What is the mix of songs that your church sings? Do you sing hymns? Modern praise songs? 70's and 80's choruses? Mix of everything? What are your preferences?
When it comes to singing in church, we must always remember what we're doing. We are responding musically to God's revelation of himself in his word. As God speaks to us, and as we know him more, we sing his praises and declare his greatness.
This immediately puts a slant on what we're doing when we sing. We're not a chart show, where we have to keep up with the latest tunes. Neither are we a music museum, where we carefully maintain and preserve historic church music. Nor are we an appreciation group, who holds tightly to a certain era of Christian music because that is what we like.
John Frame very helpfully in his book Worship in Spirit and Truth speaks of peoples' "language of worship". What this means is that in the many and varied people that make up the church, there are found different expressions of sincere worship. For some, the latest Tomlin stuff might be the best way for them to worship God. For others, it was the classic hymns that they learnt as children. And Frame counsels us to be sensitive to this.
After all, God's people are many and varied. Paul reminds us in
Ephesians 2v19: "
So then, you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God."
The solution, then, is to sing everything. Don't create unnecessary categories in your worship. Our faith has a history, which makes older songs relevant, and God is active in the present, which makes modern songs relevant. There is no need to have one category at the expense of the other.
Of course, the difficulties present in this approach are twofold:
- Though may need to be put into the arrangement of songs in order to make them accessible to a diverse congregation. This may mean playing the hymns in a traditional way, on the piano or organ, and slowing down to a stop after each verse. Or it may mean driving those hymns with a drum-beat and single chords for each bar, while keeping the same recognisable melody and traditional words. Perhaps more modern songs need to be played simpler to make them accessible, or they need to be rocked out. Know the people you're ministering to.
- Love. This is probably the hardest thing to achieve when ministering to a diverse group of people. Paul reminds us in Ephesians 4: "I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace." We need to love each other, humbly, gently and patiently. We have been joined by God's Spirit, in peace. If you are a musican, serve humbly by playing what is needed, and doing it well, rather than what you like. If you are in the pew and you don't like the songs being played, learn to love those for whom this is their sincere worship of God, and perhaps learn to worship with them, as you expect them to worship with you in the songs that mean something to you.
Jesus has loved us with an immeasurable, unending love. If we have been loved like that, how we can we not show love to those around us? It is a miracle that Jesus loves so many different people. In fact, it is a miracle that Jesus loves you.
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