Right after Easter until the end of summer is a stress-free time for most worship leaders and a good opportunity to be teaching new songs your congregation. Here are a few guidelines to help your church quickly learn new tunes:

1. Introduce no more than one new song per week.

As worship leaders, we can get so excited about new music that before we know it our entire praise set is made up of nothing but new songs! Don’t let this happen — your congregation will overload.

I was visiting a big church in Dallas (aren’t they all big) and was enjoying the praise set but wasn’t really worshiping. As I thought about why, I realized I didn’t know any of the songs and my mind was occupied with the new melodies. Then the worship leader started on a popular worship tune I knew and I started to praise.

People worship with songs they know. It takes concentration to learn anything new, and that learning process can preempt the brain from going into worship mode. When the song is known the brain is freed from the learning process and can worship.

2. Use a new song in the middle or end of a praise set.

I’ve found congregations respond best to new music after they’ve had a chance to worship with songs they know and love. However, using an upbeat new song to open your service works well as a call to worship – people are settling in anyway as thy arrive. Follow the call to worship with announcements or a Scripture reading then launch into your set.

Try introducing a new worship ballad as a response to your praise set. For instance, a few years ago I introduced “I Give You My Heart” following a praise set that ended with the hymn “I Surrender All.” The entire morning’s music had a theme of consecration and “I Give You My Heart” was a perfect end to the worship.

3. Introduce a new song as special music.

Have a soloist sing the new song as an offertory special, and have the congregation join in on the last chorus.

4. Repeat, repeat, repeat.

Use the new song three weeks in a row — the first week is the introduction, the second and third weeks are
reinforcement. Then, skip a week and try the song again on the fifth week to see if it has caught on.

>Bottom Line: Keep your worship fresh with new material.

A church in the suburbs has remodeled a majestic, historic Civil War-era church in downtown Greenville, SC and planted a satellite ministry there. I visited last Sunday and heard something I haven’t heard in a long time: a congregation actually singing.

The place was packed and their worship setup was simple: a male worship leader with acoustic guitar, female backup singer, keyboard and djembe. I’d imagine a full band wouldn’t work so well in the reverberant environment of the old timey rectangular Baptist Church layout with hard floors, plaster walls and stained glass windows. Sitting in the balcony I could hear the musicians fine and could tell the minimal sound system merely supported the natural acoustics.

The same reverberant environment that would make a rocking praise band difficult to tame made for a rich singing environment. The congregation knew the contemporary worship songs and everyone was singing. Loudly.

I can think of another very contemporary church in town where I’ve looked around during the “worship” music and nobody’s singing. Not that you could even hear them singing if they were – because the band is so loud.

Like I’ve said before, your music doesn’t necessarily grow your church, it helps define who comes to your church. The historic church attracts a young, hip crowd who probably went to a Caedmon’s Call concert the night before. The rocking church attracts a young, hip crowd who probably went to a Linkin Park concert the night before.

But whatever style your church, your congregation should be singing (even if your band is loud.) If they’re not, maybe these reasons will help you discover why:

1. The key is too high. Tenor worship leaders tend to sing worship songs in the key best suited for their voice, and that’s usually not a singable key for a plumber in the crowd. Don’t feel you must do that Chris Tomlin song in the same key he uses – your tenor worship leader will still sound fine a step or three lower and everyone else will then be able to participate.

2. They don’t know the songs. As worship leaders we know the worship songs, sing them once or twice and tire of them quickly. We also forget the average person is completely musically illiterate. At a church where I worked as pianist many years ago we wondered why people weren’t singing. When we looked at our song list we had about 100 praise songs and 100 hymns in rotation. If we sang four songs each week we’d end up singing each song on the list about once a year. Pare down your song list to something manageable and learnable.

3. They don’t like the style. I was talking about this topic once in one of my worship classes and a man asked the question “I’m doing all the top praise songs so why is my congregation not singing?” He had the typical electric guitar driven pop praise band.

I asked him “What would you say is the favorite music style of the average person in your congregation?”

“Bluegrass” he answered.

A Bluegrass loving congregation isn’t really going to get into the latest Lincoln Brewster tune. But they might like the same tune in an acoustic style with a little mandolin or fiddle thrown in. Worship leaders, don’t try to make your congregation like the music you think they should like – get a sense of who they are and tailor your worship experience to them.

This week: plant a few spies in your congregation this Sunday and ask them to report back whether people are singing or not.

One way to help hymns flow more smoothly in modern worship is to update the archaic language. This might be a touchy subject, depending on your church, as traditionalists tend to place hymn lyrics almost on par with Scripture.

In reality, you wouldn’t believe how hymn lyrics are twisted from hymnal to hymnal. As I began the HymnCharts.com website and started researching hymn lyrics for my arrangements, I was surprised to find that a hymn might have several different lyric versions as it floats from denomination to denomination. I use Word’s Celebration Hymnal as my hymn lyrics standard.

Try an experiment: take your favorite hymn and modernize it by changing all the archaic words. Substitute “You” for “Thee,” “Thou” and “Ye.” Leave off the “st” – “canst,” “shouldst” and “wouldst” will now be “can,” “should” and “would.” Change anything else that sounds like it came from your old English teacher.

This can be tricky – it won’t work if the archaic word is part of the rhyme scheme.

I was at a big-time worship conference some time ago where they incorporated “My Jesus I Love Thee” into the praise set. Here’s how their version went:

My Jesus, I love You, I know You are mine,
For You all the follies of sin I resign;
My gracious Redeemer, my Savior are Thou: (OUCH!)
If ever I loved You, my Jesus, ’tis now.

Uh oh, they should have known better. I ain’t no English major, but I don’t think you’re supposed to mix King James English with the modern vernacular. In this case I’d leave the hymn alone.

Take a look at “Lead Me to Calvary.” I wrote this new melody for the traditional hymn text back in 2002 and for years left the lyrics as is because an archaic word was part of the rhyme scheme.

But when I revisited it this year I decided the old time words just did not work, especially in a very contemporary church like Brookwood. So I decided to re-write the line that contained the archaic word in the rhyme scheme.

Here are the original lyrics:

verse 1
King of my life, I crown Thee now,
Thine shall the glory be;
Lest I forget Thy thorny brow,
Lead me to Calvary.

chorus:
Lest I forget Gethsemane,
Lest I forget Thine agony;
Lest I forget, O Lord, Thy love for me,
Lead me to Calvary.

verse 2
Show me the tomb where Thou wast laid,
Tenderly mourned and wept;
Angels in robes of light arrayed
Guarded Thee whilst Thou slept.

verse 3
May I be willing, Lord, to bear
Daily my cross for Thee;
Even Thy cup of grief to share,
Thou hast borne all for me.

Here’s the modernized version with the rewritten line in bold:

verse 1
King of my life, I crown You now,
Yours will the glory be;
Lest I forget Your thorny crown,
Lead me to Calvary.

chorus:
Lest I forget Gethsemane,
Lest I forget Your agony;
Lest I forget, O Lord, Your love for me,
Lead me to Calvary.

verse 2
Show me the tomb where You were laid,
Tenderly mourned and wept;
Angels in robes of light arrayed
Guarded You while You slept.

verse 3
May I be willing, Lord, to bear
Daily my cross for You;
Even Your cup of grief to share,
Give me a heart renewed.

The hymn retains the same meaning, yet is much more singable without the “wast” and other tongue-twisting words.

What hymn can you modernize for your worship this week?