Worship Planning

I'm on my church's worship committee (appointed with hesitation over "membership issues", as I'm not officially a member). On Friday afternoon we're meeting to discuss our vision for next year as a worship and creative arts team - drama and dance are being included soon.

In preparation for the meeting I've been asked to pray and think about where I see us headed next year. Trouble is, I've been thinking WAY outside the box and I really don't think what's in my head lines up with anyone else's vision!

After the last meeting I was really, really bothered by the thought that it's becoming more a performance than worship. We've even booked dates to do 4 worship performances next year! That we're stuck in a rut of "Hillsong" type worship - and perhaps try to imitate them unconciously instead of developing our own style for our own group. That worship needs serious re-definition in this church. And that we need to have more participation, more facilitation, less leading.

The current thinking of the worship leader is that we need to "take people from the marketplace into God's presence" through choice of songs, order of elements within what's defined as the "worship" section of the service and such. It's almost like we've put a ring through the folk's nose and are leading them unwilling where WE want to go, but not necessarily where THEY want to. That bugs me.

So I honestly don't know what I'm going to say at this meeting. Whether I should shoot my mouth off and go off on tangents, or just quietly sit there, and resign later. I'm getting more and more friction from the new guy and am not too sure I have a role to play in where this worship team is headed next year.

But I could be wrong. I'll go along and say one or two things, then see what happens.

Perhaps I'm there to throw spanners in the works and inject new thought patterns or ideas. Or I could, yet again, just be the Odd One Out.