Since Choirs Are Still Important For Worship — How Do You Make A Good One?
Basketball teams have 15 members trying to move as one. Doubles figure skaters need to move as one piece on the ice to keep safe. College football teams have over 50 people on their team uniting for the same goal. Needless to say, coaches sometimes have difficulty unifying these professionals. Believe me when I say that there is no difference when a choir director is standing in front of 20 or more singers trying to bring unity to their sound and aiming for the goal of being honoring to God. Yet, the choir is proof that many can come together to attain one goal and have one sound. These are some of the steps that I feel one could use to have a successful choir in church.
Be prepared to recruit.
It’s not an accident that I compared singing in the choir to college football. In football, you can have the greatest coach in the world but if you don’t have the players, you don’t have the winning. With a choir, if you don’t have the voices you won’t have a great sound. Now you don’t need every voice to be at the caliber of Brian McKnight or Adele, but you do need people who are willing to listen and practice. This is how you create a culture of excellence. Once your choir shows excellence and great leadership from within this will be attractive to other singers. People want to join a winner, people want to join what they see can make them better.
Explain why they are singing.
Singing in a choir is a very social activity. For example, many parents love to put their children in youth choirs to keep their children active (and for the pictures). That mindset seems to bleed over into adulthood. I’ve seen people join a church and throw themselves right into the choir. This should not be the approach to joining any kind of ministry. People need to understand that a choir is a major part of the worship service. It is no different from playing in the worship band, singing on the smaller worship team, or preaching to the congregation. When you are in front of the congregation you have a responsibility to lead a healthy christian life and be an example to others. You can’t hide in a choir stand, you are presented in a choir stand.
Remember it’s not about you, it’s about the “we.”
The choir is the ultimate example of coming together to edify one another. The choir should have one voice when singing to a congregation. The focus of one voice is it necessarily just singing, even though that is important. One voice also speaks to one mindset, understanding that we have come together to follow Christ.
A choir is an example of congregational unity, how to stand together through our worldly differences and show unity in trying to glorify the Almighty God. The choir director stands in front to make sure that we are moving as one voice making sure we are giving our best efforts when praising the Lord. The choir shows us that no matter your voice type, volume, or timbre you can be grafted into a family that is focused on praising God.
