VISION
The aim of our worship ministries is to provide excellent leadership through the Arts that will enable people to worship God, understand spiritual truth, and respond with increased obedience to His leading. We also want to develop a lifestyle of worship in deep community with people we love.
Goals
Leadership is a privilege and with privilege comes great responsibility. We are very selective about those who teach and preach. In the same way, we are very selective about who leads with the Worship Arts Team. Below are a few expectations we have:
Spiritual Maturity: A vibrant, growing relationship with Jesus Christ. A model that can be seen through an outpouring of what God is doing in your life.
Servant’s Heart: Be humble and willing to serve, surrendering your gifts and talents to be used as the Lord and the team leaders see best. Our attitude should be humble and not self-seeking and self-promoting. Our aim is God and His glory, never our own.
Team Player: Be able to work well with others to accomplish our objectives. When we lead people in worship, we are prime targets for the enemy. We cannot be effective in spiritual warfare if we’re not abiding with God and united with one another.
We Strive for Excellence not Perfection: In all things we strive to do our best for God’s glory. This means we should be willing to accept and benefit from constructive criticism when needed.
If you are interested in serving on the Worship team, here are a few things that we as a worship ministry strive for:
Our ultimate goal each week is to serve the Lord and bring glory to Him through the gifts that He has given us. We want to do to everything to bring glory to God (1 Corinthians 10:31). We desire to serve in such a way that draws attention to the Lord and not to us.
In our heart of hearts we are serving an “Audience of One,” namely God himself (Colossians 3:23). This is not a performance so much as it is serving as unto the Lord, and if that is the heart’s motivation, the rest of Swan Lake will be blessed as well.
A phrase that we have adopted is that we seek to glorify God with “undistracting excellence” (as opposed to perfection) in our music.
There is a tremendous pull toward seeking the approval of men when one is involved in a public worship ministry. By nature, we crave people’s approval. Seeking to gain people’s approval is an unattainable goal and a snare of the enemy. Our goal is to point to Christ and bring glory to Him, whether or not we gain approval from people.
All of us in the body of Christ have unique gifts and we seek to use these gifts to glorify God and build up the church (1 Corinthians 12:12). We have the privilege of using the musical gifts God has given us to build up and bless the body of Christ.
God has revealed Himself to us through His Word, the Bible. God’s Word is living and active (Hebrews 4:12). As a result, we seek to worship through songs that conform to the truth of Scripture not particular styles.
We desire to engage both the head and the heart in worship. We want to have a deep and accurate understanding of God, and we desire for this to draw our hearts and emotions into an appreciation of the glorious Gospel and a deep love for God Himself.
If you are interested in singing or playing as part of the Worship Team:
You are welcome to come and check out a worship team practice any time. We practice almost every Wednesday night.
We would like to practice with you at least three times before you would be a part of the worship service, for you to get to know us and for us to get to know you.
We would need to have an informal interview in which we would hear how the Lord has worked, and continues to work, in your life.
We would need to listen to you sing or play your instrument in front of a couple of the worship leaders.
Anyone still in high school is welcome to come to practice any time as well. We handle those who haven’t yet graduated high school on an individual basis.
Again, thank you for your interest in serving in the worship ministry. We hope that the verses listed above express the desire of your heart as well. We look forward to serving with you!
Sound Technician
Training
1. Anyone interested in becoming a sound technician is welcome to come to a worship team practice and learn more about what the ministry is like.
2. Those interested in running sound should plan to come to at least three Wednesday practices (consecutive weeks is preferred) to learn from a sound technician. This time should be considered a trial period to confirm interest and determine competency.
3. Following initial training, the trainee should plan to shadow a sound technician during a Sunday morning worship service for a minimum of two weeks, and then be shadowed for a minimum of two weeks while operating the sound during a Sunday morning service on their own.
Contact the church office for more information.