GOING FROM TRADITIONAL TO CONTEMPORARY WORSHIP

So you've taken that new job and you're trying to figure out how to implement some much needed transitions, without causing yourself or your church unnecessary "bloodshed". 

I've been talking to some friends of mine who are worship ministers, who are either in this phase of ministry or are about to experience it. During these conversations, I've found myself telling the story of my very first worship mentor. I decided to share it here with the hopes that it can be helpful even to those of us who are in established ministries.

WATCHING IT DONE WELL

I attended a church in Oklahoma City during my high school through college years, and during that time I had sung in the high school worship band and with the adult choir. I had gotten to know the worship minister for "big service". His name was Josh, and he was in the Air Force and was working for the church part time. Once I was in college, I began leading the high school worship team. I had done so for a couple of years when Josh asked if I would be willing to do an internship that paid a little bit weekly. As part of my internship, I continued to lead worship for the high school band, while playing keyboards and singing during the adult services.

Now at this time, the worship wars of the 90's were in full swing and raging across many churches. This unfortunate problem resulted from a tension to either embrace fully more traditional worship, or choose contemporary worship. Traditional worship included mainly hymnody and used piano and organ as instrumentation, while contemporary worship consisted of choruses and recently written songs and was performed with a full rock band instrumentation.

Mainly there was an “either/or” approach where both sides tended to demonize the other and build arguments as to why their style and preferences were biblical and the only '“right” way to conduct worship.

It was into this mix that I watched my mentor successfully transition the church into what many people called "blended worship", without any casualties and without causing a church split.

KEY PRINCIPALS

Bridge The Gap (Find Common Ground)

There was a group of older men in the church who had formed a bluegrass circle. The group got together from time to time, just for fun, to play bluegrass music. One of the strange things that I found was that while many of the older generation didn't like drums during worship, they seemed to forget about them if the drums were part of a bluegrass band. Not only did Josh begin to join with this group playing bass, but was also able to invite a drummer to begin jamming with them. This was Josh's inroad that helped him start the church worship transition. He found a style of music that was embraced by the large group of people who loved traditional worship, and used it as a bridge to introduce common elements in contemporary worship. 

Build Respect and Relationships

As they played their instruments, they also laughed and joked, had serious talks, and prayed together. Over time, they saw Josh more as friend than as "paid staff”. Not only did he get to know them better personally, he also showed respect to them by playing their style of music and not showing contempt for it.  As Josh built his relationships on the foundation of respect, it not only strengthened his reputation with the guys he was playing with, but with the larger community that those men were part of.

These two first steps were crucial to the process because they gave Josh credibility and trust beyond just his job title.

Incremental Change

Part of bridging the gap between traditional and contemporary worship was bringing the drums into the bluegrass group who practiced on Sunday nights in the sanctuary. This drums were the visual cue to our church that represented the Incremental Change that was starting to take place. The drums were used in rehearsal for months and stayed on the stage, but weren't played on Sunday morning. There were murmurings, but no one could complain because the drums hadn't been played during Sunday services yet. This point was where the genius really became apparent.

The worship pastor built a relationship with a segment of people who had a stake in the traditional worship style. Now it was time to expand that influence to the larger group. Josh asked the bluegrass band if they would mind doing a worship night once a month on a Sunday night that they dubbed "Pickin and Grinnin night". It was a worship service that was all bluegrass music with a full band. Old and young people alike were “hand clappin and singin”!

Patience

I don't remember exactly how many months the bluegrass band did monthly worship nights, but I do remember that drum set sitting there on many Sunday mornings, not being played. To this day, I'm amazed at the amount of Patience it takes to make a major transition like this. Now that Josh had built his bridge founded on respect and relationships with and among a large group of people, it was time to break the sacred barrier of Sunday morning services.

It was time for the Pickin and Grinnin band to do special music on Sunday morning, drums and all. At first, the band just did special music once a month. Because this group was respected by the congregation and had become familiar to the congregation, it didn't seem weird for the band to be doing special music. Imagine an all traditional church with a full bluegrass band, with the congregation singing, standing, and clapping the very first time that drums had been played live on a Sunday morning. It was astounding to me. There were no complaints about the music being too loud or irreverent. People were just worshipping Jesus.

Josh scheduled the group more and more regularly on Sunday morning until no one could remember when the drums had gotten on stage and people didn't even take notice of them any longer. From there, he took the next step of using the band on the intro song of the service. Then after that song was over, it was back to piano and organ. Again, this pattern of just one song with drums and then back to normal was repeated for months. 

For me, it felt excruciatingly slow, but I can see now that he was slowly stretching people without breaking them. This pattern of unfamiliar to familiar repeated for over a year. But each intentional step resulted first in two songs with drums, then three, until finally the whole set was done with a full band.

To this day, it is one of the most influential lessons in worship ministry I could have learned. For the sake of making this memorable, here are the bullet points:

• Bridge The Gap

• Respect and Relationships

• Incremental Change

• Patience

Continued Incremental Change

As for my own experience, I would like to add one additional lesson that I have learned in my experience of helping to transition a church in its musical worship.

The moment you stop adapting is the moment you run the risk of creating a “we've always done it this way” or “my preference is the only biblical way” culture. The responses of the heart never change, but style is fluid. If you're not careful,  the generational riff can slowly widen if you settle on one style and stay there for a period of time without making adaptations.

We can all learn from the "How To's" and "How Not To's" of worship transition. What would you add?