Here is part three of the “what do I do about Suzy?” tips. Part 1 can be found here.

4. Be sure to worship together as a team.
Again, I’m not talking about 20 min before the service starts or once the service begins. I’m talking about when no one else is there to hear you except the One you are serving. Suddenly attitudes are different when the “performance” aspect is removed. This is not to be a “practice”, this is REAL WORSHIP. Is there such a thing as “practice worship”!? Or what we so lovingly call “Worship Practice”? I say NO! Never engage in this yourself, make sure that you truly worship given the opportunity. This is a separate thing from practicing the music per se, this is truly engaging in corporate worship as a team. This type of thing could easily be incorporated into the end of your normal practice time, just set aside an extra half hour or so to simply relax in the songs you have chosen or just freely worship with instruments and singing in the spirit.

If you are not the worship leader, this is a suggestion you can prayerfully, lovingly and humbly make to your leader. Time is typically an issue for most people these days and many times leaders are fearful that they’ll lose people if they start to require more of them. In many cases there are NO requirements at all to be on a worship team or choir. I think this is a big mistake. In my experience any team worth being on is one worth working for, and once you’ve established a standard, people will want to rise to that level. People will be drawn to something that is of quality.

For years I was the director of a musical production company for children. We would put on evangelistic musicals in local high schools after hours. In keeping with the idea that the gospel is free, I felt compelled to offer these programs at no charge. However, even though we put on quality productions, when people heard the word FREE they thought NOT WORTH MUCH. We found ways to work around this by printing up tickets and requiring them for entrance and various other things, but I have seen over the years that where nothing is required to gain a thing, that thing tends to be valued very little. In the same way, once you start to make requirements such as prayer times and more extended times of worship/practice, people begin to perceive the value of the being in the group as higher since the price to be in the group is higher. In my experience, churches that implement stricter standards for participation in their music groups typically have people waiting in line to be a part of their groups. Besides, I’ve always maintained that I’d rather have two committed people on my team then ten who aren’t.

Come back next week for a new series of great tips!