La Bene Vita

Why I Lead Contemporary Worship

I'm looking for feedback about this article before I publish it in the church newsletter:

I love traditional worship. I grew up on LBW Setting 2, and I find comfort in its familiarity. I believe traditional worshippers prefer the traditional format for the same reason: because it brings them comfort.

Contemporary worship is comfortable for people who did not grow up in the church. The songs sound like something they might hear on the radio. The pastor's message resonates with their everyday lives. It brings them comfort, and they want to come back.

I realize that worship is not necessarily supposed to be comfortable. Worship is our expression of love for our God, and love should be unconditional and sometimes sacrificial. And sometimes, those messages from the pastor and the songs make us think really hard, or bring tears to our eyes, or make us realize the things we want to change about ourselves.

But I'm not just a worshipper. I'm a worship leader. And how can I be a fisher of men if I can't bring people to God in the first place? How can I be a fisher of men if I can't keep people coming back to worship again?

God called me to lead contemporary worship by giving me two intersecting gifts: leadership and contemporary music. It turns out that I can both rally a group of volunteers and play and sing modern music, and that makes me the ideal contemporary worship leader.

I believe that traditional and contemporary worship are equally important because they bring different groups of people to worship. God has called me to lead contemporary worship, and so that's what I do.

Hopefully you didn't skip ahead to this paragraph, because I'd like to know your untainted reactions to the article. I wrote the article because I got the brush-off from a traditional worship person again. I've been leading contemporary worship in my church for fifteen years now, since 2001, and there were people at the time who scoffed and acted annoyed that there were drums in their worship space and who generally don't like contemporary worship. They associate me with my worship service, and therefore, give me the cold shoulder and otherwise treat me disrespectfully. It happened again yesterday, and I think it's ridiculous that it hasn't stopped in fifteen years. I want to know if my annoyance comes off in the article. I'm trying to be political without being obvious about it. I'm trying to lovingly chastise, if that's even a thing. Your thoughts?