Youth Worship Suggestions
Until we can find the right person to lead worship in our Youth on the weekends, I’m doin it. Don’t get me wrong, I love to lead worship – it’s just that I’ve got a million other things to do on the weekend. So (a) we’re looking for a local worship leader who will rock the place youth-style. And (b) I personally am looking to my blogging worship leaders to help share with me some of the great youth songs that are working for you right now.
We introduced Cannons (Phil Wickham) a month ago and they’ve really responded well to that song. I want the teens to be excited about the songs they worship with, so I’d love to show them new music – stuff written with their culture in mind. What are your top youth worship songs?
We don’t have a youth band. We have integrated our youth musicians and singers into our primary gathering band. Our service really spans the generational gaps so that youth and seniors participate and engage throughout.
That being said, most of our younger people really respond well to Lincoln Brewster, Israel Houghton, and a lot of the Hillsong United stuff. Mostly, I think it’s because of the arrangements we play. We own them.
Also, I know of a group of kids in a different town that are really into some of the forerunner music artists. They actually just released a free compilation album. It might have some ideas for you on it.
Follow the links on forerunnermusic.com
Russ Huttos last blog post..Call Me Scrooge (10 Things I Don’t Enjoy About Christmas)
Personally i love Creed Coldplay and generally anything up beat that gets people on their feet and fists in the air. Throw up your rock fist is probably my favorite. I will through out an email to my friends at other churches and see what the are listening to and get back to you.
i lead worship for about 500 students on a weekly basis and we very rarely do anything but worship songs. b/w hillsong united, desperation band, hillsong london, michael gungor, and some passion you don’t have to look very hard to find songs that will hit their culture. we’ve been able to steer away from learning “rock” cover songs and stick to worship. we typically only play 4 songs, 1 fast, 1 medium, and 2 slow and save room at the end to go somewhere if it’s there.
i would say that “youth” cultured worship is not as much about the music you play as it is how the musicians represent it on the stage.
“youth” worship is really alive, moving, crazy, and incredibly passionate. you do that and i don’t think what songs you play are that important.
just my thoughts.
i’m about to do a blog series on building youth worship teams that fit into the vision of the entire church worship mindset. i’ve been working on this for 2 years now at our church and i’m starting to see some crazy stuff. God is really starting to build something here.
I lead/direct the youth to lead at both our Jr. High & Sr. High services (about 300 kids, total), as well as lead/oversee the worship at the Gathering Place (about 1200 kids a week) worship times, and lead at a few camps/retreats, etc. That’s not to brag about numbers, but to give you a general idea of how many I’m ’speaking for’… the songs I’ve led in those various environments that have gotten the greatest responses in the past year or so are:
“Sweetly Broken” – Jeremy Riddle/Vineyard
“It is You” – Newsboys (I don’t like the song much, but THEY sure do!)
“Glorious One” – Fee (the youth introduced this themselves of their own initiative – and WOW)
“Everything Glorious” – David Crowder (everyone seemed to know every word the first time we sang this)
“Lead Me to the Cross” – Hillsong United (warning – this song needs to be played RIGHT to really have it’s full impact… if you’re one dude on an acoustic, it’s probably not going to fly)
“All I Have” – Vineyard
“How He Loves” – John Mark McMillian
and surprisingly enough, most of our youth still LOVE “Marvelous Light” (Hall) and “No One Like You” (Crowder) after all these years!
Hope that helps!
Thanks so much St. Lewis! That’s some very helpful information – sounds like things are kickin’ out there on the right coast.
If I might throw in my .02 and possibly blatantly disagree with Jon for a moment.
I believe “Youth worship” should be all about the songs! We’re teaching and exposing students to God in music for perhaps the first time. If we simply feed them a concert then why not send them to the all ages bar across town?
That being said, I do agree, that worship (not just youth worship) needs to be represented worshipful by the musicians leading it. I try to use as many students as possible with me when I lead. If you have any that go to christian schools find out if they participate in their praise band and what songs they do in chapel. I find here they do some good songs but execute them poorly. It’s the greatest thing when we do a song they know and I hear: wow that song really is awesome! And that way you’re not teaching new songs every week.
This year the standout songs they responded to were:
Mighty to save
Marvelous Light
How he loves
Tell the world
Seriously, worship has gotten so forward now with what Crowder and Charlie and United are doing, it’s hard to go wrong. Our group is very new. Like I started the high school ministry 2 years ago, so we have a blank slate in front of us. These students don’t have any reference point. We throw in No One Like You or Forever and Every Move I Make for fun sometimes
That’s how I roll in the Dirty South. Haha.
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hey guys thanks alot for all the insight. really liked the part. and iam going to give it a shot. if you have any other nice books or sites on the subject, love to hear from you. thanks over again.
If I were to say? thanks to somebody, it would be you. Now I got to know what I have been ? confusing for? whole of my life.
I have been leading a high school praise team(worship is not just singing…) for 4-5 years now for 20-30 students. I also try to teach and encourage student band/sound/tech members as much as possible. I think they are much more likely to help out with music as adults if they do it as youth. Also, the music punches through to their peers on a more profound level when their peers are playing or leading.
I constantly struggle with balancing old, well-known standards and new, fresh music. If it gets too overplayed, you risk it getting stale; if you don’t play it enough, everyone is always lost and can’t really shift from learning to voicing what the song is saying. The most effective age for songs seems to be 2 to 5 years after publishing. There are some exceptions when songs catch on real fast(John Mark MacMillan’s How He Loves, Brandon Heath’s Your Love) or just have that certain something that makes them last(like Be Thou My Vision, Blessed Be Your Name)
Also, the push for more upbeat -vs- more worshipful is a constant concern. The fact is that feedback comes from all points of view and ranges all over just as taste does. Whenever I can, I try to learn the message theme and try to match it with at least one song. I also love to play songs with lyrics straight out of Scripture or songs with a hard-core spiritual message.
All told, it is best to stick with a smaller repertoire(10-20) to rotate and only bring in a new song while retiring an old one every 2 months or so. For the band and singers, repeating songs on consecutive performances gives them a chance to really learn and develop a song. It is good for the student body as well!
Blessings to all you fellow youth leaders and band members out there!
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Some of my favorites right now are: “Father Will You Come” by Unhindered, “Christ In Me” by The School of Worship, “Go” by Hillsong United, “Your’s Forever” by Hillsong United, “Aftermath” by by Hillsong United, “Come in My Courts” and “I Wanna Be Used By You” by Deluge “Holy” by Matt Gilman, and “Overcome” by Desperation Band. All awesome songs!