Teammates

What the Lakers showed me about worship, part 1

I don’t know that I love the Los Angeles Lakers because I can’t quite make an unconditional commitment to an imperfect NBA team [my SGV friends will appreciate that reference ]. However, I will say I like them enough to make an effort to watch them on television and even record their tournament games if I know I’ll miss the broadcast. I draw the line at buying a ticket to Staples Center, but that’s more of a financial issue. If you didn’t see game 7 last Thursday, I’m sorry you missed it! Amazing happened. To come back after being 13 points behind their biggest rival — and to wait until the last quarter to get it done — made a low scoring game unusually exciting. I even watched the award ceremony and the victory parade, which I almost never do…except for the time I actually went to their parade in 2002. Working at home has its privileges.

Something that has been consistently repeated in interviews over the last few days caught my attention and helped underscore what the Lord been steering me toward. All of the hype, combined with what I’ve been picking up at different conferences, has been re-shaping my idea of what a worship team is. What we don’t always see at a weekly worship service can be learned from the Lakers and their fans. Before you accuse me of heresy or unsound doctrine, let me explain…

Owning Our Role

Laker fans are given credit for winning the game. “LA Laker fans are the best. We couldn’t have done it without them.” And sincere Laker fans willingly take ownership of that victory. “We won!” Obviously, there is a limited application to those statements. We all know it’s really Phil and company who put hours into conditioning and practicing, and they’re the ones who have spent years building their lives around the game so they could play to win when it really counted. Still, my ultra-literal side likes to take that idea as far as it can go. Had the game, or even the entire tournament, been played in an empty arena, I wonder if the outcome would have been the same?

I’ve been playing music in front of people since grade school, starting with the dreaded piano recitals and currently in a much more enjoyable context at my church twice a month. We call the recitals a performance and church a worship service, yet I still get that unholy moment of panic right before those times I have a key [pun totally intended! ] part, even if it’s the most frequently played song that can be done with our eyes closed: the doxology. I haven’t moved past that “they’re-watching-me” perspective.

We understand worship teams to be those musical people in front with the instruments and microphones. If we’re really enlightened, we include the sound and media teams. If we’re feeling really magnanimous, we extend team membership to the speaker, facilitator, ushers, and maybe even the rest of the staff. God has been reminding me in many ways over the last two months, “you’re definition of a worship team is still incomplete.”

Most churches and conferences are set up like concerts: main event up front and sometimes elevated with the congregation facing them, set up to observe what is happening on the stage.¹ As our contemporary church culture changes, we’ve been making room up front for people to get out of their seats and stand in front of the stage during the music. I have no doubt deep worship happens there, but more often than not, it feels a little like a concert.² The people up front are the main act, and I’m there to watch and be entertained. If I make the effort, I can get past that and move into worship, but it is so easy to take on the “I’m-watching-them” perspective by default.

We can call the people up front a worship team or a music team or “chief musicians,” and the function still remains the same: to lead a group of people through an unrehearsed, yet unified, expression of praise and worship. But words carry weight and connotations, and changing our terminology can also facilitate the worship of our corporate heart…and be more difficult than simply telling everyone to stand for our final song or getting them to clap to the beat.

Remembering our place

In the last year or so, God has been underscoring to me the concept that a worship service is first intended to minister to Him. The priests, dancers, singers, and chief musicians of the Old Testament are charged with a ministry to the LORD. I’ve grown so accustomed to thinking of ministry as “toward people” and have forgotten I am also supposed to minister to God. He doesn’t need it, but it’s what He has ordained for us. Since God is the subject and object of our worship, it seems to follow that our corporate worship services are primarily a ministry to God (the object of our worship). If we’re intellectually focusing on God (the subject of our worship) we will also spiritually receive on some level, but as a “worship team” our primary ministry focus is Him, not the congregation.

Which leads me to believe our worship team includes the congregation. If they have come to worship God, wouldn’t they also be a part of the same team effort? While we need to be aware of where they are so we can encourage them to enter more deeply into worship, to what extent should we be building our worship services around our congregation’s needs? They’re on God’s heart, so they should also be on ours, but our heart for them should never surpass our heart for God because His heart for His own glory always surpasses His compassion for us.³ Through His own unique and creative twist, God’s compassion for us showcases His glory.

Putting it together

To some extent, Laker fans consider themselves a part of the team, and the Lakers organization encourages that. I wonder if we as worship teams (in the traditional sense) encouraged congregations not to be fans, but to take ownership of their part as fellow worshipers on the same team, we’d be better facilitators and leaders of worship? It’s no longer “who’s-watching-whom” but “we’re-watching-Him.” While we would still be physically facing each other, our hearts would be facing God. It would require a lot of humility from the people on stage, relinquishing their “rock star” status, but it would also take humility from the congregation, relinquishing the notion that the service is built to meet their needs.

1. Am I the only one who finds it a little dissonant when Christian artists tell their audience, “you didn’t come to a concert, you came to a worship service”? I wouldn’t pay $15-30 to go to church every Sunday. I know what they’re trying to say, though, so I just enjoy the music and worship God as I can. It’s usually quite nice. [↩]
2. That’s just my take on it, and it may simply be a reflection of my personality. I’ve also experienced times when that wasn’t the case and have felt drawn up there myself. Those were good times… [↩]
3. I am in no way suggesting we should ignore a congregation’s needs! “Balance” is usually the answer. Unless you’re in Sunday School. Then the answer is “Jesus”. [↩]