Chaotic worship or orderly worship?

If you’re starting out in multicultural worship it can make Sunday mornings seem more chaotic than a typical Sunday.  Why?

There’s a sorts of things going on during a multicultural service:

1.  More people are involved on Sunday mornings.

2. You’re trying to make sure the PowerPoint is correct, especially the different languages represented.

3. The person you planned to read scripture or praying in another language hasn’t shown up.

4. Your worship team still hasn’t gotten a certain beat down for a gospel song you’re doing.

5. It’s testimonial Sunday and you really wanted a diverse group of people, but you don’t.

6.  Just singing in multiple languages at the same time can be overwhelming.

It’ll take time for it to feel like orderly worship

I remember feeling stressed about all those things listed above and more when I first started out. And, I still feel a little bit of it now.  But it’s just a matter of getting used to multicultural worship.

Before we had a written schedule for our worship team I was really worried about not having a Hmong worship team member come to practice.  It felt like it was a hit or miss situation.  I didn’t know how to speak the language and it I didn’t occur to me to think about using phonetics.

But, as I immersed myself in the process and learned from “trial and error” I become more and more comfortable with multicultural worship. Slowly…over time…it’s felt more like orderly worship.

Orderly worship and unexpected elements

When you’re starting out in multicultural worship you might sometimes feel like a failure because you didn’t have a certain language or style.  Don’t worry about it.

You might even have a person not show up for a particular part of the service.  Don’t worry about it.

Even though we have a person in our congregation who read scripture for us in Russian he’s not always there on Sunday.  I need to make an effort to develop a relationship with him, but I’m okay if

Lesson…

Don’t worry if your multicultural service doesn’t feels more chaotic versus an orderly worship service.

Remember, it takes time to make a big transition like this.  But with planning, organization, and time it will get better.

And it can feel a little crazy on Sunday mornings, but I want you to know….I’m right there with you striving for orderly worship.

Do you get stressed about multicultural worship?  What’s helped you along your journey?

Share your story and your life…

Sincerely,
Peter Park
Blogger/Worship Leader/Speaker
peterpark@redemptionboulevard.com
(800) 453-3284

Blog posts related to orderly worship:

Baby steps, really?
Transition: Stage One

© 2010, Peter Park. All rights reserved.