This morning I got to the office and knew I had a blog post I wanted to finish, but as I was firing up my computer and going through my Tuesday morning routine of email, twitter, facebook, and iTunes shopping, I thought of something that could be useful to some, me included.  What tools do you use daily, usually those are the ones you keep in your dock of your computer (mac) I don’t know where you keep them on a PC (HA!) So I thought I would do a walk-through of what’s in my dock.

Mail app – my choice client for email. love it, and it comes standard on every mac. It’s not an extra purchase like MS Office Outlook, etc.

Safari – I know many of you are lovers of firefox and chrome, but i’m so used to safari, I can’t give it up. I use it A LOT.

iChat – great communication tool for me. I can link my AIM, Google Talk, and Facebook chat all in one place. very nice.

ProPresenter 4 – Hands down the best presentation software out there. Highly recommend that you check it out!

iCal – This little app has come a long way in it’s function, but it works great for me. I have numerous calendars for church, personal, family, etc. that I can update on any of my devices and they all sync together.  iCal + Google = awesome, for me.

iTunes – Tuesday’s are great because new music comes out and I generally shop and see whats out first thing on Tuesday morning. But i typically have music playing while I work. Currrently while I am typing this post I am listening to Matt Redman’s new record. It’s great!

Twitter – It does the job for me. multiple window options, easy to use, and doesn’t take up a lot of screen real estate.

Photoshop CS4 – Use it daily for my job. can’t think of the last day I didn’t use this program. It def. speaks for itself.

Huh?  You may be looking at the title of this post and thinking, thats a pretty selfish thing to say. Especially if you read it like this; “You didn’t mess up, the band did.” “The played that way to fast” “you sounded great on that song, but the band sounded terrible.”  Yes, all of those so very selfish and vain, but I think of that statement another way… “It’s not you that makes a great team, it’s the band.”

Where would we be as worship leaders, if it weren’t for the band. Remember the last time you decided to sing the chorus again at the end of a set? Or that time you played an extra interlude and following your lead, the band crescendoed for the perfect turn around into the bridge. I could go on, but you get the point. None of this would have happened well had it not been for the chemistry and trust you have in your team. I can’t stress enough how important it is that you, not only surround yourself with good musicians, but that you trust them as well. It also helps if you are friends, but thats a given. I encourage all you worship leaders out there to work hard at trusting and developing chemistry with your team. You won’t regret investing time into each of them, getting to know them, and just laughing with them. But this also applies to YOU. Open yourself up to your team, be vulnerable, and transparent. Simply put, be real to them. If you struggle with a song, let them take over and bring you along. If you are struggling one morning in church to lead effectively because you were up all night with a sick baby, let them pray for you and lift you up. It will be the difference.

Surround yourself with love, trust, respect, musicianship, and leadership, and you can’t go wrong. It’s not just you, it’s the band.

Bradley