It was the after-lunch session of a one day NCD result workshop. As digestive processes do their work, blood supply to the head becomes a challenge.

The focus was on the detail surrounding the church's recurring minimum factor of inspiring worship. A couple of combatants from opposite sides of the room decided to start (continue?) a little stoush over "the older songs" versus "the newer songs". Having become very bored with this wrong-headed debate over a number of years, and a little underwhelmed by this church's capacity to look much within themselves for the root of their churches health challenges, I leant against the wall for a moment and watched the insipid tennis match.

After a time, a moment of inspiration struck, I stepped forward and asked a question.

"How many people in your congregation would ask themselves on the way home from worship, 'I wonder if God and others were blessed by my worship offering today'?"

It didn't seem a very incisive question at the time. But as soon as I asked it (and many many times when I've asked it of churches since then), the effect was quite stunning. The majority of the room looked like they'd just been caught doing something naughty out the back of the church building, while the rest maintained their "bless me if you can" posture that I'd previously observed from the sidelines during one of their morning services.

In response to the question, after some time of silence, one person offered up, "Maybe five percent."

Another countered, "If that."

I allowed the awkwardness to linger for a moment while I turned to and read Malachi 1:

The Lord of Heaven’s Armies says to the priests: “A son honors his father, and a servant respects his master. If I am your father and master, where are the honor and respect I deserve? You have shown contempt for my name!

“But you ask, ‘How have we ever shown contempt for your name?’

“You have shown contempt by offering defiled sacrifices on my altar.

“Then you ask, ‘How have we defiled the sacrifices?’

“You defile them by saying the altar of the Lord deserves no respect. When you give blind animals as sacrifices, isn’t that wrong? And isn’t it wrong to offer animals that are crippled and diseased? Try giving gifts like that to your governor, and see how pleased he is!” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.

“Go ahead, beg God to be merciful to you! But when you bring that kind of offering, why should he show you any favor at all?” asks the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.

“How I wish one of you would shut the Temple doors so that these worthless sacrifices could not be offered! I am not pleased with you,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, “and I will not accept your offerings. But my name is honored by people of other nations from morning till night. All around the world they offer sweet incense and pure offerings in honor of my name. For my name is great among the nations,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies.

“But you dishonor my name with your actions. By bringing contemptible food, you are saying it’s all right to defile the Lord’s table. You say, ‘It’s too hard to serve the Lord,’ and you turn up your noses at my commands,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies. “Think of it! Animals that are stolen and crippled and sick are being presented as offerings! Should I accept from you such offerings as these?” asks the Lord.

“Cursed is the cheat who promises to give a fine ram from his flock but then sacrifices a defective one to the Lord. For I am a great king,” says the Lord of Heaven’s Armies, “and my name is feared among the nations!"

There appeared to be a new degree of conviction rippling across the room.

Who is your worship team and what do they do?

The discussion took an interesting turn at this point.

One lovely, humble lady spoke up and said, "But there are a lot people in our church who would not feel comfortable on the platform."

To lighten the mood slightly, I responded, "Yes, I understand. But lucky for you all, at NCD Australia we have some very clever diagnostic equipment. One such recently developed device is the Bless-o-meter 3000." I then alerted them to the fact that it was invisible, but that I was indeed holding it in my outstretched hand. In great technical detail, I then explained that, as I moved about the worship auditorium, it would cause them to beep faster and louder as I approached locations at which people were best able to bless God and others as an act of worship. As I moved towards the pulpit, they began beeping (and smiling). I moved away and the beeping faded. I then moved towards the guitar on stage. Very loud, almost continuous beeping (from the guitarist). The offering bags even achieved a crescendo. The piano did well. Though the drums divine impulses were surprisingly quiet, much to the disdain of the drummer sitting in our meeting...

I then moved to the back of the auditorium: to the doorway; the visitors table; the toilet door; the back corner seat; even a little into the foyer. After some time, we were finally achieving almost continuous loud beeping as the point set in.

The conclusion they were coming to was that the entire congregation is the worship team, and that when the body gathers, everyone in attendance must bring their unique offering of worship to bless God and bless the body, wherever it was most appropriate to do so. Even the person who comes with nothing other than a broken, contrite, seeking heart, brings with them a powerful gift with which to bless God and others. Anyone who turns up without some deliberate semblance of a personal worship offering should feel embarrassed.

Ingredients for a feast

When fully grasped, this understanding of gathered worship can radically change the role of a worship leader.

Over years and years, I've watched many, well-meaning worship leaders who felt immense pressure to "make worship happen", take some extraordinary and, many times, painful measures: Copying the ill-fitting styles of other congregations; changing the "worship team's" clothing; playing music they and their music team didn't even like; throwing out some traditions that weren't really a problem at all; etc. etc. All the while, the largest part of the worship workforce sat (and occasionally stood), obediently following the leader's polite instructions while in a somewhat disengaged state. From the side, this fervent activity of the worship leader and the on-stage "worship team" does really end up looking like a tail trying to wag a sleeping dog.

So what can a worship leader do to avoid God saying, "would someone please just shut the door"?

Well, a big step is to make the shift in your mind from feeling like a performer who has to make worship happen to being a chef.

A great chef can take the most unusual ingredients that they can find in the cupboard and make something beautiful from it. The everyday encounters with God, the spiritual gifts, the personalities and life experiences of all the people at your gathering are the raw ingredients of a feast of worship. By taking those ingredients as they are (and not wishing for someone else's ingredients or buying other "better" ingredients) and making space for their expression within the worship gathering, you will be shaping a beautiful, honest, God-honouring and inspiring worship gathering.

From carpark to carpark

Some will immediately fear that this "free-for-all" will be unworkable or destructive. They picture all kinds of people clamouring for the microphone or bringing along their grandfather's ukulele to play in the band. Again, it's NOT about the stage. When you begin empowering people to understand the importance of their unique offering of worship (see Q38 under Empowering Leadership on the survey), chances are you'll have less three-chord guitarists wanting to audition for the band and less closet preachers wanting to claim the stage for their (ahem... I mean God's) moment of glory. Validating the rest of the time and space of your worship gathering will help people find a rich, meaningful place where their offering can be planted in the heart of God and others.

Making time for such a wide diversity of offerings does mean that the start and finishing times of the gathering need to be reinterpreted. In simple terms, the worship gathering begins when worshippers begin to gather (no, seriously, think about that). At the very least, this takes the start time back to the arrival of people for the service and pushes the end point right out to their departure. The worship gathering is when worshippers are gathered (crazy, huh!).

However, just making more time and space available is not going to solve the challenge. It is likely that many, if not most, of those coming to your gathering won't have much of an idea of what you're talking about if you encourage them to prepare to bring their unique worship offering (see Q89 in the survey). They will probably think (as experience has shown) that you are trying to revive some outdated old testament custom involving herbs, spices and burning stuff. We should not view them harshly for their lack of understanding.

Over centuries, many worshippers have been conditioned to receive from worship gatherings with minimal expectation of them offering anything (apart from perhaps money and a bit of singing). Architecture has many times reinforced this divide between the blessers and the blessed. Approaches like seeker sensitive services (which showed no significant positive or negative correlation with long-term church development in the original NCD research) and other even more consumerist models of church life have made it very likely that the average attendee at many gatherings will get a pat on the back and even a thank you for remembering to turn up.

As part of this re-education, and following the feast of worship theme, some churches have found it helpful to think in terms of a menu of worship to prompt participants about what they could bring. Even if they've not prepared before arriving, they can view this worship feast menu (in a newsletter or on a special menu board) to prompt them about what they can 'bring to God's table'. Given an intimate knowledge of your people and some imagination, countless suggestions could be made. Just a tiny selection of examples may include:

• Give a specific word of encouragement to someone
• Help someone in from the carpark
• Offer to mind someone's children during the singing time
• Bring some flowers or some other creative gift to give to someone as a surprise
• Get to the gathering a bit earlier so that you're not running around distracting others (and yourself) from worship
• Come early and clean the toilets
• Make yourself available to sit and talk with someone who needs a friend or needs some wisdom on a particular topic
• etc.

Many will note that the kind of ideas that emerge are not all that extravagant, with some of them already taking place. The critical question though is whether people perceive those offerings as part of the worship gathering, or see them as somehow separate from the 'main event' that takes place from the opening to the closing song (again, consider Q38 under Empowering Leadership). Do they truly perceive themselves as part of the worship team?

The energy that is available at a worship gathering at which the worshippers bring their unique offerings is a gift to any worship leader. Rather than sometimes trying to raise the dead, they are given the opportunity to guide the living into one unified body of powerful worship. The blessing to any newcomer that enters such a gathering is quite profound as they may have rarely been part of such an intensified, selfless and serving experience of community.

The worship leader's task moves beyond the stage and beyond the timeframe of the gathering. The work of coming alongside individuals to help them discover their unique offering and holding them accountable for bringing it becomes very important. Remember that, in many cases, we have conditioned people not to think about their unique offering, and so you should not be surprised at how many reminders and how much instruction will be required to change this culture. The process of helping people discover their gifts (Q37 and Q46 under Gift-based Ministry on the survey) and liberating them to use those gifts (most of the other questions under Gift-based Ministry) will possibly be part of this process. So, as you can see, you are going to want to multiply this new kind of worship leader (just as a healthy church multiplies leaders of all other kinds), because the task is much bigger than a few hours of gathering or even some rehearsals.

A different perspective on every offering

Every contribution in a worship gathering is reinterpreted when the worship team is understood as the whole gathering of people. Good sermons move from being a right to be expected (and complained about if not received) to being simply the worship offering of some appropriately gifted person. A good message falling on unteachable, unprepared ears is not going to score well on any survey (consider the relationship between Q10 and Q25 to Q89 and the respective role of speakers and listeners). The preacher must always assume the humble position of one trying to hone their character and skills. However, being mindful of the responsibility of the recipients is a very important balancing dimension.

The same applies to music and other contributions to a worship gathering that are most prone to criticism (consider the relationship between Q53 to Q89 under Inspiring Worship Service). As long as any of these contributors are intentionally trying to bring their best offering to bless God and the body, they should accept the feedback of others (who they are trying to bless). But they should also feel very comfortable to politely inquire about the worship offering of the one providing feedback. "So, what did you bring today?"

All of this brings into question the reasons people gather for worship (consider Q50 on the survey). It may be that the people at your gathering are not really sure why they come or what the gathering is for. If so, some of the above may be helpful in bringing clarity to that. Seize the chance to speak into a void of understanding. On the other hand, it may be that, according to Q50, your people are reasonably confident that they know why they come to worship, and yet multiple other indicators within worship are scoring quite low. This strongly suggests that those clearly understood reasons may not be very good reasons. That is, they may not be reasons that have much to do with blessing God and the rest of the body. Re-education may be necessary.

The NCD term, Inspiring Worship Service, can remind us of the natural rhythm of worship that should be a part of the church week — 'Inspiring' (inhale) and 'Worship Service' (exhale). In an unending upward spiral, we are able to inspire (breath in) the spirit and breath of God. We are then able to breath that out in Worship Service offered to God and others who then are likely to inspire us further. No one need be worried about the workload side of worship (but you should be asking hard questions if you are currently under duress due to your worship gatherings). You will be hard pressed to out-give God and the body of Christ when they are naturally working together and you are simply hosting the feast with all ingredients provided.

Questions

How many people in your congregation would ask themselves on the way home from worship, 'I wonder if God and others were blessed by my worship offering today'?

What are some simple expressions of worship that could be encouraged more in your worship gatherings?

Do your worship leaders understand part of their role as being the unique training and releasing of worshippers? How could this be enhanced?

During what segments of your worship gatherings does it sometimes feel like someone is trying to 'make worship happen'?

How would your gatherings look, sound or feel different if each person brought along their unique offering of worship to bless God and the body? Be specific. What instruction, culture changing or accountability is needed to see that happen?