How Do You Handle a Chorister Who Doesn’t Know How to Sing but Always Contributes to the Choir?

This is quite interesting because the first question I will ask is… why? How did this person get into the choir in the first place?

Because many churches don’t really have standards for being a chorister. People just join the choir because they want to serve God, and I can understand that. There are churches, especially some of these fast-growing churches that have structures, where they actually do auditions. They are intentional about saying, okay, you need to know how to sing to a certain level before you can be part of the choir.

But when you don’t have that kind of structure, anybody can join because the person genuinely wants to serve.

Now, you have somebody who, according to you, cannot really sing well, but this person is always contributing to the choir. Maybe she’s buying things for the choir, giving money, buying drinks for people, helping to maintain things and all of that.

So how do you handle it?

You need wisdom.

You really need the wisdom of God to lead people, because leadership is beyond just knowing what is right. Sometimes, you know what is right, but you need wisdom to know how to handle it.

Because whether we like it or not, this person joined the choir to sing. In the person’s mind, “I can sing. I want to serve God.” So you can’t just embarrass the person and say, “You cannot sing, leave the choir.”

At the same time, we need to be realistic. Yes, God looks at the heart, but when you are leading congregational worship, praise, or a ministration, you also have to consider what the congregation is hearing. We don’t want people going off-key, going off-beat, or not even knowing what they are singing.

So, if it is not that bad and the person is teachable, train the person.

The fact that the person is contributing financially doesn’t mean you should give the person a microphone. No. But it can tell you that this person is committed to the choir in some way, and if the person is willing to learn, give them an opportunity to improve.

Find time to train the person. Let the person practise. Start putting the person in the background, maybe with the backup singers. Then you can gradually allow the person to participate in smaller services, maybe a midweek service or another programme where the pressure is not as much as a major Sunday ministration.

As the person keeps practising, the person can get better.

But there’s another thing that is very important here… the person must be teachable.

Because sometimes, when somebody is always putting money into the choir, the person can begin to feel like, “I’m the one helping this choir. I’m the one buying this. I’m the one giving money.” And before you know it, the person doesn’t want anybody to correct them anymore.

That one is another problem entirely.

Money does not give anybody the right to become uncorrectable.

If the person is not a good singer but is willing to learn, that’s one thing. But if the person is not a good singer, doesn’t want to improve, doesn’t want to be corrected, and believes that because she contributes money she should have a special position in the choir… then you have to deal with that.

You can appreciate what the person is doing financially without allowing the money to determine who gets to sing or who leads.

And if the person is genuinely committed and has a good heart, maybe you can even find another area where the person’s strength can be useful while the singing is still being developed.

Because at the end of the day, we should appreciate people’s willingness to serve, but we should also be honest about the responsibility they are being given.

The person can be valuable to the choir without necessarily being the person who should lead the song.

And sometimes… that’s where wisdom comes in.