There are so many schools of thought and personal preferences regarding music in christian circles that it almost is impossible to state any preference without fear of being criticized by someone. Their is so much strife and legalistic behavior over music in the church that it would seem simpler just to eliminate it all together. Problem solved!
Then we must remember that we are instructed by God’s Word to sing and make music, to praise and worship through song and instruments. To dance before the Lord. To sing to the Lord. The Psalms are full of such instruction. These admonitions all indicate that our worship should be energetic, joyful and should be an example to those who do not yet know Christ.
Music is not meant to be evangelistic in itself. That is the purpose of Biblical exposition. But God centered worship, flowing from a joyful heart will be an example to the unbeliever. We must look at the value music has in our worship and our church ministry.
In Colossians we are told to “sing songs and hymns and spiritual songs.” Obviously the Apostle Paul left it slightly ambiguous as to the style. The Holy Spirit inspired him to write that because God new there would be different styles down through the centuries. He knew that music would be different and diverse and that there would be a great variance of opinion.
The instruction is the following – songs, makes sure it is actually music. Hymns-a rhyming song or poem and spiritual songs – fairly descriptive make sure it is spiritual, worshipful and brings glory to God. I didn’t read anything in there about evangelistic songs. It is because he also wrote that “the natural man won’t receive spiritual things” So if we sing songs to be evangelistic they aren’t really going to understand them.
Salvation comes through the “foolishness” of preaching not music. In the same passage Paul writes that “what ever we do should be done with all our might to the Lord” so if we are supposed to be singing to the Lord we should be full of joy and energy because we are loving God with all our soul, mind and strength.
God is a God of diversity and variety. He has given us a creation that has more than one color. He has more than one culture and one color of skin on planet earth. We can then safely assume that he likes more than one style of music, since he created many. Music has a timelessness about it and I believe that is because God allowed different cultures and people to create and experience different styles. In the context of church music God gave us everyone from Fanny Crosby to Chris Tomlin. He has guided, directed and used very diverse vessels to pen music for the church. Many times we have the incorrect paradigm that the old hymn writers were these super Christians and today’s writers are simply flaky, shallow people who put a few words together and add a beat.
I would strongly disagree. God uses people in unique ways, does He not? God gives people diverse jobs to do and burdens to bear, right? He calls people for His purpose that are not necessarily all the same. He is simply looking for people who are willing to be used. Male, Female, Black, White, Burdened, Care-Free, Rich, Poor, people dealing with a life of tragedy and those who are doing great. The common denominator being they are someone who God can use.
People need to get off the high horse of thinking that the only appropriate music was written before this century. God still works in hearts to develop great music. We are rejecting God’s blessing on contemporary song writers when we are exclusively utilizing ambiguous southern gospel and hymnbooks. God is a God of variety. Who do we think we are if we think God only listens to hymns and slightly outdated southern gospel.
I believe many of today’s songwriters have a better concept of singing to the Lord as we are commanded to do. Too many of last centuries songs are about feelings and are ambiguous as to what they are singing about. Too many of them talk about the human experience or are attempting to be the “evangelistic type of song” that speaks about God but not to Him. Also the language they employ is many times very archaic, which I believe isn’t always understood by believers singing them. Are all of the hymns incorrect or irrelevant? No! There are many with very great concepts and excellent words.
You see God inspires people to write songs to magnify Him. It’s all about God. We need our church music to turns eyes to Him. To sing to the Lord.
What I see as a problem in conservative churches is they hold onto these old songs and are afraid to use new songs because so and so sang it or so and so recorded it. Or it is too simple without the wordiness of traditional songs. They are missing the boat. It is not about who God used to create it. It is about praising and worshiping God with the variety He deserves.
Many times in more contemporary churches they can be predisposed to use only new songs but I would encourage them to look for hymns and songs from centuries past because it broadens our worship experience and God loves those too.
The point to this whole post is this. Music is important. That is why the devil fights us, using the preferences of Christian brothers and sisters to cause division. If you are in music leadership in your church you have to be very skillful to “blend” the worship to suit everyone’s tastes. When that happens then they can take their eyes of their disparate tastes and put their eyes on Jesus.
The other side of the coin is that you won’t please everyone. But if you are a surrendered vessel the only one you have to please is Him! That’s what music in church is all about anyway. An audience of one.
