Have you seen the news headlines this week?
It seems Christmas is coming early this year (or at least Christmas shopping is!). More and more stores are planning to open their doors for “Black Friday” before the Thanksgiving turkey has even been carved on Thursday.
Now – whether you’re for it, against it, or could care less, it does tell us one thing. Read more
I just have a minute this morning, but wanted to share a quick leadership lesson I taught to a group of Top-Notch Pastors last week at an event I spoke at.
Here goes…
Question: Do you want your services to be better this week than they were last week?
(I know… silly question).
Of course you do… we all want to see our services improve (i.e. better musically, better transitions, less distractions, more opportunity for life-transformation).
Here’s the thing:
The key to making THIS Sunday’s service better is to look at LAST Sunday’s service first. At The Journey, we call this the Service Debrief. Here’s what you do. Read more
Merry Christmas!
That’s what the over-sized Snowman in Home Depot said two weeks ago when I walked in.
My family and I just laughed. The Christmas trees, snowmen and blow-up lawn Santas were right there beside the ghosts, witches and Halloween candy.
I bet you’ve seen the same thing, too!
And while it may seem strange to see Christmas decorations out SO early, it’s NOT too early to start planning your Christmas services. Read more
If you’re like me, when you read that phrase you immediately think of at least one person on your team. You can see their face right now, can’t you?
Whether they are late to rehearsal, set-up, the Sunday service, Small Group, their own wedding, or whatever else may be on the calendar, some members of your team (and mine) have a Punctuality Problem.
It turned Fall last week . . . not here in South Florida where it’s still blazing hot, but nonetheless Fall began for almost everyone else in the Northern Hemisphere.
It’s hard to believe, but the changing of the season from Summer to Fall reminds us that this year is 75% done.
Seems like just yesterday I was ringing in the New Year and asking God to do more in me and through me this year than ever before. Now here we are with just a few months left in 2013.
This is the time of year when you and I need to do TWO VERY IMPORTANT THINGS: Read more
Last week we started a quick 2-week series on the Pastor / Worship Leader Relationship by talking about what every Pastor needs from their Worship Leader.
This week we turn the tables and I want to talk to Pastors about what your Worship Leader needs from you. And if you’re a worship leader, feel free to print this out and “accidentally” leave a copy on your Pastor’s desk :-).
As I have always said, the most important relationship inside the church is the relationship between the Pastor and Worship Leader. But it’s also a relationship that can hold a lot of tension. That tension MOST LIKELY comes from one specific thing: Read more
It’s 30 seconds to service start time. The pre-service music is playing. You and your worship team take the stage. You’ve worked hard to prepare for this moment… selecting and memorizing music, leading rehearsal, arranging the slides in ProPresenter, and even one last time through the music at sound check this morning.
A final check to make sure you’re instrument is tuned. You give a thumbs up to your team to let them know you’re ready for a great opening worship song. The lights come up and…
As a worship leader you pour your heart into preparing the music, but do you take time to think about what you will say before the music even begins? Read more
“On it’s best day, ministry is hard.”
That is the advice my Pastor shared with me when I first started in ministry, and it’s true.
God has called us to no easy task. It’s hard work on it’s best day. And I don’t even want to talk about it’s worst day!
This is one of the biggest misconceptions about ministry. That since it’s God’s work it’s always fulfilling, fascinating, and fun. But a year into ministry and you realize that while it is all of those things sometimes, it’s not all of those things all the time.
When you’re short on budget, short on volunteers, short on time, and short on enthusiasm, ministry can be anything but fun. Read more
Conflict happens!
(I know… tell me something I don’t know). And worship teams are not immune.
The truth is you can’t prevent conflict on your team (sorry – we’re all human and we all make mistakes). But just because it can’t be avoided, doesn’t mean that we can’t minimize it’s effects on our team by dealing with it quickly.
There’s a ministry rule that I learned a long time ago, and that has saved me countless hours of heartache as a Worship Pastor. The rule is simply this: Run to conflict!
Whenever conflict arises we have two choices: Read more