The Worship Leader as Evangelist, Part 2

Just as I opened the last post, I want to remind you: I love what I do. There is nothing as rewarding for me as leading worship in such a way that people fully engage Jesus... except maybe hearing about how God changes someone’s life as the Spirit does His work during worship.

But I often wish I'd been gifted to be an evangelist. So I ask myself often—really often—how can a worship leader be an evangelist.

If you share my struggle, here are 10 things I try to do:

1. I work hard to connect with people in my community who may not be connected to Jesus or His church.
2. I step into non-musical roles when invited and emphasize personal evangelism.
3. I regularly encourage worshipers to invite family, friends, and neighbors to join them.
4. I diligently pursue a worship gathering that is high quality; excellence often translates into credibility.
5. I choose songs that sound more like what is on the Top 40 radio station than my grandparents’ 1940's radio.
6. I use language that isn’t crafted for insiders, but makes what I’m talking about available to everyone.
7. I have pushed hard for our worship gatherings to be streamed on Facebook Live.
8. I teach those our worship ministry about the role of worship in evangelism.
9. I plan services where we sing the gospel.
10. I pray.

Last time I explored the first two in some detail. Here are numbers 3-6.

Encourage Invitation — Telling stories of the people I invite is powerful, but modeling without communicating is often not enough.

• When a new worship series (aka sermon series) kicks off, it’s a great time to invite friends and family. I often remind those in my ministry and our congregation to do just that.
• When there’s a special event, musical or not, I try “bake in” an outward focus with my promotion of that event.
• I support growth in other ministries of our church. If our kids ministry, student ministry, or small groups are promoting something, I want to promote it within the worship ministry and as a worship leader—in every way I can imagine.
• At worship rehearsals, choir rehearsals, and in emails… virtually any time I’m communicating with those in my area of ministry, I try to find ways to encourage invitation: to join our ministry, to visit our church, to special events, etc.

Pursue Excellence — My favorite way to think of this is the phrase “authentic excellence.” I don’t want our team to sound better than we are, better than our context, but I want to personally pursue as well as encourage others to get better. Always. At every position. I’m convinced that for the first time guest, and especially a sceptic, excellence translates into credibility. What we communicate when we are sloppy is a lack of care for our subject matter—the gospel. 

Sound Like Today — We are missiologists. All of us. Our role is to be able to articulate the gospel in the part of the world we live in. It’s indigenous missions applied to worship. We learn to speak the language of our “target audience.” In case you've forgotten, that target is not living in 1985. If you have any doubt about how much has changed for those who worship with us, drive a 10 year old car and a new one. The difference is staggering.

Taken to excess, this can be alienating to some (or many) in the church. Ignored, it will be alienating to many not yet in the church. And just to be clear, this is not about new songs/old songs but new sound/old sound.

Accessible Language — Similar to the sounds I mention above, words should also sound like today. Like your part of the country. Talk like you are one of the people in your community. You ARE part of your community! Also talk like you are addressing people who have never been in your church. When citing the Bible, make it sound like it is accessible to those who are brand new to the encounter, because it is. Don’t assume the knowledge base of your audience, unless you’ve carefully thought through and decided that you can. 

I’ll expound on the last four from the list next time. Sure hope this serves you!

Again, I’m sure many of you are better at this than I am. I’d love to read your comments. How do those of you who lead worship (point person or team member) get to exercise your passion for reaching those far from God?