When I was College Minister at Arkansas State, we did our leadership interviews and selection in February. Our new Leadership Team would start after Spring Break and serve the following year until Spring Break. We also did auditions for our worship band at the same time. A student came to me and said he wanted to audition for the worship band. I said great, you will also need to sign up for an interview. I told him the interview involved him sharing his faith story and talking about his church involvement, etc. He then said, "I just wanna be in the band".
In other words, I don't want to be held to the same expectations as the Leadership Team. Here is the problem with that view, most people who will come to a collegiate large group worship will know more who is in the band than who is on your Leadership Team. There is no such thing as, "He is just the bass player". Whoever is on stage represents your ministry. They don't get a pass because they are a good musician.
Character and commitment trumps ability every time! I recently read an article that said often musicians are enlisted to play because of their ability and it is a good entry point for them into the ministry. We don't invite someone to preach at our church as an entry point into our ministry.
You know what this means....you may not always have the best band in town. But, they may represent who you are.
A friend who leads a large church based College Ministry said their church had decided not to ask alcohol abstinence from their volunteers as it had become a legalistic issue. We were together in a meeting where his first task after he got home was to talk to the student who led their worship band about being drunk in public. Apart from the College Minister, it is likely that the worship leader and even band members are the best known people in your ministry.
We should not ask more of our musicians than we ask of anyone else....but, we should not ask less.
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