articles

NYC’s Redeemer Church Pastor Tim Keller: One of the basic features of church life in the United States today is the proliferation of worship and music forms. This in turn has caused many severe conflicts within both individual congregations and whole denominations. Most books and articles about recent worship trends…

from Tom Lawson: Contemporary getting old? Well, certainly for some people this may be true. But there is another sense it which it is true for everyone. Contemporary music is increasingly tapping into the ancient history of worship to recover lyrics and thoughts the move beyond the “dating Jesus” lyrics…

Apart from a substandard worship team on stage, the 2 biggest distracters during the worship session are: Badly mixed overall sound Onscreen lyrics that are not easy to read Here are some tips to take care of potential distractions: 1. Font. There are fonts which are glitzy and look hip and…

Len Wilson on worship backgrounds: My favorite way to do song backgrounds in worship is not shifting blobs of color. Most large, contemporary-style worship services have settled into a routine for worship projection that displays individual lines of songs over random colors, shaped and lines. Continue reading.

Artist Michael Gungor on songwriting: While crafting is important for most songwriting expressions across genres, it is particularly important for congregational music. The songs we sing in our churches don’t just express our theology; they help form it. When we write songs for people to sing as a spiritual act…

Let’s make a list of a great worship leader: Strong musical ability to carry the band… …and vocally gifted to inspire the congregation each time his/her mouth opens… …but also the spiritual depth to truly lead a congregation in worship… …with a mix of theological and musical training coupled with…

Worship leader Rob Rash offers a great idea for improving your worship band. Continue reading.

Jason Chollar shows how with just five minutes instruction on each instrument you can be playing the song How He Loves as a full worship band. Continue reading.

Evan Courtney helps you view your church as a first time visitor: Last summer my family went on vacation with my in-laws to Branson, Mo. When Sunday rolled around it was defaulted to me, being the pastor in the family, to pick a church to attend. I didn’t know anything…

Nate Ragan talks about proper formatting on your slides: It’s often assumed that the ministry of onscreen multimedia in a church is merely a task of sharing information. Announcements, sermon points, song lyrics—make them large enough to read, spellcheck your work and, if possible, make it look pretty. But what…

Canadian worship leader Chris Vacher has several articles on using guitar capos as well as a downloadable capo cheat sheet. Continue reading.

Worship leader David Walker on seeker worship: There are legitimate “seekers” of the Truth out there, but when it comes to musical worship, we’ve defined “seeker” as someone who wants a show, who we don’t want to offend. We do this in an attempt to lead them to make a…

Maybe religion really is the opiate of the masses – just not the way Karl Marx imagined. A University of Washington study posits that worship services at megachurches can trigger feelings of transcendence and changes in brain chemistry – a spiritual “high” that keeps congregants coming back for more. “We…