There’s a relatively new term being used more and more often by Christians, one that appears both sacred and oxymoronic: “Worship Concert.”

Recently, I’ve had a few conversations about the term.  What does it mean, and what does it imply?  On the surface, a worship concert is simply a means by which worship artists perform in a concert setting.  The point of the music, and the point of the musicians, is to point people to God in some musically compelling way.  As the Christian church has done for the last two thousand years, She adopts the cultural setting and technologies and uses them to express the timelessness of the Gospel.  And there is great validity to this.

But then I got to thinking.  Just for grins, what would happen if the Old Testament worshippers adopted a worship concert approach?  Would we see Levitical priests advertising an evening concert featuring a particular name artist?  Would they sell tickets?  Would they play an encore?  Would they have a merchandise table in the back with logo’d T-shirts and hoodies? Would the band be signing autographs and having photo ops with fans?

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How many lead singers does it take to change a light bulb? 

One.  The lead singer holds the bulb, and the world revolves around him.

Recently, I was talking to someone new to the Christian faith.  Which is also to say that he is new to the evangelical Christian subculture.  He knew that I was a worship and arts pastor, and so our conversation eventually drifted to the weekend services at his church.  In the conversation, he said something that jolted me momentarily.  He referred to the person leading worship at his church as the “lead singer for the band.”

At first I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt.  After all, he was a new Christ follower, and without a Christian background to give you a frame of reference, the obvious equivalent phrase to “worship leader” is “lead singer.

Hair fashionably mussed, a soul patch beneath his lower lip, the Singer steps onto the small stage and eyes the small audience seated before him.  A man in a dark T-shirt impatiently eyes the Singer.  Pen fidgeting in his mouth, he inquires tersely, "Okay, what do you have for us today?"

The Singer takes a deep breath before answering.  "Well, I'd like to start out with 'Not to Us' by Chris Tomlin."

"Okay," the man responds without emotion.  "Good luck."

Apprehensive, jittery, nonplused, the Singer takes a step forward.  And with all that he has, and all that he is, he opens his mouth.  And sings.

"Not to us, but to Your name be the glory," he proclaims.  "Not to us, but to Your name..." he repeats, each time with greater conviction.  The certainty of his beliefs seem to steady his voice, and he digs into the phrase deeper.  Taking a deep breath, he readies himself for the first verse.

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Last Sunday, I once again had the privilege of bringing another person onto our worship team.  He is the 21 year old son of a long time member of the team, who picked up the electric guitar a number of years ago.  Last Sunday was his first time playing on the worship band.  I think he did great.  

This is one of the thrills of being a worship pastor.  To see people grow not only in their faith but in their artistry as well, and to see those gifts being used for God.  Yup.  It's a cool gig.

Between services, he remarked to me that he was initially having to think about every little thing he was doing, but as he settled in, it became easier to play and worship.  I explained to him that being on the worship team is like driving.  When you first learn to drive, you have to think about every act of driving—signaling, stepping on the accelerator, pointing the car in the right direction.  But eventually, you get to the point of never having to think about driving at all.  You only think about where you are going.

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