Every church may have had this experience where the praise and worship team turns a worship experience into a rock concert with all the riffs, note changes and vocal ad-libs.

If you have, you know how distracting it can be. Although the songs sound nice and the arrangements are flawless, it takes people's attention away from the true prize which is God's presence.

On the other hand, no one wants to give God worship songs that aren't practice well, too. I pray the heart of David, when he said, "I will not offer burnt offerings to the LORD my God that cost me nothing" (2 Samuel 24:24), be upon all worship leaders.

How do we have a healthy balance of technical excellence and spirit-empowerment when leading people into worship?

Point people to Christ

Worship is not about being the mediator between God and man, as most worship leaders mistakenly think most of the time. 1 Timothy 2:5 makes it clear, "For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus."

Worship is not about making us look and sound good because we're reflections of God's presence. It's about exhalting and glorifying Jesus above all else.

Excellent isn't extravagant

God desires nothing but the best. That's why He gave nothing but the best to us when He sent Jesus to die for the forgiveness of our sins. What God asks of us is the best that we can offer, not the best that we can show off.

There is a very fine line between excellence and extravagance. The excellent will make use of what is there and make it a holy and pleasing offering. Extravagance will often unsatisfyingly think it's about what we give and not whom we give it to.

Measure sacrifice

Just as the king David offered nothing but pure sacrifice, we are as well to offer our worship as sacrifice. Because of that, we sacrifice time and effort to make our songs better. We must, however, always keep in mind that the quality of the sacrifice will never be as important to God as the quality of the heart of sacrifice.

What pleased God most about Abel's sacrifice was that it was the best choice. The heart is the root from which all of our praises flow. Not the lyrics, chord progressions and drum solos.

When making your music more excellent for God, do you do it as a means of offering up praises to Him or simply to make the team or yourself sound better?