Private Devotion and Public Worship
How Important is the Private Worship Time of Worship Leaders for the Public Worship?
As a worship leader, I have seen this question from numerous books, articles and sermons over many years. There must be no doubt that it is of paramount importance for all of Christians to have private worship time with God every day. But, especially for worship leaders, it is much more significant. I feel that there is no possibility I could fill all of the reasons why the private devotion is so important for worship leaders with this limited space here. However, let me offer a few thoughts on that.
First, I want to post one of my favorite quotations about leading worship, which says, “You can not take people where you have not been.” If we are not involved with our personal devotion time regularly worshiping God, we will not sufficiently be able to lead our church people to the presence of God in worship. Our meaningful and private worship time with God is what makes leading worship more possible and more powerful. Even though we have many talents in music and we are well-prepared mentally and physically, without that as part of our lives, we cannot be a true worship leader who worship God pleasing Him alone in our worship leading. In all of this, I am very convinced that we cannot dive into worship in front of people on Sundays when we miss our worship time in our private lives.
Someone also says, “We are not only worship leaders, but also leading worshipers.” I cannot agree with this point more. Before we become leaders for the congregation, we have to become worshipers first. Our role as worship leaders is not primarily musical. It is definitely, first and foremost, spiritual. If we really want to lead worship spiritually and effectively, we should maintain our worshipful and habitual relationship with God in our lives. In light of what 2 Corinthians 11:3 says, without a life of pure and sincere devotion to Christ, “Our minds may somehow be led astray.” To reflect a sincere worship of God in our leading worship, we should more focus on and look for our spiritual devotion in our daily routines.
It is absolutely vital that the worship leader actually worship while leading. If and when we feel that we have trouble concentrating on God while leading worship, the problem is probably lack of spiritual preparation and lack of personal worship in private. So, in other words, I believe that our private worship time can make a big impact on our public worship. As worship leaders, It is also true that we have to focus on the people but, if we are too much focus the people, so that we cannot be worshiping our Lord during the worship time. It means that we lose the main part of our roles in public worship. We must know exactly how to strike a balance between leading the people and worshiping God.
In conclusion, beyond any other preparations for our public worship, we have to seek the Lord first by setting our private devotion time in advance. In doing so, we can be given God’s direction for our worship leading and the guide by Holy Spirit. For a God-centered worship, praying and asking God to guide us is much more important than any others. In planning for our Sunday worship services, our number one priority is to seek God’s guidance. It is little wonder that if God calls us to do something specially on the platform in our public worship, He will definitely equip us well beforehand in our private worship.
