Emily Eslick's Worship Blog

In chapters 25 and 26 of Worship Matters, Bob Kauflin talks about being skilled/authentic and ministering believers/unbelievers. He talks about how the quality of music doesn’t always make worship better. If you don’t come from a place of authenticity than you can hope to please God. You also don’t want to sacrifice skill for genuine worship. If you don’t practice or rehearse, you won’t be able to bring the excellence that God had given you. He also talks about serving both non believers and active christians. If you only play or minister to a believing crowd you aren’t doing what God has asked. Actively seeking out people who aren’t christian is a great way to evangelize and share the gospel. I agree with all of this. Authenticity and skill go hand in hand. Making sure to practice and rehearse is important, but if it doesn’t come from a genuine place than it isn’t worship. You could be the best piano player in the entire world but if you aren’t giving it to God that it wouldn’t matt...

In chapters 23 and 24 of Worship Matters, Bob Kauflin talks about planned/spontaneous and rooted/relevant. He tells a story about a church he played with in Philadelphia where they wouldn’t practice. It was very free form and they would play pretty much whatever the congregation started singing. Being flexible and being able to go without the flow of a congregation is very important. Knowing that things might not go as planned is important for a good set. He also talks about being rooted and relevant. He tells of a time when he used only scripture when trying to share the word of God. While rooting everything you do in the bible is important, being able to relate the stories from thousands of years ago to today is key. You can use stories from your life, other peoples experiences, or even other quotes/books written by respectable people to aid in a sermon or conversation. You alpo have to keep your sermon rooted in the bible. Starting to far away form the original text can confuse and ...

In Chapters 21 and 22, Bob Kauflin talks about the differences between internal and external and vertical and horizontal. Even if you show expressiveness and emotion outwardly, if it doesn’t matchup with your inward feelings it is useless. You cannot pretend to pour out on someone if you are empty. If you don’t have a good and stable relationship with God, you can’t lead people inthe act of finding him. This also goes hand in hand with Chapter 22. Having a vertical relationship with God will let you have a horizontal relationship with other people. Bringing people to God means that you have to know where to go. I agree with all of this. Trying to fool your congregation into believing that you are Christian through outward expression will not get you anywhere with God. Many people rely on worship to bring them closer to God. You can’t facilitate that if you don’t know God. Stepping up to the role of worship leading means that you will most likely have people that want to talk with y...