Planning is a continuous process. Scripture encourages planning, and God promises success if we will invite him to be part of the process. A retreat is an ideal time for long-range planning and a time to offer suggestions.
In the book of Proverbs we read, “A sluggard does not plow in season; so at harvest time he looks but finds nothing” (Prov. 20:4). Sluggards are tragicomical figures. Can you imagine what kind of person would fail to plow, sow, weed, and feed, yet go out in the fall, surprised at not finding a harvest?
The sluggard fails to realize that today’s decisions will determine tomorrow’s results. He or she needs to learn that planning is a key to reaping a harvest. Worship leaders also need to plan. They are looking for a harvest of people who can enter into the presence of God unhindered, to bring him pleasure, and to be a channel for his power to be manifested in all the earth.
I know congregations in which there is a steady growth in worship life and power. They are blessed with growing numbers of people committed to worshiping the Lord. Their music is filled with life. People stand in line to become part of the worship team. They are able to field two, three, or more complete worship teams. Most of all, the power of God is evident in their times of worship, so much so that there are testimonies of physical and emotional healings occurring during the worship. Such power in worship comes, in part, from the dedication and the spiritual quality of the leaders and their people. But spirituality cannot be divorced from getting a plan from God for the worship life of the congregation.
God’s Views on Planning
God more than allows us to plan, as if he were giving in to our weaknesses. With wonderful promises, he encourages us to plan. But he wants to be involved in the planning process. Our plans must be submitted to the Lord to succeed. Planning becomes carnal only if God is not invited to inspire and lead the process. But he promises that if we commit to him whatever we do, our plans will succeed (Prov. 16:3).
I have a friend who once stated proudly in his worship service, “We never publish a bulletin, and we never plan anything in advance because we want to be inspired by the Holy Ghost, and we don’t want the devil to know in advance what we’re going to do!” But that’s not really a scriptural view. For God’s inspiration can work flawlessly through the process of thinking, organizing, and planning.
The process by which Luke wrote his Gospel is a clear example of that. Luke did research as any historian would. Describing his strategy, Luke tells us he “carefully investigated” the stories about Jesus and wrote them down in an orderly fashion so Theophilus might be assured in his faith (Luke 1:1–4). Though Luke studied, researched, and in an orderly fashion recorded his findings, we receive his Gospel as “God-breathed” (2 Tim. 3:16), written by the Holy Spirit himself. Therefore, inspiration is not excluded by, or even limited by, the ordinary use of human intellect and planning.
Prosperity. When we plan, we open one of God’s channels to prosper us: “The plans of the diligent lead to profit as surely as haste leads to poverty” (Prov. 21:5). This power-packed promise contains three main concepts: First, there must be plans. Second, there must be diligence. Third, our plans and diligence must help us avoid hasty “crisis management.”
Unity from Planning. Planning has an amazing ability to unite people. This is especially true if they are allowed to contribute substantially to the process. Unless insensitive parents or other adults quash it, children have an unquenchable desire to do. “Let me, Mommy!” is the cry of just about any child I have ever known.
A worship team that lets its members have a vital share of the planning is responding to that God-ordained drive inside of people to create! It’s unfortunate that in most churches the real doers have to live by the creed, “It’s easier to get forgiveness than permission.” Only the bold and perhaps slightly rebellious will be able to develop their potential. The submissive may have trouble flowering to their maximum under a rigid system.
Maximizing Group Gifts through Planning. Planning is essential to the stewardship of our gifts. For instance, let’s suppose that your worship team is asked to minister at a large outdoor rally. If you plan ahead far enough, you will discover that your bass player has connections with the top supplier of sound systems in your five-state area. You further discover that if he has six weeks or more notice, he is able to arrange for a manufacturer’s demo of its top-of-the-line product free of charge. You get $25,000 worth of public-address equipment for a weekend, and it doesn’t cost you a cent! It takes planning ahead to benefit like that.
Some Basics about Planning
The exciting business of planning with the Holy Spirit is a big subject. To date, the best single resource I have seen to guide you through the process, short of retaining a professional consultant, is a book by Dr. R. Henry Migliore, titled Strategic Planning for Ministry and Church Growth (Tulsa: Honor Books, 1988).
Retreating Is Ideal. My favorite format to initiate planning is a retreat lasting at least a weekend, but preferably a whole week. The format should alternate between structured meetings during which the group works through a formal planning model (such as the one presented by Dr. Migliore) and relaxed times that give attendees the opportunity for informal interchange, walks, prayer, meditation, and so on.
What should be involved? Your long-range plans for worship can include matters such as these:
1. Gradual upgrading of the sound system.
2. Upgrading of musical instruments.
3. Securing permission to perform copyrighted pieces.
4. Publishing a recording of your group.
5. Establishing and increasing funding for the purchase of music.
6. Plans to attend worship seminars and symposia.
7. Increasing congregational awareness of the importance of worship through special sermons, nights of worship, etc.
8. Increasing interest in worship leading as a ministry.
9. Involving young people more in worship and worship leading.
This list could go on almost indefinitely. What is included on such a list will depend greatly on your mission statement.
Involve Everyone. Everyone who is involved in the worship life of the church—whether in a leadership role or as a selected representative of the congregation—ought to take part to some degree in the worship planning retreat. In addition, questionnaires can be distributed to the remainder of the congregation ahead of time, seeking responses about the worship life of the church.
Preparation for Planning
A good planning retreat requires much preparation. You must have attractive facilities, good food, and restful lodging. Even more, there must be spiritual preparation and practical homework.
Prayer, fasting, studying worship, and attending worship seminars and conferences are all-important preparations for the retreat. If you are filled with the Word of God and godly advice about worship, your retreat will be very fruitful. Practical groundwork would include arranging for substitute worship leaders on the home front, as well as advertising the retreat to the congregation. It’s important to let everyone know what you are doing, what your goals are, and why you are doing it. It would be very helpful if the pastor would support the idea of a worship leaders’ retreat from the pulpit, explaining to people how such planning will benefit the whole congregation and the work of God in your community.
The Product of Planning. No planning program is complete until there is a written organizational plan encompassing all the items that are part of your planning model. I am convinced that writing a coherent statement about anything I am wanting to do helps me understand my task far better. Not only that, the written plan will help to keep you from “management by platitudes,” in which vague statements of an undefined hope replace real goals.
Planning Is a Continuous Process. Part of your commitment as you begin planning is to decide that you will do planning continuously. This is necessary, first, because your written plan must be your working document—your written orders. Just as a contractor continually refers to blueprints, so you must continually check your progress against your written goals to see if you are on target.
Unlike those of the contractor, however, your plans will continually change. You are not building with static materials on the unmoving ground. Your materials and your ground are continually changing. If your plans are not adaptable to changing situations, they will be like Saul’s armor to young David: Their weight will keep you from the battle.
And, unlike the contractor, you can never say your building is finished. So, if you are working with a seven-year plan, you can drop year one when it has ended, but you will have to add a new year seven. Every week you and your team ought to devote some prayerful time to check your progress against your plans. Every year, at least, you ought to update your long-range planning.
Finally, plans dealing with people must involve educated guesses. Most of us vastly overestimate what we can accomplish in the short term (although we tend to underestimate what we can do in the long haul). Consequently, you probably will need to adjust your plans to a less ambitious pace.
Planning for Worship Services
The concept of planning can be applied not only to overall goals for the worship team but for the worship services as well. Each worship service can be a piece of the master plan. If your congregation is involved in strategic long-range planning, you have tremendous resources for planning your worship services, sermons included. For instance, one of the issues a church considers in planning is its strengths and weaknesses. Similarly, in your services, you can encourage the strengths and prophesy solutions to the weaknesses!
Planning and Spontaneity. Planning does not exclude spontaneity. As with your longer-range planning, so in the services, you must retain flexibility. The Holy Spirit may not reveal all his plans to you because he wants to be able to use someone else in the congregation in a significant way. For example, I have ministered on several occasions with a worship team in which we sensed it was God’s will to have a healing service; but we had no clue as to how the service would be conducted. But as we obeyed as much as we knew, the Lord gave his Word to someone in the congregation, revealing what else was to be done. And in every case, the service was a wonderful experience of his manifest presence.
Who Should Be Involved? As with large-scale planning, so planning the Sunday morning and other services needs to be open to all the people in the congregation. Ideally, they should be encouraged to call you or even to attend the planning session if they feel they have an insight from the Lord for the service. Of course, the pastor and other church leaders could make extremely valuable additions to the service planning.
Tools for Planning. How do you plan a worship service? Here is a simple outline that I have found to be effective:
1. Pray at your planning meeting.
2. Ask the preacher or teacher to tell the group what word he believes the Lord has given him.
3. Ask the others present to share any Scriptures, songs, hymns, prayers, insights, or perceptions they may have had that they feel relate to the service you are planning. If they have been going through some difficulty, encourage them to share that. Often what we experience is common to many others in the body.
4. Arrange the parts of the service for an orderly flow. For instance, if the Word deals with a need for deep repentance, starting the service with songs of rejoicing would be very odd. Such a sermon ought to pave the way for rejoicing, not the reverse.
5. In that regard, I also believe that every service ought to end on a note of victory unless the people remain unrepentant.
Plan to Plan. There is a great potential for blessing hidden in faithful, prayerful planning. You don’t have to be an expert planner to start. As I said to a perfectionist friend of mine once, “I like my way of doing things better than your way of not doing things.” Ask the Lord to help you, purchase a good book, attend a seminar on the subject, and start!