Worship Musician February 2018 | Page 26

PLANNING CENTER ONLINE [ 5 REASONS WORSHIP MINISTRY LEADERS USE PCO | Brendan Prout ] There may be no magic silver bullets in worship prepare privately and show up ready to engage & youth ministry, deacons, pastors & elders, ministry, but there is PCO. corporately. Being able to upload mp3’s of trustees, security team, teachers & speakers) songs (easily transposed into the actual key on the same page together so that everybody Planning Center Online helps a ministry of any we’re playing the song in) proves incredibly knows what is supposed to happen and when, size become better organized and prepared, helpful for personal preparation. Additionally, resulting in a more unified spirit. As Amos 3:3 communicate better, reduce the administrative PCO establishes a library to post and link to asks, “How can two walk together unless work that is a drag for many leaders responsible charts, they’re in agreement?” for herding cats, erm... creatives, artists, tutorial resources, click tracks, and the overall techies and musicians, and it promotes unity in map of the service. arrangements, documents, video When everybody is on the same page, we the Body of Christ. support every area of ministry better. When we provide the ability to prepare better, Here are 5 Reasons why effective worship and communicate a culture of individual SCHEDULING ministry leaders use PCO: ownership in practicing better, as a team we PCO streamlines scheduling so that it is not the perform better. monster that eats all my time. When we train COMMUNICATION Churches have the team to use the calendar blackout dates multiple streams of communication, with far-reaching possibilities in ways we disseminate information: Facebook groups, group texts, emails, private web forums, phone calls, church bulletins, social media apps... and too many options means there are many chances for necessary details to get lost or ignored. PCO provides an effective platform for our ministry team members to use one common means of communication, ensuring fewer drops in the information stream. When we insist on just one means of communicating – no more group texts about scheduling, no more telephone game (Mary Sue asked me to tell you that she won’t be able to be here on Thursday...) – the result is no more missed and respond quickly to requests, scheduling When my focus as a leader becomes uber fast, allowing us to focus on the more important (and fun) aspects of leading a worship team. Using PCO allows me to minimize administrative time and prioritize spiritual and musical preparation, far more can be on big fruitful pursuits. picture elements of worship When my focus as a leader can be on big picture elements of worship rather than on the minutia of scheduling, our team benefits from rather than on the better focus and the whole church is better for it. the minutia of scheduling, our UNITY team benefits... and love as we seek to live out Jesus’ vision for connections, which is a huge time saver and We desire to be united in heart, mind, spirit, His Church. Using effective methods and tools, such as PCO provides, gives us the ability to do stress reliever for the typical person responsible all that we do better each Sunday to bless one for a worship ministry. PCO is incredibly good CENTRALIZATION at making this happen. There are myriad resources out there for another in our local church. learning songs, making it challenging to get When we do all that we do with the achievable When we communicate expectations better, everyone on the same page. PCO provides vision of being unified in heart and spirit, God we see expectations met better. the ability to collect what is most helpful for the is glorified and His local church is better for it. team and put it in one place, so we provide PREPARATION a clear vision of each part, each song, each PCO allows a worship leader to put all the tools set, and each service. Using PCO brings our in one place for every member of the team to whole ministry team (ushers, greeters, children 26 February 2018 Brendan Prout Husband, dad, pastor, and worship leader. He loves training and equipping others to do the work of ministry they are called to, all things geeky, coffee, good food, cars, and not driving off cliffs anymore. WorshipMusician.com