Why a Pastor of Worship?

As most of you know New Life is currently seeking a Pastor of Worship. Some people may be wondering why? Why not a senior pastor? What good would a pastor of Worship do? Well I am glad you asked.

There are three simple reasons as to why, and they all have to do with growth, spiritual, communal, and neumerical.

1) Staff. The simple fact is tha a lack of staffing often holds a church back. The rule of thumb is for every 100 people a church needs some sort of staff member. This is obviously a point focused on the western church were most of the congregation is exceedingly busy and is forced to relegate much of the work of the church to paid positions, at least in a directory sense. Many churches don’t do this and they stop growing once they reach a particular size. The second aspect of this is that a church must staff for growth, be prepared for what is coming. So a church with 200 people doesn’t need 2 staff they need 3 to be prepared for the growth that God wants to cause in their congregation. This is a faith issue, all staff is. If a church waits to hire a staff member to when it is safe then they will never do it or do it late. They must follow God. We aren’t talking about a safe thing here, people are dieing and going to hell, families are dividing, friendships are ending, lives are being ruined. The church needs to reach its community in doing so it will grow and to grow it must have staff.

2) Worship Service. This one is especially true for smaller churches. Weather we like it or not for most people, especially in small churches, the worship services is the first and primary expositure of a visitor to the church. In the case of the small church the entire church, in many cases, is the sunday service. So it stands to reason that if this aspect of the church is improved the church will retain more visitors. This is meer logic. There is another aspect of this improvement. It also encourages the current congregates. If you enjoyed or benefited more from your churches worship service wouldn’t you be more excited about church, more likely to invite your friends, more likely to be on time, want to be involved etc.  A Pastor of Worship’s job is just that, to see that the service is as good as can be.

I would like to add that the first two points are commonly included in top five lists of church growth inhibators.

3) More Leadership. Often times in churches, especially small ones, every working congregant is doing more than one job and multiple jobs they are not equipped for or passionate about. This situation results in burn out, mediocrity and no time to take ownership of any job to see to its excellence. When a church brings on a staff to address a wide array of issues and jobs, like a pastor of worship, many of the little jobs that people are doing just so that the job gets done will now be addressed by the staff. This allows the person to focus on the jobs they are passionate about likely taking over a few areas from people that aren’t passionate about what ever the first person was passionate about. This happens throughout the church, all from one staff member. This person will also better equipe and supply people currently doing jobs that they are passionate about with the resources and assistance they need to succeed. In all, much of the church improves in quality and effectivness, regardless of what aspect of the church it is.

As a small additional point on leadership. The addition of another leader provides the current leadership with depth for more perspectives, ideas, and direction to better lead the entire congregation.

So a single staff can have a profound effect on a church especially for something as crucial as a pastor of worship. So that is why a pastor of worship.