To Lead Others To Worship

I was recently at a Pastor and Leadership Conference in Omaha, Nebraska. This was my third year attending this conference. The first year I went to this conference was my first year committing to leading worship at my home church. It was a year where it seemed like no one was excited much about worship. I remember bringing my guitar and trying to start up an afterglow-type worship session with a few of the other musicians that came to the conference. A small group of us gathered. It was refreshing, but I longed for more people to fall in love with just sitting at Jesus' feet.

I've been praying and watching the Lord do a work. This year was much different. There was a glimpse of the revival I feel the Lord is doing through worship in Bible believing churches. I sat down with a few people with guitars and we started playing. After strumming through a few songs with another brother, I looked around. There were several guitarists, a eukalale, a cajun drummer, a base player and the whole sanctuary was filled with people just worshipping! 

The Lord was speaking to my heart, "You're not needed to serve in this way. Put your guitar down."

I put my guitar away and stepped back and watched and prayed. The Lord was ministering to my heart. He showed me my job as a worship leader is to bring others to Jesus' feet. Once they are there, I have done my job. 

I started to notice other ways I could serve my brothers and sisters as a worship leader, as their worship leader. 

- One brother was playing and I noticed he was being bothered by a guitar next to him. I shot up, moved the guitar out of his way and quickly sat back down unnoticed. 

- Another brother on the base guitar was sitting in a place where others couldn't really hear him and he couldn't see very well. I grabbed his amp and carried it while he carried his guitar to a more prominent position. 

- I noticed a youth girl struggling to keep up with the chords and getting discouraged. I encouraged her to just keep trying and told her this was exactly how I learned to play guitar. 

- I spent the time interceding for the body, for people's hearts, for people's minds. I prayed for unity, skill, excitement, words from the Holy Spirit, encouragement, inspiration for new songs from God's Word we had been studying over the weekend. 

Our jobs as worship leaders isn't to "steal the show", it isn't to play the songs we think are best, it isn't even to always be playing or singing. Our jobs are to lead others into worship. Once they are there, we aren't needed anymore. 

What a glorious feeling it was to be able to serve my home church, my brothers and sisters, my body in this new way!