Re: [Worship] Burnout

[KIncorvaia@aol.com]

Donnie:  I too have been struggling with burnout during the last six months.  
 It started last November when our Pastor terminated our  full time worship  
leader.   I was on the worship team and also elder in charge of the worship 
ministry.   I spent many hours meeting with the worship leader and pastor 
trying to work things out to no avail.  Although I understood the worship 
leader's need to move on to a different ministry, it was very hard seeing him 
and his wife leave our church, and to see the effects it had on our worship 
team.  We then had to transition to a new partime leader who was very 
controlling and difficult to work with.
I had a very difficult time working with her and began to hate rehearsals 
both on Tuesday nite and right before our Sunday worship service.   The 
ministry became a chore, not  a joy and I felt depressed alot.   At the same 
time I had a hard time experiencing the joy of the Lord in my worship and 
times of prayer.  In fact,  I have felt very little during the last six 
months, even in the midst of times when God has moved powerfully in our 
worship services.    

When our part time worship leader left I thought things would get better as 
our worship team began to use internal leadership to run the ministry.  
However,  2 weeks later  my wife and I were released from the worship team 
when my pastor told me I needed to be teaching rather than doing music.   
That story has been told in a recent posting called "Death of a Worship 
Team."  Needless to say,  this has been a very difficult time for us and the 
feelings of burnout increased even more.   

Last week Randy Clark,  who helped initiate the so-called "Toronto Blessing" 
and himself was empowered by God to undertake a worldwide ministry of healing 
after a time of  emotional and spiritual burnout,  came to San Diego for 
three evenings.  I went to two of the meetings, hoping to recapture my 
passion for the things of God.  The last night I stayed till 12:30 a.m.  so 
that I could receive personal prayer from Randy himself.   I asked for prayer 
to be refreshed by God and to overcome my feelings of burnout.  I told myself 
as I drove to the meeting that I would not leave until I received that 
prayer.   Unfortunately,  Randy was very tired by that time and our prayer 
time was very short.  I felt nothing afterwards,  yet somehow I felt the Lord 
tell me that he would honor my decision to stay that late to receive 
something from Him.   Because when you are in burnout and in the desert,  you 
are desperate for God and will do anything to come into his Holy Presence.
At this point I am trusting God that he will use this season for his purposes 
and to teach me to be totally dependent on him and not on my feelings.   
There is a great article on Morningstar website called Flowing in the 
Anointing that deals with this issue of the desert experience.  It helped me 
tremendously when I read it.   I saw that God gives each of us seasons of  
flowing in the river and of walking in the desert.  Both are important to our 
spiritual growth.

By the way,  what you feel inside has nothing to do with the anointing God 
gives you to lead worship or minister to others.   You can have the external 
anointing even if you feel nothing inside.  God showed me this last Sunday 
nite when at our worship service my pastor asked me to pray over some people 
even though I was feeling totally out of it.  I was amazed to see how God 
gave me words of encouragement to speak to these people and how the 
individuals were positively moved by the Spirit as we prayed.   So don't be 
discouraged;  I believe God has and will use times like this to show us that 
the anointing flows totally from him and that we must trust Him even when our 
feelings tell us otherwise.

God Bless
Joel Incorvaia
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