Planning Worship
One Worship Pastor’s Process
Perspective
As a Worship Pastor, planning worship can be very fulfilling. The experience can and should be a time of worship as I seek God’s leading and allow Him to work in and through me. Worship planning can also be a daunting task when I fail to seek God and try to plan worship in my own strength and “wisdom.” After all, when you’ve been doing this as long as I have, planning worship should be second nature. I just need a theme of some sort, put a few songs and scripture passages together and call it a service. When I consider the responsibility of planning what the body of Christ will express to God and one another, it helps put things in the right perspective. With every created response and chosen song, I am literally putting words in the mouths of the people who will gather to worship Almighty God.
Prayer
Knowing the awesome responsibility I have as a Worship Pastor, I have to seek God through every step of the planning process, or it will become something it is not meant to be. With a blank page and an open Bible before me, prayer is always the best first step. I pray for direction in planning a desired Spirit-filled worship experience for the body of Christ. I pray that each element would be an opportunity for the church to worship in Spirit and truth. I pray for the Senior Pastor as he seeks God in preparing his sermon. I pray that God will lead me to the songs, scripture passages, and other elements that will best glorify Him as His sons and daughters gather to worship. I pray that God will use all worship elements to draw people to Himself and open the hearts of those who have yet to believe. I pray that the church as well as new believers would respond to the Holy Spirit through this worship experience. Surrendering the plan in prayer is the first step to a Spirit-filled and Spirit-led service.
Plan
The next step is to begin notating what God has given. Our worship ministry uses Planning Center Services®️ as a tool for worship planning, scheduling team members, team communication, and distribution of song files for rehearsal purposes. For worship planners who do not use Planning Center, the same principles should apply. Typically as I begin praying through the worship planning process, I have a sermon series theme and a scripture passage that I trust the Lord has given my Senior Pastor. I begin by recording the sermon series and scripture passage into Planning Center.
After reading through the scripture passage in its context, I begin to add songs to the service that the Spirit brings to mind. Usually I list too many songs for one worship service, knowing that I may consider some of them for another service in the series. I then consider adding other elements to the service such as scripture, prayer, baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and testimony. A variety of worship elements help the congregation to engage in different ways through what they see, hear, say, and sing.
Flow is very important when placing songs and other elements in an order of worship. I think of worship flow much like the flow of a river. First, a river goes in a direction. If you are traveling down a river, it is taking you to a place, much like the flow of worship takes the worshiper to a place. An ideal boat ride on the river would be smooth and non-eventful on the journey to our destination. A not-so ideal boat ride would be rough and would distract us from reaching our destination. When planning worship, the ideal is for a smooth flow without distraction on our journey to glorify God as we respond to the revelation of His greatness and goodness.
Other things which affect flow are song key, tempo, dynamics, and lyric content. Though I don’t believe that song key is as critical when considering placement, I first consider if songs can be grouped in the same key or relative keys. This makes the flow more seamless for a smooth worship journey. Tempo and dynamics are important, because they enable the worshiper to express different emotions as they worship God. Lyric content is most essential for direction flow. The lyrics help us proclaim truth and respond to God with thanksgiving and confession of sin, moving the worshiper to action through a sequence of revelation and response. This pattern can be seen in the Isaiah 6 Model in verses one through nine.
I am always amazed when I look back at a service that God planned through me! Tempo, keys, dynamics, lyrics, gospel story, scripture, sermon and response flow so smoothly as God is glorified, and all are taken on a journey as they experience God in a fresh way. To see the church, as well as new believers, respond to God is such a blessing. Experiencing God throughout the process of planning worship makes me thankful that God called me to do what I do, knowing there is another blank page and service to plan.
