Consider The Audience

If you’ve been leading worship for a while, you know the difference an engaged crowd makes to a worship service. When the majority of people in the room are singing and participating, that makes the worship service so much sweeter.

Welcome to part 3 of an 11 part series called How To Plan A Worship Service from Start to Finish.

In this video we’re going to talk about your audience and why it’s important for you to consider them each time you plan a worship service.

Here we go.

If you missed any of the other videos, I encourage you to go back and watch them on Youtube or at fwbworship.com.

Be sure to download “Top 5 Resources To Use When Planning Worship” it’s a free download produced by the Free Will Baptist Music Commission.

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The third step to take when planning a worship service is: Consider The Audience.

The age, gender and preferences of the people you will be leading are all important things to consider when planning a worship service.

Planning a service for teenagers for instance, is a lot different than planning worship for a senior adult group. They have different preferences, they listen to different music, they know different songs and different styles of music will minister to them in different ways.

When you plan, keep in mind the general age of the congregation so that you don’t alienate them with song selections they aren’t familiar with.

Many of you will be leading the same basic congregation from week to week – so this is not something you have to spend a lot of time on, but it is important to keep the age of your church in mind, so you have a starting point.

Now this doesn’t mean that you should only sing hymns for older adults and only sing contemporary songs for teenagers. That’s not the point.

The point is to be considerate of your crowd.

One of your main goals as a worship leader is to get the crowd to participate – to engage in worship. And if you sing 4 songs they have never heard or don’t like – that becomes a hindrance to them being able to participate in worship.

So keep the age of the crowd in mind when you plan.

Many of you are leading churches that have multiple generations in the crowd. That’s my experience. We have 5 generations in our church. My approach to this is to lean younger – without forsaking the familiar.

Just because someone is older, doesn’t mean they can’t learn a new song, but the style and the way the song is presented plays a huge role in whether or not the older crowd will participate. The same is true for younger audiences.

You should also consider the gender of the crowd. Planning for all women or all men will determine not only song selection, but more importantly what keys the songs are sung in.

This might mean that you choose keys that are not good for you – but they are good for the crowd. They should be the priority when choosing keys, so that they have every opportunity to sing.

Now let’s talk about preferences and song selection for a minute. Everyone knows if you have 100 people in the room, there will be 100 preferences to try to please.

That is a not a good approach, because frankly, if you try to please everyone, you won’t please anyone. And ultimately, there’s only one person you should try to please. And that’s Jesus.

So here are a few principles when it comes to navigating preferences over style and song selection.

1. First of all, make sure you and your pastor are on the same page – and if you have to make a choice, go with what your pastor wants. I talk more about this in the previous video, so be sure to watch that if you haven’t yet.
2. Second, make sure the songs you choose are Biblically solid. You will probably get some complaints over style, and maybe over volume, but you should never ever get a complaint OR a legitimate complaint over whether or not the songs you sing are theologically sound. Do your homework and only sing songs that are firmly rooted in scripture.
3. Third, keep the general preferences of the congregation in mind. If you know that 80% of your church loves southern gospel – then by all means sing some Bible-based, Christ-honoring southern gospel every now and then.

That doesn’t mean that you should always do what the loudest person wants though.

Considering your audience is just one step in the planning process. But you shouldn’t skip over it.

4. Fourth, when introducing new music, do it a way that shows the church the value of the song and encourages them in their faith.

For example, use your choir or a special music group to introduce a new song – so that when it’s time for the congregation to sing it – they are familiar with it and can sing along.

5. Fifth, ultimately, you have to sing what the Lord wants. Earnestly seek His direction and He will show you the right songs to sing and the right style to use, that will help your church engage in worship each week.

I have the opportunity to lead worship for the Oklahoma Minister’s Retreat every year. I think I’ve led there for 8 or 9 years now.

When I plan for that retreat, it looks a lot different than when I plan for our regular church services.

You see, the retreat is mostly men, mostly pastors – and some lay leaders. And while there are some younger men there, the crowd leans to older adults.

Knowing this, I plan music that will reach the majority of the congregation.

I make sure to put songs in lower keys that are easy for men to sing.

I choose a handful of older hymns that they can sing without looking at the screen.

I also choose songs that are theologically rich and tell the whole story of the gospel.

And I pick one or two new worship songs that we learn together at the retreat that can encourage them and help them see the gospel in a fresh way.

The worship during this retreat is always special and the pastors are encouraged as we sing together.

I realize – this is because of the Holy Spirit’s work during the retreat – but I believe it is facilitated in part, because I considered my audience in the planning process.

And so I encourage you to consider your audience each time you plan.

Thanks for watching part 3 of this 11 part series: How To Plan A Worship Service From Start To Finish. I hope you’ll watch the rest of the videos and let us know what you think in the comments.

If you want to go deeper on this topic, we’ve put some additional links in the description below.

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