#10 Rock & Roll

We’ve all been services that go on and on and on and on and on.  Sometimes pastors are the primary cause, presenting sermons that have not been through the rigor of content and substance review and as a result are long winded indulgent affairs.

The next worst thing to an overly wrong sermon is a worship leader who sticks to their ‘order of worship’ like union safety officer on a building site: to the letter of the law.  Murphy’s law states that on days when a preacher clocks up a Mother-of-All-Sermons the worship leader has scheduled at least 4 songs for the closing ‘bracket’.

I have instituted an award which I gleefully hand out to my fellow staff.  The Mother-of-All-Sermons award is a laminated and framed certificate which offenders are given when they clock up the longest sermon for the year.  The current certificate is displayed in a prominent place in our office area to remind the offender of his heinous crime, a 40 minute epic in an evening service where 15 is the rule of thumb.

I love worship leaders who have the confidence and awareness to rock and roll with whatever is happening, and to abbreviate or even extend where necessary.  Editing on the fly is a competency that I appreciate greatly.  On many occasions it has given more time to a situation where important processes have been underway, and at other times has cut short disasters and given relief to the longsuffering.

Good worship leaders recognize that an ‘order of service’ is just a list on a piece of paper.  It has no divine authority and it does not have to be obeyed.

To all those worship leaders who have had mercy on me after being flagellated by a long service - thank you.  To all those worship leaders who have sensed the moving of the Spirit and kept us focusing on what God has been doing amongst us, thank you.

To all those worship leaders who regard a list as merely a list - you are genius.  Thank you!.