I can’t really tell you why this is on my mind. It couldn’t be because I have one or two of these lit on my dashboard right now, could it? Nah. That’s not it.

But, if our lives had a dashboard with warning lights, there are a few warning lights we would all do well to look for, before we wind up on the side of the road.

1. You have a quicker than usual trigger on emotions of all kinds.

Things that usually don’t bother you, all of a sudden bother you. Or, you find yourself crying over something that usually wouldn’t move you that way. Whatever it might be on the spectrum of emotions, you are not yourself and little things trigger out of proportion reactions.

2. You are experiencing constant fatigue, loss of sleep, and appetite.

Stress causes many things and one of them can be loss of sleep and rest. It doesn’t seem to matter how much you need sleep, you find it very hard to get rest. Along with that, a normal day is exhausting to you because your internal motor is running faster than your speed should require. It’s like you are in a low gear, but running at high speeds. Your engine is screaming at you.

3. You have a growing desire for isolation from others.

This one is so dangerous. You are tired and overloaded emotionally. You want to retreat from everyone, even those closest to you. You avoid people you work with and withdraw from your friends. You just want to be left alone, all the time. But, our enemy longs to have a man by himself. We are most vulnerable when we are isolated.

4. Your inner voice is drowning out all others, even God’s.

The first three lead to the last one. When you are out of balance emotionally, tired and fatigued, and isolated, you will be susceptible to your inner voice and it will lie to you.

“Nobody cares about me.”

“I am worthless.”

“I don’t have anything left to give.”

“It wouldn’t matter if I just went away.”

Of course, none of these thoughts are true.

Do you have any of these warning lights on right now? Disconnect from your usual pace. Get some physical rest and enjoy a good meal with your spouse. Run to the Word of God and saturate yourself with everything you know about Jesus through music, reading, and meditating on God’s promises. Find someone you trust and open up your heart to them. Communicate with your husband or wife and spend time in prayer.

Most of all zero in on God’s voice. He is speaking and wants you to hear Him now.

We used to hear criticism of the “7-11” songs. You know, seven words, eleven times? Then, when we acknowledged how repetitive hymns are, not so much anymore. The more recent critique of modern songs is that they all sound the same — same chords, same melodies, same rhythms, underneath only a handful of ideas about God.

Once, I heard a massive medley of modern worship songs – 10 in all – that had the same chord progression, tempo, and groove. It was scary how easily all of them could fit over the same accompaniment… and telling. Many of them actually shared the same ideas as well.

In my opinion, our musical palettes have become so small and narrow in modern worship that it was inevitable our songs would start to sound the same. Songs used to be written by musicians. Now, many of them are written by songwriters – and those two are not necessarily the same person. Perhaps this stems from the reality that the musical range of many songwriters is limited to a single approach on a single instrument — guitar. My fear of that happening to me is why I loved writing with Luke Garrett – his versatility on the piano stretched his songs in every conceivable direction, and I was the beneficiary of that as his co-writer.

Would you agree that our modern songs have a sameness about them? Is it a problem? So what if all of our songs are sounding the same? What difference does it make?

Here are three reasons why I think it matters.

We are losing the interest of our congregation.

They may love what our songs are saying. But, the sameness of our songs is making congregational singing pretty predictable. We have bemoaned often why our congregations don’t sing as enthusiastically as before. Maybe one reason we have overlooked is that they just don’t want to – the songs aren’t that interesting.

We won’t remember this song a year from now.

It is staggering to me how quickly churches move on from songs they love. It may be because the new songs sound just like the ones they loved and they all run together. It makes me wonder what this generation will sing on their death beds – they won’t remember any of these songs.

We are prone to reach for extreme lyrics (and other things) to compensate.

This is the scariest one to me. The musical same-ness of today is driving songwriters to reach for more extreme ways to say things lyrically in an effort to create interest. I’ll refrain from giving my own examples of this, but one of the reasons we see lyrical “reaches” is because the music doesn’t create interest, so the lyric has to for the song to catch attention. The effects we use in worship and as singers are also trying to compensate for this.

I’m concerned about this. Are you?

Question for today: Can we worship God and honor our country at the same time?

 

Over the last 15 years or so, a noticeable dilemma for worship ministry leaders has emerged. Can patriotism and worship co-exist? It’s a fair question to consider now as we are still some time away from July 4.

 

I recognize that some of the feelings on this question are generational.  My generation easily embraced the presence of patriotism in worship and it never crossed our minds we were doing anything that would somehow dishonor God and was inappropriate for worship.  When I was in youth choir at Tate Street Baptist Church, the musical we sang that fueled two different choir tours was “I Love America” by the legend, John W. Peterson. Even as a 17-year-old, I cried every time we sang, “The Red, White and Blue.” Today, many churches would think a song like that would be out of place in a worship service.  Were we wrong and are they right?

 

It’s not that simple.

 

The critical issue for anything we do in worship is, “Why?”  If you carefully study the principles that Paul lays out for church behavior in the letters to the Corinthians and Romans, the attitude of one’s heart toward the choice is paramount as to whether or not it is sinful. In other words, patriotism could be right in one setting and wrong in another, depending on the heart of the worshipper.

 

More practically – if the church is seeking to somehow esteem our country as being superior and super-blessed as opposed to every other country, then maybe what we think is patriotism is actually pride, something that doesn’t belong in worship at all.

 

But, if the church is seeking to 1) express gratitude for God’s blessing in our past by honoring the God-story of our nation’s history, 2)  acknowledge our failure and sin by crying out in confession and repentance for our nation, and, 3) call our people to “Salt and Light” living in the present, then perhaps we are acting like the “kingdom of priests” that we are called to be. It doesn’t have to be political at all and certainly shouldn’t be. It can be spiritual and certainly must be.

 

In the meantime, let’s be patient with each other if we feel differently about this than others do. For the leader who thinks nothing patriotic fits in a worship service, be careful characterizing the church across town doing a “I Love America” rally as doing something wrong. They may not be. And, for the church that is passing out flags as people come into the sanctuary, don’t look despairingly on the church that feels differently and would never do that.

 

Within your own fellowship, don’t be frustrated if some of your people want to handle this differently than you. The people who want to say the pledge are not necessarily idolaters that “don’t get it,” and the folks that cringe at a patriotic element in worship don’t hate America. Find some balance that helps your church process this and lead well in articulating the “why” behind your approach to this.

 

Whatever we do, let’s not let our enemy divide us on this question for the sake of proving our point. There is more than one way to lose here. Pursue each other, not your conviction.

Most people agree, churches don’t sing like they used to. Do a simple internet search on the subject and you will find several sources outlining the reasons why churches seem to be more passive about singing. I’ve written on the subject myself.

 

One reason is an unfamiliarity of the songs we are choosing. In this era of churches writing songs and a proliferation of songs available as Christian music and congregational music overlap more than ever, the sheer number of new songs we are singing may be overwhelming our congregations. I have a suggestion. Here are 3 lists to develop that can help you grow the confidence of your church and help them sing the songs of worship well. Organize Your Planning Approach by developing three lists that you keep at hand every time you plan worship that you update constantly.

 

1. Significant Songs (theme based – you are still integrating these, but they have great potential).
2. Legacy Hymns and Songs (your people know and LOVE to sing these).
3. New Songs – because of content and structure, these are songs your church should know, but don’t.

 

Once you have these lists, build each service with a mix of these titles, but lean toward the Significant list most of all. If you will bring back these songs often enough, you will move several of them to your Legacy list. And growing that list should be your goal.

 

You could think about it this way – sing three significant titles and two legacy songs for every new song. If you did, your church would grow in confidence and start to sing more. For some, it might be one new song a week while for others it could be once a month.

 

Every service should have at least one moment that the congregation can trust that they know the song so well, they can release their worship with full abandon. In those moments, you create the standard that all other songs will be measured by. As you grow their repertoire, you will have more and more songs that will invite this response. If you introduce a new song that a still doesn’t become significant to the congregation after a few times, move on from it. Consider bringing it back for another try at a later time.

 

Obviously, there will be times when a song comes along that is so right for the moment, it will be worth breaking the pattern to include it. As with any system, don’t become legalistic about serving the process. But, if you only rely on how you feel as you plan worship, you will gravitate to the few legacy songs you have, or to new ones, and neglect the vast number of songs in between. The confidence of your congregation will not grow, and they won’t know any songs to sing in the pivot moments of their lives.

 

To everyone’s spiritual benefit, grow the repertoire of your congregation.

In the wacked-out world of social media, a phenomenon has developed that until recently, had happened to everyone else. It has become so common that platforms like Twitter have a process where an account can be certified to protect against the “fake” accounts that can pop up overnight and take over someone’s identity.

 

In recent weeks, it has happened to me twice. Someone (or something) has taken over my name, pictures, and profile to create a social media account that was intended to look like it’s me – but it’s not me.  It hasn’t really bothered me that much, at least so far. As soon as I became aware of them, I was able to quickly have them removed.  A fake account can be a huge distraction to the real one and even misrepresent my belief. It’s important that I not tolerate one for very long. But, as I’ve thought about it, I’ve been reminded of another threat that is even more daunting and dangerous. It’s one that I’ve lived with for much longer than the internet has been around.

 

Fake Mike Harland existed way before Twitter. And, I wonder if you have a fake account from time to time too. It’s that personality that puts on a face of spirituality to sing, teach, or lead, all the while knowing that what is seen is not the whole story. The problem for anyone who stands on a platform – digital or otherwise – is that talent and skill can hide a great deal. Sometime, God even chooses to honor His Word through a person like that, and the visible results can further imply that something real must be going on in the speaker.  But we all know that’s not always true.

 

It seems to me that just like I keep a watch out for the fake accounts that can crop up in social media, I had better be even more diligent about watching out for this one. As a matter of fact, if everything is working like it should, my profile and personality shouldn’t matter at all because if what I’m doing is real, it won’t be about me anyway.

 

John, the forerunner of Jesus could have built a ton of followers in his fake account. But, he didn’t. He simply said, “He must increase, and I must decrease.”  (John 3:30)

 

May God help me keep a check on the fake account and blow it up every time it surfaces. Maybe we all should. Here’s how –

 

Stay in the Word.

Make prayer a real priority.

Keep relationships authentic.

Fight for purity in mind and deed.

 

And, delete the fake account every time it shows up so that Jesus can be the only One that shines as we serve Him.

 

1. Volunteer for Duty

 

Churches call for volunteers all the time – a need for host homes for the DiscipleNow, or more adults to chaperone the Kid’s ministry event, or just someone to serve potatoes in the Church Supper line. It goes on and on. But, often worship ministry leaders take the position that we are doing enough. “We’re the musicians and can’t be bothered with that other stuff,” is the way we can easily come across if we never step up as a volunteer for other ministries.

 

You will expand your influence if you will get shoulder to shoulder with other volunteers in your church in a ministry outside of the one you lead.

 

2. Teach a Bible Study Class

 

More than likely, by the time you are leading a worship ministry in a church, you are one the most trained Bible students in the whole fellowship. Why not put it to use? It could be that your Sunday schedule makes teaching in the Bible Study hour impossible for you, but there are other times you could lead a small group. If you are like me, you will find great joy in leading the music and then teaching a class or vice versa. We ask our choir members to do that all the time. Why can’t we do it?

 

As one of the teachers in our Discipleship ministry in churches I served, I grew relationships with other leaders and supported that ministry with service. In turn, I found those individuals more supportive of what we were doing in the Worship ministry and relationships that went beyond the ministry I was leading.

 

3. Be the Chief Listener to Your pastor’s Sermons

 

This is so simple yet can make a big difference. When the music part of the service is over, move to a nearby seat and become the most active listener in the room to your pastor’s message. And, do it every service you can even if it means hearing the same message more than once.

 

When a musician leaves the room before the sermon, he or she is sending to at least some of the congregation an unintended message. “My part is over. I’m not that interested in the rest of it.”  But, when the leader becomes a listener, you send a much healthier signal. “I’m a learner too. This part is vitally important. I’m supporting my pastor.”

 

Develop active listening skills to the preaching ministry and model for others how to listen and respond. When you do, you will encourage your pastor and demonstrate genuine interest in the whole church, not just your part.

Anyone can do these. I would encourage every Worship ministry leader to use these ways and find others to engage with the rest of the church outside of the worship ministry. If you do, you will find your influence growing and your relationships deepening beyond your small circle.

 

We have no right to influence anyone we are not willing to serve.