Students as Teachers When it Comes to Church
Reflection Roundup reports from conversations couched in relationships. Here, readers will find boots-on-the-ground and “live from the field” activities of people intent on increasing their understanding of what it means to live like Christ in the world. As always, listening broadly draws together differing perspectives from which we can learn but with which we may not concur. Over the course of this spring semester, two first-year students at Abilene Christian University shared their observations and experiences with church in two aspects relevant to all church ministers and leaders: worship and burnout.
Standing on the sideline and cheering for students as they run the race of developing and actualizing their own faith is one of the greatest joys of my life. This spring, two exceptional students in my classes at Abilene Christian University made some intentional observations both about what literature says on the topic of church and on what is happening currently in many churches. Here is some of what they discovered and shared, followed by some additional helpful resources.
As someone musically gifted who has also grown up spending time in various Christian denominations, Shawn Nicholson was an astute participant observer of the worship at various churches around Abilene this spring. Questing independently, he spent fifteen weeks thinking deeply about what was happening around him.[1] Because young adults are standing at a hinge moment between the values instilled in them by their families and foundationally formative churches and their own personal choices, this is important research. They are deciding what to carry forward with them into their adult lives.
Worship leaders must be able to simultaneously worship while leading others. Nicholson discovered this key value. While not stating a preference in his work regarding many of the factors church attendees and leaders can get caught up with—gender, color, clothing, etc.—the key take-away for Nicholson was whether or not the leader(s) themselves were engaged in worship. It is clear to church attendees, or at least it was to Nicholson, when leaders are performing rather than worshipping. Vital also is preparation to the degree needed for the leader to be comfortable and confident in the leadership role. This does not necessitate perfection as, again, leading worship is not a performance. What was valuable to worship participants, Nicholson concluded, was a leader who was able to take the focus off of themselves and place it squarely on the God they and the congregation are worshipping. It takes a unique type of preparation for the leader to communicate and elicit participation within a worshipping body. A leader with their hands in their pockets while leading the congregation can be enough to send a young adult looking for a different type of worship leadership and a different church. Nicholson found these types of nonverbals speaking loudly.
Throughout my own experiences leading worship with the direction of several worship ministers over the years, one of the most poignant pieces of advice has been to lead out of overflow. The folks at PursueGod.org offer a brief article highlighting this key point. Leaders cannot lead others to places they have not already visited. The Zoe Group of acapella Christian worship leaders has a song entitled “Overflow,” which also simultaneously instructs and offers an experience of this very important aspect. The story of Jesus creates such joy—how can people help but let this joy overflow in response and in worship right back to Jesus?!
Emma Walls, also a first year student at ACU, wrote a professional-style review of Barbara Brown Taylor’s 2006 book Leaving the Church: A Memoir of Faith. The book has been around a while, but Walls found Taylor’s narrative reflection a useful partner for her own. Of course it’s helpful! It’s the Barbara Brown Taylor.
Walls shares her perception of Taylor’s experiences in church as a leader “trying to fulfill God’s place in people’s hearts,” and the “overwhelming exhaustion and emptiness” a person is met with when they are bearing a leadership burden in this way.[2] As a wise young adult searching for her own seat at the table of “church,” Walls explored Taylor’s story as one who “became hyper-attentive to the needs of the church while neglecting the one who called her to ministry in the first place.”[3]
Walls highlights Taylor’s story, demonstrating to readers how she had to be willing to relinquish her aspirations of power and position within the church to regain the joy and passion she had primarily exuded in her walk with the Lord. Walls confessed in her review to feeling both encouraged and challenged: encouraged that there is more to faith than moral and practical legalism, and challenged to live into this with grace that represents the true beauty of walking with the Lord.
Many entering ministry fear burnout or have a sense that genuine portrayals that do not seek to hide the truth are too vulnerable and risky. Walls clearly values this quality in Taylor’s work, saying Taylor “challenges readers to put themselves inside the pages and walk alongside her difficult journey of discovering what it means to be a human in church and not the church to humans.”[4] A priceless and nimbly worded observation, indeed.
“A Covenant Prayer in the Wesleyan Tradition” can be a helpful tool in the hip pocket of those deeply embedded in ministry. This tool invites us to remain cognizant of the fact that all ministry belongs to God and that God has thoughts and ways toward ministry that are higher than those of people (Isaiah 55:9). The Wesleyan Covenant Prayer can be a helpful prayer for the prideful or the faint of heart—undesirable yet inevitable realizations most people have about themselves at one time or another. Combined with the prayer of Psalm 131, the prayerful heart serves God with a willingness to be used, laid aside, or even criticized while remaining content, calm, and quietly receptive to the personal nurture of God’s own holy wisdom.
Heartfelt gratitude and deep-seated confidence in both the present and the future of our churches extends to these two students for their earnest and sage reflections on their own journeys alongside the communities of faith of which they have been and continue to be a part. The Lord is clearly your God, and is evidently with you. Rest in God’s love knowing that at every moment God is singing over you, hands outstretched (Zephaniah 3:17).
