Worship Matters

If you lead worship, you may not think of yourself as a biblical counselor. Maybe that should change. Last month I had the joy of leading the singing at the CCEF conference. While I was there David Powlison asked if we could chat about the relationship between singing congregationally and biblical counseling. There are a [...]

Over at the Gospel Coalition blog Kevin DeYoung gives 25 reasons why words are so important in our corporate worship. Here are some samples: All the corporate worship we know of in the early church is saturated with words. While there are many things we don’t know about the worship of the early church in the [...]

I first met Matt Redman in 1997 when I was over in England for a worship conference. In a few minutes of conversation a few things stood out to me. He was a young man passionate about impacting his generation with worship songs that communicated biblical truth about God and not simply emotional responses. He [...]

In his book, Christian Leaders of the 18th Century, J.C. Ryle (1816-1900) spends a chapter on August Toplady, the gifted but often contentious hymn-writer/pastor who penned “Rock of Ages.” I appreciated Ryle’s comments on the effect of writing good songs for the church to sing. It makes me more aware of the importance of leading and [...]

Ben Neumann, a member of my church, told me about an interview with Matt Redman that was recorded a couple years ago. I’ve had a number of opportunities to hang around with Matt, and each time I walk away encouraged by the grace of God in his life. He’s a diligent theologian, a devoted husband [...]

After last year’s WorshipGod conference we received some feedback that we had introduced too many new songs. I agreed. So at WorshipGod09 we tried to include  more songs that people would be familiar with, while also including songs from our recent projects. Here’s what we ended up with. Song list from Wednesday PM: 1. Come [...]

Chris recently wrote me to ask a question about the tension between congregational-friendly keys and leader-friendly keys. I have a upper-mid range tenor voice and though I can sing lower fairly easily, I find that if I transpose a song to a “congregational friendly” key the song loses energy, sometimes significantly. I want to serve [...]

This past Sunday I had the privilege of leading the singing at my home church. At Christmas time there’s sometimes a tension between choosing to sing songs that are “comfortably Christmasy” or songs that help people glory in the miracle of God becoming man. So here’s what we went with: Hark! the Herald Angels Sing [...]

Last month my church started memorizing great hymns of the faith. We’ll be memorizing a hymn a month for ten months. Ken Boer, who oversees music at Covenant Life, explains on the church website why we’re doing this: Memorizing hymns is one of the ways we can obey Scripture’s command to “let the word of [...]

A friend recently emailed me and expressed a dilemma he was facing when teaching new songs performed by an artist who varies the way he or she sings the melody. My friend asked: When do we go with the lead sheet, and when do we go with the CD melody?  And when do we go [...]

Just when I start thinking all the best worship songs have already been written (which I don’t really believe), I hear a new song that affects me profoundly. A friend recently sent me an email letting me know that he just taught his church My Soul Finds Rest (Ps 62) by Aaron Keyes and Stuart [...]

Over at the Sovereign Grace website, we’ve finally posted 29 WorshipGod08 seminars for you to listen to or download for free. . . . Here’s the list: Band on the Run (Bob Kauflin) Building Bridges: Pastors and Worship Leaders (Bob Kauflin) Caring for Your Sound System (Darryl Wenger) Copyright Law and Church Music: The Eight [...]

Last week I spent four days in beautiful Mt. Hermon, CA, near San Jose. I had the joy of participating in a Christian Songwriter’s Retreat sponsored by the Mt. Hermon Retreat Center. About 300 folks came to learn how to develop their heart and craft as Christian song writers. The speakers/musicians included Paul Baloche, Joy [...]

If you just read the comments on my last Together for the Gospel post, you might be tempted to think that things went flawlessly. Not the case. Practically every time I lead I learn something new about what I’m doing, even though I’ve been leading worship for over 30 years now. I pray that I’m [...]

I have a friend, Brian Oaks, whom I’ve only met by e-mail. He’s a guitarist now living in Nashville who made an indie CD a while back called There Still is Room. It’s a collection of redone hymns that I’ve really enjoyed. Great lyrics, nice guitar work and vocals. Brian was asking me what to [...]