The Must-Haves for the Worship Musician – Passion

 

Passion

“Passion” seems a little fluffy to be part of the foundation of the six elements, don’t you think? Yeah, it’s important, but passion can be so misguided. The first few episodes of any season of American Idol are great examples of deep desire, deeply deluded. Holy cow, someone should have told those kids they really CAN’T sing before they camped out for three days in Cleveland.

To a hopefully lesser degree, we’ve all encountered misguided passion on our worship teams. And so passion scares us.

Passion has to be subject to a surrendered heart – both to Jesus and those He’s delegated leadership to – and conjoined with true gifting and talent. And the fervor for music and ministry should always be a subordinate passion. David (as in: giant slayer, king, roof-top voyeur) no doubt had a passion for music. But it was a tool to express love to his True Passion.

Consider the alternative to having passionate musicians: volunteers who happen to play an instrument and are willing ‘sacrifice’ a Sunday or two a month. I just threw up in my mouth.

Passion is worth the risk.

Read Psalm 57:7-11

My heart, O God, is steadfast, my heart is steadfast;
I will sing and make music.
Awake, my soul! Awake, harp and lyre! I will awaken the dawn.

I will praise you, Lord, among the nations;
I will sing of you among the peoples.
For great is your love, reaching to the heavens;your faithfulness reaches to the skies.

Be exalted, O God, above the heavens;let your glory be over all the earth.

Discuss:

1. What do we see about the relationship between David’s music and his worship of God?
2. Why is “passion” for music & ministry so dangerous?
3. Do you think passion is really a “must have”?
   Why/why not?
4. What are some marks of a healthy passion for music and worship ministry?
   What are some “red flags”?

Get the Must-Haves Worship Team Devotional

We’ll be running this series over the coming weeks but if you liked it and would like to download the whole 10-week devotional ebook for free you can do so using the link below. It not only includes the ebook, but a printable version so you can take a hard copy to rehearsals. Also the download includes a separate pdf for each week so you can email it to your whole team. This way, you can foster an email discussion with those who aren’t scheduled that week.

Here are the Must-Haves we have published so far:

Must Haves Devotional – Introduction session

Must Haves Devotional – Called

Must Haves – Teachable (part 1)

Must Haves – Teachable (part 2)

Get “The Must Haves” Devotional

Thanks to Jon Nicol for his generosity in making this resource available to us.