Part 2 – Working At It
Darcy Watkins – July 22, 2024
In part one of this article, we considered the matter of writing and using your own songs in worship. We ended with the matter of having the mandate, first of course from the Lord (Psalms 96) and then from your church leadership. So, let’s assume that you have the green light on this, and you are committed, what’s next?
Developing and introducing your own songs in worship takes a lot of hard work. There are no music scores, no YouTube videos, no MP3 files. You even must write your own charts. You may not be that great an arranger so it’s difficult to get it sounding right. Once you have the song and arrangement developed, then you must teach it to the team. These days, worship musicians are used to learning songs quickly by watching videos. They don’t just learn a song, they learn a specific version or arrangement of the song. You may have to start producing music videos, or at least be as patient as you are demanding as you coach the team through these songs.
Without intentional effort to write and develop songs within your church, the default source of songs will be commercial publishers. Whoever has the most material readily available will get the largest share. You must intentionally develop your material, or like a radio station, your church may become a top 40 worship hits following or perhaps a more traditional “oldies” worship following. This sort of goes back to my earlier rant about what God is saying to us here and now, versus way over there or way back when.
Even if you develop your own songs, your church will still get some songs from outside sources. Songs from commercial sources will have been reviewed for quality in terms of the craft. Many commercial sources of worship music work closely with churches and other religious organizations, so they also benefit from review to ensure that lyrics are theologically sound. The point is, published songs have been vetted for someone to invest money and effort to develop and publish it as part of a business. And we know that these businesspeople aren’t idiots gambling away their money.
In part three, we will further cover reviewing and vetting songs, not just the ones you write, but the ones you bring in from published sources. I also recommend you check out my article from worship foundations series on the songs we sing.