What do you do with long instrumentals in worship?

Let me offer up a thought on this...

I'm a 25 year old music director, with about a year of "real experience" under my belt. That being said, many people might disagree with this, some might be on the same page.

I worked as a Creative Arts Pastor for about a year at a fairly large church in Cape Coral FL. During my time there, I learned a lot of do's and don'ts. One thing that I ran into there was this whole topic of long instrumentals. Do we play them, or skip them entirely? When we did play them, it usually consisted of me up there on my electric for 20secs, shredding through a lead line to just go back into the chorus. When we skipped them, it usually made for an awkward transition back to the same thing we just sang. On worship records, they use the instrumental to break up the song and give the listener something different to grab their attention again. In worship, it feels like we were giving the worshipper time to disengage.

My suggestion would be to use that time to re-engage our fellow worshippers. This can be done in a number of ways. If the song speaks of the cross, why not pull up scripture talking about the sacrifice of Jesus? If the song speaks of injustice, why not use engaging pictures showing the injustices in the world? If the song speaks of repentance, why not offer up a thoughtful prayer and give time for reflection?

When we prepare for weekend worship, we as worship leaders need to be ready to use every moment to God's advantage. I'm all for face melting solos, but how productive is this when we as a congregation want to keep our focus on God? It's our privilege to plan better with the wisdom and guidance that comes from the Spirit. Let's challenge ourselves every week to plan with the goal to keep our church family engaged at all times.

Grace and Peace.
Paul

A link to a video demonstrating one way to do this.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-iiMENEuvuk

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