Excellence + Grace

Encouraging Growth While Honoring Grace

We’ve probably all been in that rehearsal:

The pianist has spent hours practicing a difficult anthem, only to be publicly scolded for the measures she still can’t play. A singer misses an entrance and gets The Look. Some of us have watched a choir member cry in rehearsal. Some of us have been that choir member and gone home believing we had failed at our ministry.

So, we determined that we would lead differently. We would choose grace.

But grace and excellence can feel like opposing forces. Push too hard toward excellence and we create musicians who are afraid to fail. Lean too far the other direction and “good enough” eventually becomes the standard.

It helps me to remember that excellence and grace were never meant to be enemies. A safe rehearsal isn’t one where mistakes don’t matter. It’s one where mistakes aren’t dangerous.

We can stop and fix the wrong entrance. We can rehearse those eight measures again. We can say, “Nope. We can do better than that.”

Grace doesn’t require lowering the bar. Grace changes how we help people reach it.

But What Is Our Grace Accomplishing?

Sometimes what we call grace is really avoidance dressed in nicer clothes. We overlook the chronically unprepared singer because we don’t want an uncomfortable conversation. We continually excuse an accompanist who can’t manage the repertoire. We keep giving opportunities to someone who has done very little to prepare for them.

Everyone feels better temporarily, but nobody grows. Grace makes room for growth. Enabling makes room for repetition.

So maybe one of the best questions we can ask when navigating a difficult situation is: What is this grace actually accomplishing?

Is it giving someone room to recover, learn a skill, try again? Great. But if six months later we are still solving exactly the same problem, maybe grace needs to take a different form. Because grace should always take us somewhere.

What Does That Look Like in Real Life?

Let’s start with the soprano who auditions for every solo—the one who has more willingness than talent.

It’s tempting to just keep saying no. But there may be a better conversation, one centered on stewardship: “How are you stewarding the talent you have?” Ask her. Has she ever taken voice lessons? Worked on sight-reading or theory? What has she actually done to develop her voice?

In my experience, this can be an “aha” moment for would-be soloists. They either begin stewarding their gift intentionally or realize they don’t want the solo badly enough to invest the extra time and effort.

Give her a pathway instead of merely a verdict. Suggest six months of lessons and another audition. Give her a smaller opportunity first. If you see real potential and commitment, perhaps the choir budget can even cover a few lessons to get her started.

Now “no” has become “not yet—and here’s how we get there.” That’s grace accomplishing something.

When Someone’s Best Still Isn’t Enough

What about the accompanist who practices for hours every week and still struggles to keep up? This one is harder because effort matters. A lot. And while grace honors effort, excellence still evaluates outcome.

Six hours of practice matters, even if the anthem is still beyond the accompanist’s current ability. So ask: What would make this person more successful?

Maybe he needs the music earlier. Perhaps a short weekly rehearsal with the director would help. Maybe the accompaniment can be simplified without compromising the piece. Or possibly, the church could pay for several sessions with a strong collaborative pianist, specifically to work on the weekly anthem.

Sometimes, after genuine investment and effort, we still may find that the role has outgrown the person. We can remove someone from a role without diminishing their worth. Allowing someone to struggle publicly, week after week, in a position they can no longer fulfill may not be particularly gracious either.

Grace Has to Consider the Whole Room

There’s another side to grace.

The singer who arrives unprepared may need grace. Absolutely. Life happens. But when it happens every week, extending endless grace to one person begins costing everyone else.

Forty-nine other volunteers prepared their music, rearranged their evenings, and showed up ready to work. If rehearsal continually stalls because one person hasn’t prepared, our grace toward one musician becomes rather ungracious toward the other forty-nine.

Sometimes accountability is grace.

“You need to know your music.”
“We need you here on time.”
“This part needs more preparation before Sunday.”

These statements are reasonable expectations. We can require accountability while still extending grace.

Excellence Should Cost the Leader Something First

Stewardship, of course, travels in both directions.

• Before asking the pianist for another three hours of practice, did I get the music to her early enough?
• Before becoming frustrated that the choir still can’t sing measure 47, have I tried teaching it differently?
• Before expecting excellent preparation from my volunteers, have I offered excellent preparation as their leader?

Sometimes grace is inconvenient. Teaching something differently takes time. So does meeting privately with a struggling musician. Development may require some budget. And an uncomfortable conversation handled thoughtfully requires far more of us than The Look. Maybe the alternative to perfectionism isn’t lowering the standard. Maybe it’s development.

Perfectionism identifies the gap. Good leadership helps build the bridge. Grace gives musicians a safe place to begin, and stewardship asks all of us, director included, to keep moving.

As we head into our next season, here are two good litmus tests to carry into our rehearsals:

• If we achieve a flawless musical offering while damaging the people who offered it, was it actually excellent?
• If we protect everyone from discomfort so carefully that nobody is challenged to grow, is that actually grace?

There’s a lot of room between those two questions. And I suspect that’s where some of our best music—and our healthiest musicians—are made.