I don't have a good voice. I know very little about musical theory, whether I'm an alto, tenor, or soprano, or how to play a diminished chord on the piano. You might be significantly more musically gifted than me, an average musician like myself, or simply have no musical bone in your body. Unless you are musically gifted and pursuing woship ministry vocationally, you probably haven't considered yourself a worship leader. But the truth is you are a worship leader. You may not sing on stage at your church, have any influence over the direction of your weekend services, or even be working at a church, but you lead worship every day.
Everyone is a worship leader.
If you are a parent, you are the worship leader in your home. If you are a youth pastor, you are the worship leader to the students you serve. If you are a volunteer in the children's ministry, you lead worship for the children. If you are just one person in the worshipping congregation, you lead worship for those around you. If you own a small business, you lead your employees by the way you worship. If you attend school, you lead your peers in worship by the attitudes you have towards those in authority. Being a worship leader is not determined by musical capability; it is simply part of being a Christian. If a disciple is someone who follows Jesus and wants to be like him, as Christians when we make more disciples we are making more worshippers.
It's more than a song.
Be careful not confuse this with getting people to sing songs. Music is our first reaction when we think of worship leaders, but worship is more than music it is a way of life. Romans 12 says, "Therefore, I urge you,brothers, in view of God’s mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices,holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship." This is not about song choices but a way of life. Worship is a life lived in view of the cross given completely to God.
Louie Giglio defines it this way, "Worship is our response, both personal and corporate, to God for who He is, and what He has done; expressed in and by the things we say and the way we live." Mark Driscoll describes it by saying, "Worship is living our life individually and corporately as continuous living sacrifices to the glory of a person or thing."
This means that in your home you are a worship leader; not because you gather the famly around an instrument and sing bible songs, but because you teach your children what it means to love their neighbor, work hard in school, and read their bible. You are a worship leader in your student ministry not because you have a "time of worship" in your programs, but because the goal of student ministry is that people's lives will be all about living for Jesus, which is worship.
If you are a Christian, you are a worship leader.
Who are the people that God has put in your life that you have influence over and have the opportunity to lead in worship? Not because they need to be taught to sing songs, but because they should be taught, led, and encouraged to love God and love others the way that God teaches us to.