readily applaud ministry that looks like the successes of other churches rather than champion the indigenous creation from their own people. My friends in the business world do this all the time. One company sells computers successfully, so reverse engineering takes place by competitors.  The idea is to emulate the success and hopefully exceed the level of your competition. In church work, our thinking may actually be similar. 

The thought is this: “If a song is popular on the Christian radio station, then surely it will resonate with people in our worship services.” Instead, creative leadership says this: “We need to worship and lead culturally from who we are and from who spiritually we desire to be.” In the first case, no question is asked and answered about the assets and opportunities existing around you. The second idea starts at home then outside content is validated or dismissed. When you are blind to self-awareness the only option left is to copy another’s identity. However, when you know who you are, you set the stage for creativity. 

Why copy? Cut-and-paste creativity is about efficiency. We can download from the Internet complete sermons, including outlines, small group handouts, and polished graphics. We do this, because it is efficient and looks and feels like the successful church we admire. Learning the process and finding inspiration from these incredible ministries and their leaders is a must. Best practices are mined by competent leaders. But, we should never simply copy without full disclosure. If we champion the need for authenticity, should not that value steer us to create rather than emulate?

Inspiration and mastery calls us to create. Ambition or fear drives us to cut and paste. Most have the best intentions. To reach a community is the heart of most pastors I know, but fear of letting go of the process to reach those people narrows the bandwidth of the local church. What if people not like us actually become leaders and start steering things? That fact is inevitable. Time offers us a shelf-life. Legacy is ours to own or abdicate. Would we want to lose our legacy to the creative energy of leaders who have no personal relationship with us?

Failure has value. When we copy another’s success, we lose our ability to fail with our own creativity. This one fact alone stalls us! Innovation allows mistakes that we choose to make, not that others prescribe for us. The trendy church culture is gullible, fickle and ever-changing. Songs, sermons and personalities are fluid. A church needs to birth from their identity to be a force that lasts. If we pass on anything, it should be who we are. If we do not know how to answer that question, then perhaps passing on is not an issue to us. We live in the now, and worship the god of efficiency.

One of the most important reasons to blog is the community aspect of it. Those of us who work as volunteer and staff leaders in churches, as I have over the years, have places to go to discuss, learn and grow. This week I am featured in three blog posts on copyrightcommunity.com where I write a bit about copyrights from the perspective of church leaders.

Go and check out the first one dealing with ethics of copyrights in the church: View from Both Sides of the Table.

Dunn & Wilt are special guests debunking myths about Christmas worship and more. WorshipMythbusters also celebrates 12 Episodes and its 12th month! Woo hoo!

Go and get the podcast!

Head on over to WorshipMythbusters.com to Episode 11 and enter the CD give away of Rita Springer’s new CD “The Play List” which has been having great reviews. Ever wonder if there are some fresh tunes for the women who lead worship? You will find some answers in this CD. Also, I give a tribute on mentorship. Happy Thanksgiving!

RECAP: This past weekend was busy with Emilie singing at a local Temecula event and then her leading worship with me at Chorus Church in French Valley, CA. This was our first time leading at Chorus Church and after partnering with Eric Beeman on the School of Worship last month we were happy to fill in for him as worship leaders. Eric took the Sunday off, by the way, to run in Race for the Cure.

Working with volunteer musicians is always a challenge and always rewarding. The group did a great job preparing and their media guy treated me well, even buying me a Starbucks for the morning. Of ourse, we will not mention how he accidentally spilled it.(Sorry Tim, you are awesome by the way!) Well accidents happen, and when you are renting a school like Chorus Church does you have to be prepared. And, they were!

Dave Reynolds, their pastor, delivered a challenging message out of Nehemiah chapter 2. “In order to give, something’s got to give.” There is a cost, and sometimes it might mean when you follow God you can’t do your other priorities at all. We all hear messages on how we put God first, but not often on how we just put God and nothing else. You will have to download the sermon to fully get the point, I think.

On top of leading worship, Emilie shared her newly recorded song “Turning This Town Upside Down” which is off her new EP. It seemed tie in great with the message.

SET LIST: When you are itinerate as a worship leader, you rely heavily on the host church’s set list. Here is what Eric helped me come up with. Songs are listed with artist/worship leader who recorded the version we used:

• Our God – Chris Tomlin
• Your Love Never Fails – Jesus Culture.
• Amazing Grace (My Chains Are Gone) – Chris Tomlin
• Lead Me To The Cross – Hillsong
• Turning This Town Upside Down – Emilie Kirkpatrick

LINKS:

• Chorus Church Facebook
• Emilie’s EP Release Party Link (She is being hosted by Chorus Church!)
• The Worship Community set lists

How was your worship weekend?

At The Forge Conference in Ocean Grove, New Jersey we recorded a LIVE version of Worship Mythbusters! The panel was made up of worship leaders and speakers from the conference. Episode 10: The Myth of the Happy Clappy.

When Joel Klampert said I had to come to the New Jersey Shore and help with The Forge Conference, I immediately knew it would be something unique. Joel is unique. I had never met a worship leader from Rhode Island like him! (Actually, he is also the only worship leader I knew from there.) And, the vision of this conference to serve the smaller local church and challenge out-of-box thinking resonated with me and the seasons I have spent in church planting. The diversity of backgrounds from liturgical, charismatic, Messianic, baptist to modern worship stretched the pallet and enriched the environment like no other conference on worship I have ever attended.

Here are some highlights from my perspective:

• I was led in worship by and jammed in the late night worship with a dulcimer player and worship leader Dan Wilt and was moved deeply by Jeremy Dunn and Dan Wilt’s liturgical-yet-modern time of worship.
• Facilitated the WorshipMythbusters.com podcast live with an amazing panel on the topic: The Myth of the Happy Clappy. It seemed this and the other open forum panel encouraged me to continue and hone what I do with my podcast and other teaching settings about worship.
• Taught a WorshipMythbusters.com session in an 1880s chapel where the song “Great is Thy Faithfulness” was first sung. The religious history of Pilgrim Way, the Victorian architecture, the helpful staff of Ocean Grove all were appreciated and made for a terrific setting.
• John Voelz’s talk about indigenous worship hit a chord with me. He and the other Key Note guys were on fire!
• My daughter and I with Joel Klampert and Shannon Lewis lead worship together in a very meaningful session where all the attendees were prayed over and sent out.
• I LOVE people from New England. Their accent and sarcasm is almost as good as some of us from the Left Coast.
• Yes, my daughter Emilie was with me and that made the travel and the conference just that much more meaningful.
• The attendees: The top highlight was how encouraged I was by meeting, chatting and praying with worship leaders as we swapped stories.

I made a decision before I ever was a professional minister in the local church to serve in the church as a family. My parents modeled that, and as I was courting my dear love as a young adult we forged an agreement that we had to learn to do ministry together if we were to marry. That was back when cell phones were coming of age and before Facebook existed.

 Ministry is a family business. From church plants to megachurch employment, my family has always seen it this way. Sometimes it has been on the stage with me in front of thousands singing together, or in quiet places like our living room praying with dear friends. My wife has ran sound and tech in a church plant as well as filled the role of leadership in children’s ministry. She has been the “tentmaker” in lean times, working to pay our bills on top of all of this.

Years ago, a mentor and influencer of mine shared how he kept his family involved in his creative arts ministry. The thinking was since holidays were often times of heavy hours, why not include his wife and kids in the very ministry where he was spending those hours. One could sing, one could paint sets and all of them could be together. I took his advice and never regretted it, even though I knew some could never understand this decision.

People resent talent. There, I said it. When I discovered my own girl could sing I allowed her–as I did any young person with talent–to join our worship team. She grew in the process and people were blessed by her leadership of worship along my side. Of course, some people chose to see this as a threat. Sometimes serving as a family has a down side. We have experienced that first hand.

In other cases, a lead pastor’s spouse is treated either as someone who has to be at every function or banned from any official input. Why not come up with a way institutionally to help facilitate what we all know already exists? Many resent that a spouse has influence they do not possess. Is there not a way to help support the gifts and call of a ministry leader’s spouse and family that neither excludes them from the organizational structure or healthy boundaries?

A healthy situation will see to it that the gifts and call of each member of that ministry family is empowered. Unhealthy situations will make these issues taboo to even mention and use institutional policy and politics to wet blanket God’s unique calling to a family set apart for longterm, vocational service. When a minister’s family misbehaves or things go awry it is pretty messy, too. But, if our institutions are about keeping things smooth and not about the people in them I believe they have failed.

Ministry should be a family business for all of us. Sometimes one of us is out front. Sometimes, not. But, if we are to raise up others for works of service, should that not also include our own spouse and children? This thick tension to live this out as a family exists not because of bad intentions but because of institution-over-people thinking. And, what does being a professional minister mean anyway?

 RECAP: This past weekend was full of worship! I had the privilege of teaching a Worship Mythbusters session and leading worship at the School of Worship at Chorus Church on Saturday and Sunday was part of the Rancho Community Church Murrieta campus worship team. 

Eric Beeman of Chorus put together the School of Worship conference. We had people as far as Bakersfield attend. My daughter and I led worship with Eric, Karl and the “panel” worship team and were able to share our original music that night. Emilie did a great job, and it was rich to sit in with these talented worship leaders.

At Rancho Murrieta with Chad and the team, I had my first opportunity to join this band on the keys. I have led worship at their main campus and played keys there, so these guys are like family to me. Like always, this team is well prepared and I thoroughly enjoyed being on their team this weekend!

SET LIST: Here are the songs from the two worship sets I was a part of.

School of Worship, September 24

• Here For You
• Sweetly Broken
• You Love Never Fails
• Lead Me To The Cross
• Spirit Fall

Rancho Community Church, Murrieta, September 25

• Freedom is Here
• Desert Song
• Arms Open Wide
• You Won’t Relent
• Sing To The King

Links: Here is some info related to this post.

• The Worship Community Set Lists from all over!
• Rancho Community Church, Chorus Church
• School of Worship
• Emilie Kirkpatrick music page
• Worship Mythbusters

EPISODE 9 of Worship Mythbusters is LIVE! I had an energetic discussion with my good friend Jeremy  Blasongame about church tech and all things in the “booth”.