5 Neglected Habits Realized By A Recovering Worship Leader
For those of you that don't know, 2 and a half months ago I resigned from my position as full-time worship pastor at the church I was leading at.
And that resignation marked the start of the longest break I've had from leading worship (and leading in a church in general) since I first started 13 years ago.
In the course of one week, I abruptly transitioned from leading worship multiple times every week, working on "church stuff" every day, and showing up to church every Sunday morning at 7:30am TO not leading worship at all, finding myself relieved of the plethora of small church struggles and responsibilities, and being able to roll into church 5 minutes before the service starts.
And it's been quite the transition...
But, through this transition period, I've had an extended amount of time to reflect on my first 13 years of ministry.
And there has been a lot of good over these past 13 years: personal and spiritual growth in a way I never imagined I would experience, confidence in God's calling on my life, and lifelong friendships with the people I got to serve alongside.
(Perhaps we'll have a chance to celebrate those in a future post…)
On the other hand, during this period of reflection, I've identified some of the things that I didn't get right over these past 13 years.
And what I realized was: your life is what you do EVERY DAY. Life is not ONE big event.
It's the millions of small choices you make along the way. It is the habits that you form and commit yourself to.
And there have been a lot of good habits that, by the grace of God, I've been able to develop over the years.
But, I've also neglected a few key habits that would have helped me lead better and WILL help me lead better should I choose to embrace them in my next season of ministry.
And it's those neglected habits that I think will be most beneficial for YOU to hear.
So, heed these warnings and learn from my mistakes.
Here are 5 habits I realized I neglected while recovering from being a worship pastor:
1 | Ministry to family and friends
I've heard it said time and time again: "If you lose your family, you lose your ministry."
And, while that didn't really happen to me, I think the neglecting of familial ministry was something I teetered on the edge of throughout my time serving in a church.
It's easy to think (I'm speaking to you young men and women!) that that adage is only true for married, 40-year-old pastors with kids.
Surely, it doesn't applied to single 20-somethings!
We've got all the time and freedom in the world, right? So, let's just keep pouring ourselves into our church responsibilities - keep our foot on the gas pedal - and never look back.
But what I realized is that, when you fail to pour into relationships with your friends and family (whether wife, husband, mother, father, sister, brother, or children), you miss out on one of the key pieces that God has created to sustain you through your ministry!
The hierarchy of relationships in ministry is as follows:
1 | God
2 | Family
3 | Church
But, all too often, we shuffle those pieces around and move church to the top and family to the bottom.
So, consider these question:
1 | How have you been ministering to and connecting with your family and friends this past year?
2 | Do you spend more time thinking about meeting your church's needs than you do your family’s and friends’?
It's not that it's wrong to serve your church - we're supposed to do that too.
But, the best way to serve your church is to make sure that you have the foundation of your life set on solid ground so that you can continue to serve in ministry for the long-run.
2 | One-on-one time with God
Truth: your time spent preparing to lead the people of your church is not the same as personal one-on-one time with God.
This is something that I struggled to get right over the past several years.
Because the thing is, when you sit down to prepare your speaking transitions for Sunday or a sermon or a small group Bible study - it can look a lot like spending one-on-one time with God.
It's got all of the trademark characteristics: you've got your Bible, you're studying it, and you even pray!
But, here's the danger: your preparation for leading others, if done correctly, is focused on how you can best serve THEM.
You take the Word of God, find the truth in it, and then figure out how it applies to the lives of the PEOPLE YOU'RE LEADING.
And sure, you'll probably get something out of the process too.
But, it's not the same as you sitting down by yourself reading the Bible for no other reason than to receive for yourself.
Quickly your "one-on-one times with God" become filled with thoughts of how you can use that verse to set up a song on Sunday, or how it applies to the single mom in your church, or how so-and-so really needs to receive that truth.
Your focus on other's eventually becomes the demise of your personal relationship with God.
A starving chef can't feed their dinner guests forever - they'll eventually collapse from exhaustion.
A starving pastor can't feed their church forever - they'll eventually collapse from exhaustion.
So, consider this question:
1 | When was the last time you read your Bible simply to receive for YOURSELF? Not to prepare to lead anyone. Just a true meaningful conversation between you and God?
3 | True deep rest
I'll subtitle this point: "But I take a Sabbath every week!"
Because I did.
I was so intentional about taking at least a day off every week.
It was honestly one of the things that I was MOST concerned about in ministry - I didn't want to burn out.
And yet, over the course of 13 years of taking one day off a week, I found myself... exhausted.
How could I be tired when I consistently took a day off?!
It was because there is a massive difference between a day off and TRUE DEEP REST.
What I realized was that my days off were like when your cellphone is at 10% battery and you have to leave to go somewhere in 30 minutes.
So, you plug your phone in until you have to leave and it gets up to 50% but it never gets fully charged.
That was me.
I never burned out because I always recharged myself to 50%.
But 50% sucks! It's only half as good as 100%.
I suspect, like myself, most worship leaders are stuck leading at 50%.
And you know what? I don't think you can maintain 100% by only taking 1 day off a week.
Sure, that's the regular rhythm. But, if you haven't noticed, ministry is hard!... and tiring!
If you want to reach 100%, you need to take a PROLONGED break, put yourself on the proverbial charger for more than 30 minutes, and experience TRUE DEEP REST.
What's TRUE DEEP REST actually look like? Here are a few thoughts:
1 | It lasts for a minimum of 3 days but is probably best experienced through a 7 day break
2 | It means ALL of your responsibilities are covered during your time of rest in a way where you don't have to worry about whether they'll be covered or not
3 | It involves you doing whatever "fills you up" - that's different for everyone:
- For some of us, it's reading.
- For others, it's traveling.
- For me, it's sitting down with a pour-over coffee staring out the window doing absolutely nothing.
So, consider this question:
1 | When was the last time you experienced TRUE DEEP REST? And how can you plan to experience it this year?
4 | Musical development
There's a principle that I learned from Carey Nieuwhof a few years ago that I found to be true in my life: The better you are at something, the more tempting it is to "cheat your gift."
Cheating your gift is when you know you're good at something so you never spend time developing it.
It's trusting that you know you can play those 4-chord worship songs, so you don't need to practice.
It's knowing that you've led worship for the past 13 years and pretty much know what to say at this point so you don't really need to prepare your speaking transitions.
Cheating your gift is coasting in your giftedness.
For the past few years, that's been me.
I remember when I first started playing guitar. I'd sit in my bedroom for at least 3 hours every day strumming away - forming callouses - developing my gift.
Eventually, I got to a point where I felt comfortable playing pretty much any song.
So, I continued to play for maybe an hour a day just for fun.
Then, I became a full-time worship pastor and "playing music" was part of the job.
And it was easy. I was good at it.
So, when it came to preparing musically... I didn't. Because I didn't need to.
And so, for the past few years I fell out of the habit of developing my musical skill.
I settled into the comfortable and really only played when I led worship.
In doing so, I cheated my gift. I stopped developing it.
Flash-forward to the present moment: I've LEARNED more songs, WRITTEN more songs, and grew in my musical ability more in these past 2 and a half months than I have in the past 2 and a half years!
I found out the best way you can make the biggest impact is to not cheat your gifts.
The best way to make the biggest impact is to step into your giftedness and spend less time doing what you're not good at.
So, consider this question:
1 | What gift have you been cheating?
Abandon the things that are stealing your time and energy from developing that gift and embrace the ways that God has uniquely gifted you!
5 | Being ministered TO
When you're a leader in the church, you spend pretty much ALL of your time ministering to OTHER PEOPLE.
You're constantly looking for ways to serve and lead the people of your church.
So, when it's time to lead a Bible study, YOU lead the conversation.
When it comes to worship on Sunday morning, YOU'RE the one leading the songs.
And even when you're not leading anything, YOU still have the responsibility of shepherding the people around you.
In every moment that the typically church member is ministered TO, you bear the weight of the responsibility of leading them.
Which means YOU often miss getting a chance to be ministered to.
And I've become acutely aware of this in my own life over the past 2 and a half months.
During that time, I've started attending a small group that I'm not in charge of. Which means I can simply show up and experience it as a regular member of the group.
And it's been difficult learning how to "just be" and not have my mind racing a million miles a minute always trying to think of how to best lead the group.
I've also gotten to attend worship services that I don't have to lead.
And let me tell you: I've had one heck of a time learning how to worship without a guitar strapped to my body and a mic stand in front of me.
I feel like Ricky Bobby - "I don't know what to do with my hands!"
And every single moment has been wonderful and life-giving.
So, consider this question:
1 | What is the ratio of time you spend ministering TO OTHER PEOPLE to the amount of time you spend being ministered TO?
Experience what it's like to not be in charge of anything and simple "be."
What can you take away from these reflections?
So, will you heed these warnings? There are 13 years of trial and error in this blog post.
Which of these 5 habits have you been neglecting? Let us know in the comments below.
Maybe you need to break incorporating these 5 habits into smaller chunks.
Maybe you can only focus on one this year.
Make it your goal to cement it into your daily routine.
If you need help setting your goals for this year, check out the FREE worksheet I put together called "5 Questions You Need To Answer To Crush Your 2020 Worship Leading Goals."
Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links, meaning, at no additional cost to you, I will earn a commission if you click through and make a purchase.
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