Blog | 5 Tips for Creating a Committed Worship Team Culture

Use Activities That Warrant Engagement

This is a really broad point, but commitment requires engagement to a certain extent. If people feel they are only a part of the worship team insofar is it concerns their role on a rehearsal and Sunday morning they are scheduled for, that’s as deep as their commitment will go.

We’ll cover most of this in following points, but we want to get your wheels turning on what activities you can be doing that warrant responses and engagement from your worship team members. Getting together for monthly hangs – including all band and tech/media crew. Holding creative meetings. Having a text/messenger group you share ideas and videos with.

Mix Up Scheduling of Worship Team Members

Worship pastors will often schedule teams based on existing friendships or age groups. Sometimes worship pastors will walk into situations where “the teams have just always been scheduled this way”, so they don’t change anything.

This type of thing can be very toxic for worship team culture… here’s why:

If you’re trying to create a committed worship team culture, this type of “consistent teams / same volunteer scheduling” pattern needs to change. Worship team isn’t just a 1-hour hangout to catchup with your 3 close friends you’ve played and chatted together with on-stage for the last 5 years. It should be a place where members feel committed and engaged, are actively growing in their relationships with all involved members/volunteers (worship and tech team), and prioritizing it is an important ministry.

Worship ministry is not a place for older people to go hang with just their older friends, and younger people to just hang with younger friends. This creates an exclusion-mentality in which people close themselves off and only feel comfortable around their circle. Subsequently, worship team just becomes a short “hangout” for them and their close friends; not a space for genuine relationship building and ministry, and ultimately turns away new people who would like to join.

Creative Worship Team Nights

Music is an art, and being a part of a worship team means you are both a leader as well as an artist. But most volunteers don’t get the privilege of exercising either of those.

Get in the habit of consistently scheduling all-team creative nights where all worship team and tech volunteers/staff get together for some purpose. It could be original songwriting – have your church piece together some songs. Give people a heads up and have them come with song ideas. Break off into groups to work together.

Your meetings could also involve workshops of some sort. This could be done by bringing in guest musicians (have everyone attend – drummers and vocalists should still be there for guitar workshops to hear leadership advice). If you don’t have access to musicians who can come in, find instrument or worship clinics online and show videos. These can essentially be treated as leadership meetings or professional training clinics. The key is to make sure you are providing volunteers with something of value that is encouraging and helpful.

Do Life Together!

I cannot emphasize how important this is. Our worship team does everything together – all members of all teams in all positions are friends who actively hang out together. Schedule a bowling night. Have a grill out. Go out for appetizers after a rehearsal.

But remember – getting people together in the same room doesn’t eliminate cliques on its own. You need to follow the prior point of mixing up the scheduling of members on teams. Playing music and being on a stage with others is what builds deep, meaningful relationships, and mixing up the scheduling is how you get disconnected people to engage with each other.

Emulate the Excitement You Expect from Your Worship Team

If all this feels like a rehearsed leadership chore, nothing is going to change. Your attitude, posture, and approach to all of this is so important. Keep in mind that it may take a lot of time for worship team volunteers to adjust, but you need to emulate the excitement you’re expecting from your worship team volunteers.

Obviously, that can be difficult. In order for you to emulate that excitement, you also need to feel inspired, so go and find what does that for you! If improving the musical excellence of your team gets you excited, go search for resources. Watch videos of musicians and leaders you look up to and find a way to get those in front of your team during team nights. Basically, chase what gives you inspiration and passion for growing your team, demonstrate that passion to your team, and encourage them consistently as you watch it transform your worship ministry.