Week 8 • Season 2 • Worship Team Devotionals
He makes me lie down in green pastures, he leads me beside quiet waters, he refreshes my soul.
Psalm 23:2-3 (NIV)
What’s actually going on
The problem with worship leading is that it doesn’t have an off-season. There’s always another Sunday. The cycle never breaks. You can put together a brilliant set on Sunday and by Monday afternoon you’re staring at next week’s slot in Planning Center wondering if you have anything left to say to your church.
Most secular jobs have rhythm. Quarterly reviews. Slow seasons. Vacation cycles. Worship leading has Sunday, every week, forever.
Without intentional rhythm built into the work, the work becomes the rhythm. Your soul ends up shaped by the urgency of the next set instead of the deeper currents of the gospel.
We hear it from worship leaders all the time. I love what I do but I haven’t been spiritually fed in months. I feed everyone else and forget to eat. The spiritual disciplines I used to keep have all been replaced with set planning.
If your only spiritual rhythm is Sunday, you don’t have a spiritual rhythm. You have a job.
What’s true
The shepherd in Psalm 23 makes the sheep lie down. He leads them to quiet water. He refreshes the soul. None of those verbs are something the sheep does to itself. They are gifts from the shepherd, received by the sheep.
Worship leaders are not sheep, exactly. We are also shepherding. But we are sheep before we are shepherds. We have a Shepherd of our own. And He does for us what we are trying to do for our churches.
Soul rhythms for a worship leader don’t have to be fancy. They might be a daily Bible reading you don’t lead other people through. A weekly day where you’re not on stage. A monthly retreat day. A quarterly silence. An annual sabbath week.
The shape of the rhythm matters less than the existence of one. The Lord is leading you to green pastures. Your job is to follow. Sunday will keep coming. You can keep coming, too.
For your team
Three discussion questions for your pre-rehearsal team huddle.
- What spiritual rhythms used to feed you that you’ve stopped doing?
- Where in your weekly schedule could you protect one hour for just being a sheep, not a shepherd?
- What would it look like for our team to encourage each other in soul rhythms outside of Sunday?
Pray this
Shepherd, I confess I have lived as if I were on my own. Lead me to quiet waters. Make me lie down. Refresh my soul. I will follow where You lead. Amen.
This Sunday
Block one hour this week, on your calendar, for nothing but being with Jesus. Don’t make it a planning session. Just be there.
Go deeper
In the network: Search “The Secret Place a Secret Weapon” in the TCC community for the live training on the spiritual disciplines that fuel sustained ministry. Free at thechurchcollective.mn.co.
This is Week 8 of 52 Weekly Worship Team Devotionals from The Church Collective. The first 12 (including this one) are available now — grab them as a free PDF. New devotionals drop every Monday morning. Free, denominationally diverse, 501(c)(3). Made possible by our Supporters: become a Supporter or give one-time.
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