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Sermon preached on 10th December, 2006
The CSI Cathedral, Madurai,
South India
MUSIC IN CHRISTIAN WORSHIP
(The conflict between the Traditional and the contemporary)
I chose this
topic for two reasons: One, because I’ve been involved in the field of
church music for quite sometime. Two: Celebration of Christmas has a lot
of singing.
Also this is
a very familiar theme – Music in Christian worship. But it is
familiarity that makes us insensitive and numb to serious issues. I think
music in Christian worship is one such area where we have developed a bit of
insensitivity. This is my observation. So it is appropriate to spend
some time reflecting on this topic.
First, let’s
talk about worship. How should our worship be? Jesus removed much of the need
for discussion and debate about worship when he declared in John chapter 4
verse 24 that ‘his worshippers must worship in spirit and truth’. Well
that lays the foundation for Christian worship. True Christian worshippers
will worship the Father in spirit and truth. Truth in worship is being
sincere about it. No pretensions. No falsehood. No hypocrisy inside the
church.
Worship is sometimes reduced to a
kind of routine warming up formality before we listen to a
sermon. Worship is not a press-button experience on a Sunday morning. Our
worship must be fresh and new every time we gather to worship God. Let
us not be mere creatures of habit. It must be prophetic.
It is natural for our minds and bodies to be programmed for certain ways of
thinking and particular ways of behaving. That is how God has made us. For
example we experience some kind of subconscious territorial security in
sitting in the same place week after week. But God has also given us the
freedom to change. God will never want us to become stagnant. Movement,
change, flow, progress, etc are good for us. God would want us to be dynamic.
The Spirit of God is one that is creative and desires us also to be creative. A
word of caution: Being creative does not necessarily mean that we
should stop being traditional and go in all-out for the new and
the contemporary. Creativity is only a different way of treating the old.
Newness is using the old in a new way. I think there cannot be anything new
without the old. In other words, we cannot be 100 % new in anything.
Let’s now
move into the area of MUSIC in the church. Contemporary Christian music has
become one of the most controversial issues facing the church now.
Contemporariness
is seen more in music than in anything else. Moreover music is very much there
in our lives. Wherever we turn there is music.
Someone has said, “Nothing is more
singular about this generation than its addiction to music. Today,
a large proportion of young people between the ages of ten and twenty live for
music. It is their passion. Nothing else excites them as music does….”
Yes, an estimated three hundred thousand professional and amateur rock groups
are performing in the United States
alone. Music stars are more than mere creators of background music to our kids;
they are their heroes.
The Christian faith is a singing
faith. We have lots of music in our worship. But the question is how much of it
is good music or the right kind of music. What is wrong about the
music used in our services?
According
to the Bible God always enjoys music. God even makes room for noise as long as
it is joyful and for His glory: ‘Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth.
Serve the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs’ says Psalm
100 verses 1 and 2. God is not offended by joyful, loving exuberance. It is
lukewarm religious hypocrisy that makes him sick. The bitter truth
is: religious hypocrisy has almost our second nature. Hypocrisy is the
opposite of truth. God loves to see all our creative resources released as an
expression of sincere praise and honor to Him.
The question is not whether we should
praise or thank God in our worship services. It is the kind of musical medium
that comes under fire. In this the conflict is often between tradition and
modernity. This is not new. From as long ago as the sixth century
the contemporary and the traditional became a point of conflict.
What is
tradition? How did it take shape? What we now call tradition was once
contemporary. But as soon as the religious authorities declared: ‘This is the
way it has to be done’ contemporary spontaneous expression became forced into a
death mould which we now call tradition. Once this happens conflict emerges
with the contemporary. This conflict is the expression of fear. All fear is
born of illusion. Tradition and modernity are only different phases of
the same event. What was modern and contemporary to our ancestors is
traditional to us. What is modern and contemporary to us will eventually become
old and traditional to the future generations. History supplies us with
evidences for this.
In the sixteenth century a new
move of God brought with it many new songs. Reformed theology was not
the only interest of the great reformer Martin Luther. He was also vitally
interested in reforming the worship of the church, putting it into the
language of the common people. For him music was more than just a warm-up
to a sermon. He said, “Music is a noble gift of God, next to theology”. Luther
adapted and translated Latin hymns, making them available to the ordinary,
non-scholastic person, and wrote many new hymns in the German language – some
to even secular tunes. And he was much criticized for that! He was
thought to be going against tradition. His music was contemporary then. To us
now they have become traditional.
The
Methodist revival of the early 18th century caused many
things to change. Do we not now believe it was God who used men like Isaac
Watts and Charles Wesley in a whole new wave of music. That new wave gave us through Isaac Watts ‘Joy
to the World’, ‘When I survey the wondrous cross’, ‘O
God our help in ages past’, ‘Jesus shall reign where’er the sun’ and many more. And through
Charles Wesley, the hymns ‘Come Thou long
expected Jesus’, ‘Hark! the Herald angels sing’,
‘Christ the Lord is risen today’, ‘Ye, servants of God, your Master proclaim’,’Jesus lover of my
soul’ and ‘Love divine, all love’s excelling’. Just think how our worship
would be without these lovely “traditional” hymns and carols.
In 1861, however, controversy was
once more in the air as the book Hymns Ancient and Modern was published
for the Anglican Church. Breaking away from unison singing, chordal
progressions and harmonies were added. These harmonies were then considered
to be sensual! The established church found it hard to receive the new music.
D.L. Moody teamed up with Ira Sankey to
produce the Sankey and Moody Hymn-book in 1875, using contemporary
dance styles such as the waltz. The established church reacted
negatively towards this ‘worldly music’ – even though thousands of sinners
received the gospel through these songs.
William Booth of the Salvation Army was
criticized by the religious establishment for using secular and militant
tunes. However, masses of the world’s poor and needy met Jesus through this
music.
The
Pentecostal revival in Britain
at the beginning of the 20th century created an increasing popularity
for choruses. Short and memorable, these embryonic statements of faith reflected
renewed joy and fervor. But they were criticized as being mere ditties,
musically and poetically poor and theologically weak too.
The piano
seems rather harmless to the church members of the 1990s, but few nineteenth-century
churches would have considered using such a secular instrument. Eighteenth-century
Moravians accepted many instruments, but rejected the violin since
it was associated with dance and was labeled “the devil’s fiddle.”
Between
1930 and 1960 there
was a movement within the church called the ‘liturgical Movement’ by
which the churches took a new interest in historic forms and practices of worship. Corporate experience was glorified and the solo
shunned as being too personal and something which glorified the soloist.
Even the choir was not spared. Early “Free Churches,” which broke from
the state Churches in Europe,
vehemently opposed the choir as “popish” because of its
associations with the Roman Church.
These are all lessons for us from
history. George Santayana, a philosopher,
has said those who cannot remember the past are condemned
to repeat it.
So, what was once despised
criticized and considered unconventional has become very traditional for us.
The true church of Christ
is a dynamic one and is in a constant state of renewal and restoration. Let
us respond and not be reactionary and backward-looking when it
comes to coping with change. Let us also know that one of God’s many dealings
with his people in the wilderness wanderings was to teach them the challenge of
change. They were called to follow the cloud wherever it led them,
regardless how inconvenient and unsettling it might be.
Christianity
was never intended to be a ‘settled’ religious tradition, but a ‘prophetic
challenge’.
Unfortunately it developed into a ‘settled’ religion.
Let us remind ourselves that
individually and collectively we are in the process of Change. All that God
requires is hearts that are willing and hearts that are sincere. So long as our
thought matches that of God’s, he will bring it pass. Anything ungodly and
unchristian has to be rejected. Not everything that is new is good. Every
change may not be in the right direction.
Change
for the sake of change is not something to be desired.
I think God
is not so concerned with methods of worship. He is looking for true
worshippers. God is looking for people who have hearts that reach out to
him, lives that are open to His leading, ears that are sensitive
to His voice.
The
most important fruit of true worship is God’s presence. This is the very
heart of worship. The deepest cry of the Psalmist was: ‘Do not cast me from
your presence or take your Holy Spirit from me’ (Psalm 51:11) The Lord’s
presence is not a matter of style, traditional or radical. Large
congregations, fine preaching, accomplished musicians
do not constitute or guarantee the presence of God. It is the heart of the
people that causes God to respond. We, in our anxiety for experiencing
thrills in our worship think of many changes. Informality replaces liturgy;
songs of fellowship replaces hymns. The hymn-book is sidelined in
favor of the overhead projector. God still cries: ‘Rend your hearts and not
your garments’ (Joel 2:13)
Worship
from the heart will
experience the presence of God. The hallmarks of the presence of God are: deliverance,
healing, and joy. In one word it is salvation. Christmas
began in the heart of God. It is complete only when it reaches the heart of
man. Christmas: not the tinsels, not the giving and
receiving, not even the carols. Rather, it is the humble that
receives anew God’s wondrous gift, the Christ. Our song should be: ‘O come
to my heart, Lord Jesus – There is room in my heart for Thee!’
So we see
that it is all in the heart. The heart of the matter is the heart.
The question
is not whether using guitars or drums appropriate in Christian worship. Drums
are not bad or worldly – it is the drummer who is bad or worldly. Guitars
are not worldly or immoral – it is the guitarist who can be immoral or worldly.
There is nothing wrong with the organ or the electronic keyboard. It is the
organist’s lifestyle that really matters. The ability to sing or to play a
musical instrument is only one of the qualifications of a church
musician. It is not the only qualification needed. The good musician who
is not spiritually qualified may nullify the message he is singing with what
one sees in his life.
There is
nothing wrong in using contemporary music in churches provided it takes people
closer to God and glorifies God alone. Traditional music has many precious
things in it. We need them also.
My last word
on this issue is that there need not be any controversy between traditional and
contemporary music.
Let us make
music that is meaningful and relevant. Let us make music that is
purposeful. Let us look into the needs of the church, the needs of the people.
Like being balanced in our diet, let us be balanced even in our music.
Let us make music that is intelligent
and intelligible. Nowadays people talk of multiple-intelligence. We need spiritual
intelligence. We must be aesthetically intelligent. God wants us to
be musically intelligent also. The ministry of music is a multi-dimensional
one. It must be musically correct; aesthetically appealing;
theologically sound; contextually relevant; and spiritually enabling.
Ponder over the words of the song
that we are now going to sing. Make it a sermon that you’ll preach to all
whom you meet.
Lessons:
First lesson – Psalm - 33 : 1 – 5.
Second lesson – I Timothy 2 : 1 – 10
IF I COULD VISIT BETHLEHEM
Tune :
WINCHESTER OLD C.M.
1.
If I could visit Bethlehem,
What
presents would I bring?
If I
could see what happened then,
What
would I say or sing.?
2.
I wouldn’t take a
modern toy,
But
gold to pay for bread,
Some
wine to give His parents joy,
And wool to warm His bed.
3.
I’d learn some
simple words to speak
In
Aramaic tongue,
I’d
cradle Him and kiss His cheek,
And
say, “I’m glad you’ve come.”
4.
If Mary asked me
who I was
And
what her child would do;
I
wouldn’t talk about His pain,
Or
tell her all I knew.
5.
I’d say, “He’ll
never hurt or kill,
And
joy will follow tears.
We’ll
know his name and love Him still,
In
twenty hundred years.
6.
I cannot visit Bethlehem,
But
what I can, I’ll do:
I’ll
love you Jesus, as my friend,
And
give my life to you. Amen.
- Brian Wren, November, 1988.
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