We had a situation in one of our services today that I thought was worth processing via blog. We had a guest who was dancing all over the place during worship. We certainly want people to have the freedom to worship God within their personality. And I certainly believe in expressive worship. But there is a fine line between worshipping God and distracting everybody around you. And I felt like he crossed that line when he started dancing all over the front of the theater. It was hard to focus on God. This guy became the focal point of worship. And I felt like maybe he wanted to be. Because we felt like his worship was interfering with other people’s worship we asked him to simply stay in one place so it didn’t interfere with our interpretation for the deaf.

I never want to quench the Holy Spirit. And I’m challenged by expressive worshippers. But I also know that our spirits are under our control according to I Corinthians 14:32. And the overall tone of I Corinthians 14 is this balance between an openness to the spirit and orderly services. It’s awfully tough to strike a balance between those two things! All you can do is be sensitive the spirit and try to make a decision that honors God.

I have always felt like leaders are too reticent to offend one person even when they are compromising the experience of multiple people. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a small group or a church service. I try to make my decisions thinking about how it effects the entire flock. Sometimes you need to pull one sheep aside and be graceful and truthful with them. That is what I tried to do with this guy. I affirmed his apparent exuberance for God. But I explained that his worship was distracting and interfering with the people around him. And he didn’t disagree.

I openly talked about the situation in this service because it was so obvious. I just feel like those are teachable moments. These unplanned moments are wonderful opportunities to be real and raw. And the key isn’t even what you say. It is always the spirit with which you operate that is heard loud and clear.