Leading Worship: What’s Your Preference?

October 18, 2011 by Editor 45 Comments

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As a worship leader one of the tensions that we will consistently manage is the notion of preference.

I’ve noticed over the years that even my own preferences are shaped and changed by circumstances. I’ve never, ever been in a church where preference wasn’t present. Whether it’s talked about, or not, preference is something that is a part of every individual’s experience, and every community’s make-up.

People have certain individual preferences when it comes to the music that we use offer as worship.

volume preferences
style and genre preferences
historical and legacy preferences
length of set preferences
look and style of band preferences
look and style of stage/platform preferences
choir, orchestra or band preferences
and many more I’m sure

It’s not bad that folks have preferences because, well, people are people. If we were all the same, we’d sure be a boring, lifeless group wouldn’t we?

I’ve been in place after place where preference showed up in a very negative way and caused division. People leave churches over preference. People start churches to cater to preference. Churches are segregated and compartmentalized due to preference. Preference isn’t a bad thing. But if it becomes the sole focus of any individual or group it can lead to ugly outcomes.

It’s a pretty common thread in the discussions of worship leaders and ministry team members: It’s hard to please everybody.

Some people say that we should become all things to all men and mix in a little bit of everything. Others say that we should pick one target group and minister well to them. Still others say we should do it the way Peter and Paul did it. Everyone’s got a preference for style and methodology.

Well, believe it or not, I’m actually writing this post as a challenge (and as a reminder) to us who lead in worship to make one preference more important than all the rest. Whether it’s a staff position or a volunteer role. Whether you are in the band or in the tech team. Whether you sing soprano or run the lighting rig…

There’s only one preference that rules them all.

As a leader of people (and as a follower of Christ) my preference is to prefer others above myself.

That starts by putting Jesus first.

God hasn’t called you to the place you are for your own glory. He hasn’t promoted you to your individual place so that you could find eternal fulfillment in being you. Don’t get me wrong, God loves the wonderfully-made and beautiful creation that you are, but as we follow Christ’s lead, it’s clear that we are who we are to bring GOD glory and to do HIS work.

One of the most beautiful and wonderful attributes a Christ-follower can have is that of preferring others.

I’d go as far as saying that if you’re not manifesting that attribute your eyes might not be on Christ and His purpose for your life at the moment.

That being said, how do we as worship leaders prefer others above our own selves?

Do we put out a request box?

Do we cater to and coddle people who only want things their way?

Do we take a poll and lead and sing only songs that the most vocal majority want to hear?

I’m not suggesting that there is only one way to approach this subject. I believe that ultimately many approaches can work as long as the heart of the matter is settled: it’s not about us. It’s about Christ and His Kingdom (which includes serving His people). In fact, I write this today, not to provide an end-all answer, but more to stimulate a bit of discussion.

Please share your thoughts on this matter. Join the discussion in the comments!

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Filed Under: Featured Story, Recent Articles, Worship Leadership, Worship Theology Tagged With: preferenece, worship

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http://profiles.google.com/hitch.on.the.loose Justin Hitchborn

Personally, I have started walking as far away from catering to preference as much as possible. Someone, somewhere will complain about what is done, even if it is in God’s perfect will. My job as a worship arts director is not to cater to folks, but to hear God and do what He says given my current mantle of leadership. It will naturally have my fingerprint on it…it can’t not. I am convinced that the more we collectively focus on what Jesus is doing in our lives, things like genre, volume, legacy and all the rest become much less important.
- http://www.theworshipcommunity.com Russ
  
  Indeed. I’m not an advocate of catering or coddling at all, but I’m also not an advocate of just doing our own thing and calling it art. I think there is a fine balance between the two and it will absolutely look different for different groups of people. I think the key for me, personally, is trying to always fight (myself) for that servant’s heart. Lord, help me serve, serve, serve!
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http://www.SaintLewisMusic.com/ Shannon Lewis

I suppose I cater to preference to a small degree because I feel you need to meet people where they are, however I am NOT at all happy to leave them there, so – to a degree – I also like to defy preference. I like to think that my own worship preferences are informed by the fact that 1.) God says he wants our whole heart, mind, soul, & strength, so corporate worship should encourage deep thought, deep emotion, deep spiritual connection, & physical response, & 2.) worship is one of the only aspects of this life that will continue on indefinitely into eternity, so we should worship in a way that trains us for what we were created to do – i.e., don’t skimp on the corporate worship! ;-)
- Anonymous
  
  Definitely a balance! I like to think of it more as serving the Body (than catering to their preferences). There’s definitely some extreme examples we can use to point out a BAD “serving” of the Body. For example, I love rap music. I always have and I always will… But for me to get up on Sunday mornings and try and lead worship (read: serve the Body) with a bunch of rap songs would probably not go over too well. Haha!
  
  I also love to rock things out and remix the fire out of them, but that wouldn’t go over well. So what does go over well, and why? That’s the ultimate question and the answer WILL BE different at each place of worship AND will be shaped and molded by each worship LEADER’s own personal journey as well!
  
  So, there’s definitely a balance, I think!
http://www.fredmckinnon.com fmckinnon

I “prefer” to lead in such a way that as many people as possible will connect and engage. :-)
- Anonymous
  
  And that my friend is very hard to determine! Who is engaging? What does it look like? How do we evaluate it? Something we’re all wrestling through!
http://www.lynnemodranski.com Lynne

I would say that in that list of “preferences,” some I try to make more “middle of the road” and others I gear toward my preference or what I hear coming from our congregation. Volume, for instance, I tend to keep somewhere in the middle. You can hear yourself in our worship, but you probably don’t feel like anyone two people away can hear. Music selection, set length, and other similar “preferences” are shaped a great deal by my own; however, our praise team (which right now is a band rather than a choir, more out of available talent than preference) brings suggestions to the table, I occasionally bounce ideas off our leadership team in regard to length and components, and when I hear a few people in the congregation tell me that a particular song ministered to them, I’ll tend to put it in the rotation more frequently.

In short, I guess my preferences shape the worship style and music more than any other, but I try to be in prayer as much as possible so the Holy Spirit has a huge hand in the planning.
- Anonymous
  
  I hear you Lynne, I’m not in favor of a worship leader not being who God created them to be. I’m just wrestling around with the ideas of my own personal experiences in which I’ve not had a servant’s heart and/or was stubborn about my own preferences.
  
  I think we can’t help but lead in and through our own strengths, and that is absolutely affected by our own preferences. I think where I’m fighting to get to, personally, is being willing to totally throw my own preferences out the window if it means I can serve better in the place God calls me to. Lord help us!
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http://www.chrisburke.ca Chris Burke

wow.. our pastor talked about this very topic this past sunday.. he’s working through the psalms right now and was really struck with the idea that our worship on Sunday (or any day) is not for us.. it’s for God..

we’ve had a number of complaints over the years about musical preferences (what church doesn’t right)… but our pastor, who has said “we put our music team in place after prayer and consideration, and we believe that God has the people there who are going to do the job right, and glorify God while doing it..

After being really struck on Sunday, he said to the people “if it’s ok with you guys, I’m going to be straight up and real for a second”… “after reading this, all I can think of is.. if you have a problem with music on Sunday, or anything about our service style on sunday, I just don’t care… we don’t gather on Sunday to keep you happy, we gather on Sunday to glorify God, and if you can’t do that, then theres something wrong in your life”

It was such an awesome thing to hear as a worship leader who enjoys hymns AND modern.. I wanted to jump up so many times and say “PREACH IT”.. but that would be glorifying me.. not God
- http://www.theworshipcommunity.com Russ
  
  haha! Preach it! I’ve felt like challenging folks like that many times. I think the key is sensitivity to the culture of your congregation. I’ve been in many places where the pastor would be on the next train out had they mentioned anything like that.
  
  That being said, I appreciate his boldness and pray that he continues to lead well and hears God’s voice! You too!
  
  Blessings!
- http://www.facebook.com/people/Brad-Jahn/1306128397 Brad Jahn
  
  And now every worship leader reading this wants to work for your senior pastor. :-) I’ve taken the stance that I have one audience that I worry about pleasing (God), and one critic that I will actually listen to (my senior pastor). I was called by one and hired by the other, I leave the rest in their hands.
  - http://www.chrisburke.ca Chris Burke
    
    Yea, he really is a great pastor, and one who trusts me and my team very much, and supports us in all the whacky things we try.. I’ve worked at about 6 churches over the past 10 years (intern placements) and I’m glad to be at the church I’m at now (have been here for 6 years).. he’s the best pastor I’ve worked under!
http://www.facebook.com/eric.rokohl Eric Rokohl

Great topic. Its something, as a new worship leader myself, have been dwelling on lately. Our worship pastor (and our church as a whole, for that matter) believes that worship should be a response to God, and so he usually picks a set that has more to do with the sermon topic. He also has a preference toward doing songs that he knows the band likes and he enjoys, because as a musician, it is difficult to show passion and love for God when playing a song that doesn’t inspire you to worship (for whatever reason).

He does, however, have a very open mind to many different persons and genres (if there are different genres of worship music), including original songs from the congregation. A member of our congregation will often take the words of a long forgotten hymn and write his own music to it, and usually put in a chorus if it doesn’t already have one. We’ve done quite a few of those, and what’s cool is that the band has a lot to do with the end compositional process.

Since there are multiple worship leaders in the church for different ministries (overseen by the worship minister, of course) you get different worshipping styles and song selection in the different ministries that work for the different environments. Then new songs and arrangements from those different settings begin to make their way to the other ministries, etc, etc.

When all this converges, its this really cool organic, creative process that allows us not only to grow as musicians, keep a good mix of music, but also keep it relevant to any given sermon so the congregation and rightly respond to God in all His glory.
- http://www.theworshipcommunity.com Russ
  
  Organic! I like! Thanks for joining the discussion, Eric!
- Kendall Clary
  
  i’m definitely with your worship pastor on this one (being a worship pastor myself). worship is about our response to what God is doing in our lives. i always pray about the setlist i choose, and – like your worship pastor – i use the sermon topic/theme as a basis for where to start.
  
  and i love the whole organic process you mentioned. i think i might call on some of our more creative minds to do something like this. maybe bridge that traditional/contemporary gap a bit more.
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http://saywhatyouwill.net Matt Owens

No request box. I check in with our leadership, my pastor, to see how he and the elders are feeling about the direction. They hear from the congregation (more than I do) about worship and they take into consideration preferences, but they also have an idea where they see us moving.
- http://www.theworshipcommunity.com Russ
  
  I like this! I don’t think I’ve ever used a request box either. The closest I’ve come to that is INVITING our team (singers/musicians/etc) to bring new music that they are personally being moved by and engaging with in their own personal worship times. That always seems to bring out some keepers. Some duds too! And by dud I mean, not as a song, but as a song that is useful in the place we’re serving at.
  - http://www.facebook.com/people/Brad-Jahn/1306128397 Brad Jahn
    
    I’ve tried asking the team to bring in songs as well on several occasions. Oddly, no one has ever taken me up on it short of a couple of my older members asking for some MUCH older choruses. I’m with Matt, as long as I’m in line with my Senior pastor’s vision for the church, I don’t worry about it very much.
http://saywhatyouwill.net Matt Owens

Oh, and thanks for the article, Russ. It’s always good for me to make sure I’m not catering only to MY OWN preferences.
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http://www.shoutsfromthewilderness.com Cody Kimmel

I appreciate the point you made about putting the preferences of the church before your own, and I agree to a point. There is a value in projecting your artistic preference and direction in leading a church into a new place they may not be comfortable with for the sake of pointing them to Christ. However, there must be an exegesis of the culture.

Further, I think when it comes to dealing with preferences, we as worship leaders need to figure out what is stuff that can shift depending on the congregational preferences and what needs to be consistent regardless of preferences. Obviously the content and focus being on Christ is something that shouldn’t shift, but what about things like Communion. Some churches may value it more than others, but if you join a church that prefers to not have communion, should you as a worship leader not lead them to it?

There are things that can shift and things that can’t, and we just need to figure out what those things are.
- Anonymous
  
  Thanks, Cody! I’m right there with you on the unshiftables.
Sycamoredave

Generalizations are an interesting but potentially troublesome thing. I feel there is something missing if we try to address preferences without first addressing the heart.

Russ, to get where you are today with your congregation and your role, baby steps had to be taken in your heart, and in the faith experience of the congregation. Preparations had to be made. I’m pretty sure you did not slam dunk an agenda into the scheme of things, but prayerfully and steadily worked to get where you are today. Not everyone is coming from the same place, and to generalize the ideals of dealing with preference may or may not be practical in creating a heart for worship in each of our particular congregations.

In each place and time, God has a way of moving us toward Him in a particular way. You may call it preference, but I would prefer to call it inspiration. Yes, we need to prefer others, and make prayerful choices, but most of all we need to prefer to love and worship God. To that point, there needs to be connection points for people to find meaning, value, and hope. To me, it is a good thing to hear about the things that inspire people to worship, and to find ways to bring that worship alive.
- Anonymous
  
  Thanks for chiming in Dave. You made some great points in your reply. I’m wondering though if you actually read the article? I’m not talking about leaving preferences behind.
  
  I love that you call them “inspiration” – that’s a really positive perspective one what can be fairly negative.
  
  My ultimate question in this article is how can we better learn to PREFER each other above ourselves. From a leadership standpoint that might include putting our own inspirations aside and it might not…that’s what the question is!
  
  Thanks for chiming in!
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Thomas Smeltzer

Hello, my name is Tom. I’ve been worship leader at my church since 2001. The first thing I do is pray that God will guide the song choices. After all, it’s His service. We have an 8:00 traditional service and a 10:30 “not traditional”. We tried a “blended” musical style, but that didn’t fly for long. The 50 or so folks at the early service are quite vocal about wanting ONLY hymns, so, that’s what we offer. I have revived a few songs from the hymnal that were forgotten, and I have introduced some new songs, mainly from Keith Getty and Stuart Townend. Their songs lend themselves easily to a more traditional setting. We used to have a choir and handbells, but now we don’t have enough attending the 1st service. In 2nd service, most anything goes. I have re-arranged hymns with a more upbeat style, since many of our 30-50 crowd grew up on hymns and still value their message. Getty/Townend songs are also well-received, as well as the Tomlin; Baloche; and songs from other various artists. My main concern is message. There is a LOT of what I call fluff on Christian radio that just won’t work for worship.
- Anonymous
  
  Thanks, for jumping in and sharing your perspective, Thomas!
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Leading Worship: What’s Your Preference?

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