Tetsuya Kuroko: Template of a Worship Leader

“I am a supporting actor, a shadow. But a shadow will become darker if the light is stronger and it will make the white of the light stand out.” - Tetsuya Kuroko

In my lecture on worship, I analogized Tetsuya Kuroko (the titular character of the basketball anime Kuroko No Basuke) as how a worship leader should be. His quote (see above) powerfully and poetically nailed the proper attitude and outlook of a genuine and effective worship leader. It is parallel to what John the Baptist stated in John 3:30: “He must become greater and greater, and I must become less and less.” As what I’ve argued:

God is our Light, and we worship leaders are His shadow. Just as Tetsuya directs attention away from himself to make his teammates better, so we must make ourselves less and less that God would become greater and greater. As the shadow, let us be “darker” that “the white of the Light will stand out.” […] The best worship leaders are those that can effectively direct all available glory towards God.

I want to elaborate on it a bit. In this analogy, Tetsuya is the worship leader. The basketball is the “praise” or “glory”. And the recipient of the basket ball is God.

Thus, the best kind of worship leader is someone who can deflect or redirect that basketball of “glory” towards God in every single play.

“Passing” the glory to God comes naturally to him.

It’s an instinctive automatic response whenever an available opportunity to do so presented itself.

And he eagerly seeks such opportunities around him all of the time.

If the glory is being directed towards him, he will automatically redirect that glory to God.

And whenever someone attempts to grab the glory for himself, the worship leader would prevent that from happening by promptly pushing the glory towards God.

Tetsuya Kuroko is a perfect template of a true worship leader. He should be emulated, not only by worship leaders, but by all worshippers.