Ben Cantelon - Study: The End Of Being Clever Worship Leaders?

Little articles like this need to have clever hooks right up here in the first paragraph.  They’re the bits that get pasted on walls and make you want to read more. Without something that sparkles, who’s going to click through to read whatever comes next?

Looks like I’ve blown it.

If you’ve got this far then well done. And thank you. And sorry - because I’ve not really got all that much for you. All I have is one thought on this piece of timeless wisdom that Paul delivers in Colossians 2:

‘In Christ you have been brought to fullness’ [verse 10]

In just eight words Paul absolutely nails it. He nails it for those of us living in fear, living in luxury, living in the past or living in denial. And he nails it for worship leaders too.

We all approach the task of leading people in sung worship with different experiences, different baggage, different backgrounds. And that’s OK. It’s even a good thing as it allows us to connect with a different range of people (most often those with similar experiences, baggage and backgrounds).

But sometimes we can be tempted to allow where we have come from to be the most important thing about

our times of worship. We can be tempted to put our creativity front and centre, to mine the past for the brightest colours and boldest sounds.

Somehow that doesn’t seem quite enough.

Our songs, our sounds and our creativity should only ever be the tool that helps us worship - never the focus. For no matter how bright or bold our work, it will never be a match for the fulness in Christ that Paul reminds of.

That fulness of life is on offer to us all - whatever our background, whatever our past, whatever our style. The question is, what are we going to do with the life ahead of us? Are we going to live with self-imposed limits or are we going to live a life abandoned to Christ? Are we going to use our creativity to leave people in awe of God, to set them off in pursuit of our Maker, one step closer to the fulness that only Christ can offer?

Are we going to see our times of worship as the destination to arrive at, or the departure gate for the fullest life of all?