Using recorded sound as your source, rather than a microphone on a voice or instrument, provides exact repeatability for comparison of different control settings. It also allows you to hear only what the mixer settings are doing, without the confusion of hearing direct sound from the stage.
One factor that should make the sea of knobs in front of you a little less imposing is the fact that during a typical church service, relatively few controls need to be touched. Many of the controls on your console are used to pre-adjust levels or determine the destinations to which signals will be routed. It is not unusual for an operator to use only the mute buttons and faders during a service. Trim controls should be set in advance and need to be adjusted only if conditions change dramatically. Likewise, channel assignments to sub sends or main outputs are normally set and left alone. Once channel EQ adjustments have been made for particular microphone, there should be no further need to adjust EQ during the service.
Of course, there's a lot more to mixing sound than we can get to in this article. That's what Sound Advice is for. In the future we'll further explore what it takes to provide the best sound possible in your worship service.
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Experiencing Worship, The Study