Worship Leaders, Time to Take a Break!

This blog is for worship leaders. You know who you are, many of us have been guilty of this. We have been leading worship for our home church's music ministry for YEARS now. Every Sunday faithfully, we've gotten up early, setup the sound gear, tuned, plug in chords, picked songs, printed sheet music, etc. etc. etc. I'm talking to you! It's time to take a break! Here's why...

There are many of us who have been begrudgingly or sincerely serving this role for many years. That's great. But guess what--you need to take a break, retreat, step down, move on or at bare minimum, take a breather.

Right now, many of you are in denial, thinking, "I'm fine", or, "What will my church do without me", or, "Who else will do it", or, "We've been surviving this long so...".

Here's a few reasons why you NEED to take a break:

1. Nurturing Future Leaders.
While it's great that you have taken it upon yourself to take the lead for the past 2, 5, 10, 20, 30+ years, the ripple effect of you doing this is that it has not opened the ability for other people's gifts to be nurtured or utilized.

No one else has come forward to offer to serve because there hasn't been a perceived need. If you step down for a month, six months, or a year, this need will become apparent. As worship leaders, we should be mentoring and nurturing other budding leaders. We should be sharing what we've learned, to crop up others who will also be able to help build up the body of Christ. If it becomes just about "US", than that is pride and ego. There's no room for that, and it impedes our ability to implement God's will.

By nurturing other leaders and talents, your community will flourish, and when you decide you want to take a breather, there will be bodies available to willingly and competently lift that burden from you.

2. Mental Health.
I was a worship leader at my home church for seven years straight. Every Sunday. I got burnt out, and didn't realize it. There were Sundays I did not want to be there. My wife and I realized we hadn't gone to church together, as a family, for seven years. So I stepped down (for a year), and I struggled. It was hard for me to let go of a certain standard I had built for myself with regards to quality, music selection, arrangement, etc. However, I believe that God was using this experience to teach me a lesson. He wanted me to experience what worship was like, when, by my standards, the music sucked, when the preacher was boring, when the people seemed less friendly than I had hoped. He wanted me to experience a church community as an "average Joe", rather than a celebrity leader (like many pastors and worship leaders become in their home church). God wanted me to experience church as a husband and a father. He wanted me to realize WHY and WHAT it is that "church" is all about in the first place, and the unbalanced dependency these superficial musical distractions had made.

We retreat to take a step back, to evaluate how things are going, to see where we need to grow, and what's not working. We can't do this effectively, while still going forward in full force. The retreat process requires a change of pace. Perhaps God is calling you to serve in other areas. Maybe he has other plans for you, or wants you to nurture some other gift(s) he has given you... We don't know this until we retreat.

3. Spiritual Health.
Only worship leaders will fully understand this: LEADING worship is very different from participating in worship. Both are blessed, however, each blesses in different ways. As a worship leader, if you are not taking the opportunity to just participate in worship, than you are probably not being nurtured spiritually in all the ways you should/could be.

Many times leaders lead, and that's all they do. But a good leader, always has a mentor, someone they can learn from, someone who leads them. If you don't have a mentor, someone pouring into you, someone guiding you, keeping you accountable, find that resource immediately. The people you are leading will typically only grow as far as their leader is capable of guiding them. Don't become spiritually stagnate. When things get comfortable, it's time to stretch. Stretching is always uncomfortable. Step outside of your comfort zone.

If you don't have a vibrant relationship with your Saviour, if you're not disciplined in your faith, and continually growing, you're not going to be as an effective leader as you can, as God wants you to be.

4. For the Congregation's Sake.
You're amazing, and God bless you for all you do. But guess what, there are other people who do some things better than you (OUCH--ego burst!). Maybe you excel in one particular area--that's great. As a leader you need to be considering what is best for the people you have been entrusted to lead. So what do you do? Bring in other leaders from time to time. Let your congregation experience development in other areas. Grow leaders from within your own community to supplement, and grow your own talents. No matter how amazing you are, or think you are, you aren't the best at absolutely everything, nor will you be. That's why we are the body of Christ, many members, given each different unique gifts and talents to use and share, to build each other up, to glorify our Creator.

If you have been leading for a while. Take a step down, maybe a month, maybe a year. Discern where God wants you and where he wants you to grow. Finally, as someone who has benefited, grown and been fed by many great leaders over the years, THANKS for all you do! Continue to put your whole self, the best of your abilities, into how you serve God.