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I've served in a church that took the calendar seriously. We moved through Advent into Christmas, through Lent into Easter, and on into Pentecost, and the preaching followed that shape faithfully, Sunday after Sunday, year after year. If you'd asked me whether this congregation observed the church year, I would...
Years ago, at a church I no longer attend, I remember taking communion on an ordinary Sunday and being undone by it.Nothing dramatic had happened that week. I wasn't in crisis. But I understood, in a way I hadn't quite let myself understand before, what I was holding in my...
I was sitting in on a service once, watching the intercessory prayer.The person leading it had been asked to bring the congregation's needs before God — the community's life, the work of the church, the people in the room who were carrying things the rest of us didn't know about....
I once sat through a service where everything looked right on paper.The worship team was tight. Vocals were strong. The songs were familiar enough to follow — or at least most of them were. The pastor had clearly put hours into the sermon. By any objective measure, the service was...
There have been moments, more than I'd like to admit, where I've stood in the wings before a service knowing I had no business being there.Not logistically. I was prepared. I'd rehearsed the set, the transitions were solid, I knew what the order of service was. The preparation wasn't the...
There's a particular kind of confusion I didn't have words for until I started studying worship theology formally, and it happened to me more than once.I'd lead a set I felt good about. The playing was tight, I was present, I meant every word I sang — and afterward I'd...
A few years ago, I was asked to make sure the closing song "matched" the sermon.The sermon was on grace, or judgment, or restoration — I genuinely don't remember anymore, because I never actually heard what it was about until the preacher stood up to deliver it. No outline beforehand....
I'll be honest with you.After more than twenty years of leading worship, the offering is still the most awkward moment in the service for me.Not because I think it's wrong. Not because I don't believe in giving. But because I've watched it — week after week, from the platform —...
There's a specific feeling I've had more times than I can count.The service is over. The benediction is said — quickly, warmly, the way you say goodbye to a room full of people you love. And then the room clears. Not slowly. Fast. Conversations ignite in the aisles, people check...
For years, my job when selecting the response song after the sermon was simple: match the message.If the pastor preached on grace, I'd pick a song about grace. If the sermon was about surrender, I'd find something that felt like surrender. The criteria was the content of the sermon —...
For years, I picked the opening song the same way.I'd think about the congregation walking in — some still half-asleep, some carrying whatever the week had left on them — and I'd ask myself: what's going to get everyone in the same place, energetically speaking? Something accessible with a strong...
For most of my early years leading worship, I planned by feel.I'd think about the sermon topic, pick songs that matched, and arrange them in whatever order felt right. Fast song to open, something quieter to settle people down, a reflective song before the preacher stepped up. Emotional pacing —...
There's a feeling I've had in certain services that I've never quite known how to name.It's not boredom, exactly. It's more like waiting. You're sitting in the service — or standing at the front — and somewhere in the back of your mind is the sense that the real thing...
A few weeks ago, I was sitting in a Sunday service — not leading, just sitting — and I found myself doing something I almost never do. I was watching.Not the screen. Not the worship leader. I was watching the congregation. The older woman in the third row who had...
I have been a worship leader for more than twenty years. And I still find it strange that the role has a name.Not that the name is wrong. It describes something real — the person at the front of the gathered congregation, choosing the songs, holding the microphone. But when...
I have a confession to make.I love the old hymns. Not just as artifacts or historical curiosities, but genuinely — the density of them, the way a single verse can carry more theology than three contemporary choruses. I grew up singing "How Great Thou Art" and the Doxology and "Be...
I grew up in a tradition that was deeply uncomfortable with the body.Not in a Victorian way, exactly. Nobody was telling us bodies were shameful. It was more — quieter than that. The assumption was simply that real worship happened from the neck up. You engaged your mind. You controlled...
The first time someone told me that drums didn't belong in church, I was nineteen years old and standing behind a kit I'd set up myself.We were a small congregation. College town. Nobody had told me there was a debate. I just thought we were trying to worship.The objection came...
I've been to a lot of services that were designed to produce something.Not just inspire something, or lead someone somewhere — produce something. A response. A decision. A visible moment of transformation. I've led some of those services myself. You can feel the difference in the room. There's a kind...
I walked into a small Episcopal church years ago — just passing through a city, nothing planned — and ended up staying for a communion service I hadn't expected to attend.At some point, the congregation spoke together in words I didn't recognize. I found the page and read along.We do...
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