WORSHIP LEADERS
THE 9 HIGH COSTS OF BEING A DISORGANIZED WORSHIP LEADER ( PART 1 ) | Jon Nicol
True story ... I had a senior pastor who battled me about my messy desk . Occasionally , I ' d clean it up to make him happy . But within a couple weeks , it would be back to looking like a post-apocalyptic landscape of music charts , CDs , and half-read books for my ordination process .
In frustration one day , he finally told me , " I give up !"
Inside I was secretly triumphant ( but acted appropriately sorry for his benefit ). Why ? I ' m not a naturally organized person …
• I ' m a piler , not a filer .
• I fly pretty well by the seat of my pants .
• Why do today what you can put off to tomorrow ?
• If it weren ' t for the last minute , I ' d never get anything done .
And if I ' m not intentionally working at it , I forget things . And lose things . And miss appointments .
But eventually , I learned my disorganization was costing me more than just a messy desk , a forgotten appointment , or a ticked-off senior pastor . If there were a recovery group for people like me , I ' d be the first one to stand up and say , " Hi , my name is Jon , and I ' m an Administratively-Challenged Worship Leader ."
Maybe you wouldn ' t hesitate to join that twelve-step group either . You know you ' re a disorganized dumpster fire .
Or , maybe you may resist seeing yourself like that . You might be thinking , " I ' m neat . Orderly . Punctual . And I don ' t miss appointments . I am not like you and those other disorganized worship leaders , Jon ." You ' re probably not and be thankful . ( It can be a crazy-stressful life .)
But let me challenge you to read this with an open mind . Because some of the disorganizations I ' m going to talk about are overt — like the stuff I mentioned above . But other worship leader disorganizations are subtle . They ' re quiet termites eating away at your team ' s health and effectiveness . And I ' ve met a lot of highly organized worship leaders who still had broken or dysfunctional systems in their ministry .
You may not need a recovery program to overcome a messy desk . But chances are , you ' ve probably got some disorganized processes costing you and your worship team . So , with that caveat in place , let ' s get into The 9 High Costs of a Disorganized Worship Leader . Here we go ...
1 . SET PLANNING The Issue : My setlists weren ' t planned far enough ahead .
Early on in my ministry , I was wildly inconsistent in planning my Sunday music . Sometimes I ' d have it planned out a week or two in advance . Some weeks , my team didn ' t see the setlist until a day before rehearsal .
The Cost : Disorganization hindered practice .
Because of this haphazard approach to planning , my team didn ' t have enough time to practice , so they were still learning their songs at rehearsal . Which , of course , affected the quality of Sunday .
2 . LAST-MINUTE CHANGES The Issue : As a disorganized worship leader , I ' d make a last-minute song change . And if I wasn ' t completely swapping out songs , I ' d change the key . Or change the arrangement . Or make some other " in-the-moment " change at rehearsal .
The Cost : The team decided preparation was pointless .
I had a team member ask / accuse me in frustration , " What ' s the point of practicing before rehearsal if you ' re going to change everything ?!" I tried to rationalize the changes as creativity , or artistry , or being Spirit-led . But the reality is , I was frustrating my team and encouraging them not to practice .
3 . UNCLEAR EXPECTATIONS The Issue : A moving target of team expectations .