On Worship Music

I lead the worship music ministry in our church, under the oversight of our elders.  This has been a tremendous privilege.  Our church is just over two years old and one of the blessings we’ve seen the Lord bestow on us a unity and humility with respect to music in the church, which in recent years has been, sadly, a source of such division in so many churches.

Week over week, I’m responsible for selecting the songs we sing in our Sunday worship services.  As a lover of both well-written hymns of old as well as more recent styles of worship music, it’s been a pleasure to introduce a number of songs to a generationally diverse congregation from a few years to a few hundred years old (the songs, not the saints *grin*).

This privilege is not without its challenges, however.  One of my challenges is being pastorally sensitive to the congregation’s preferences in music and style while maintaining a high standard for the music that we sing as a church.  Our church’s philosophy of worship is well-thought out, and encourages diverse and Biblically-saturated songs:

[The] songs the Church is to be singing are religious, biblical, spiritual and theo-centric in nature. That rules out secular, man-centered, unbiblical earthly songs.

It also provides guidance on what “Biblical” means:

God puts a premium on truth as expressed in words, written and spoken. So the words of our songs sung in church need to be consistent with Scripture—extolling Scripture, explaining Scripture and applying Scripture.

But with the plethora of “Christian worship music” out there, I find myself often challenged to see whether the songs I’m choosing — and often the songs I’m deliberately not choosing — are founded from these principles.  There are a number of very popular songs in the worship music industry, for example, that I very quickly dismiss because I find them lacking in substance and clarity.  This has been a dilemma for me for a long time, which was why I asked the question of pastor and song leader Bob Kauflin via his blog early last year:

I’ve at times received well-intentioned “suggestions” from folks who’ve enjoyed one song or another while visiting other churches (perhaps on vacation).  While occasionally these are nice songs, I’ve often felt that many of the songs simply lack Biblical substance but are musically very catchy… How might you respond to members of a congregation (particularly small churches) who enthusiastically ask for you to play songs that you otherwise feel lacking in substance, or are perhaps even overly man-centered and poorly written?

His answer was very helpful and has given me guidance ever since.  Especially helpful was his closing thought:

I’m sure I’ll make some wrong decisions in choosing what songs we shouldn’t sing. But if my goal is always to sing songs that exalt God’s glory in Christ in people’s hearts and minds in the clearest and best ways, I don’t think I’ll ever have any regrets.

On Suffering

One of the graces God has bestowed on our young church is that He has spared us from any great tragedies.  In so many churches we’ve been through, and so many lives we’ve encountered, one constant has been the reality of suffering.  And, of course, this is altogether consistent with a Biblical worldview.  Anyone who is surprised when suffering and tragedy occur and thinks them to be abnormal has either not lived long enough, or not read his Bible carefully enough (e.g., Romans 8:17-25).  Life is hard in this sin-entrenched creation, and will be until God renews all of creation to glory.  Anything we do as a church — preaching, singing, fellowship — must not be ignorant of this reality.  Nor surprised by it.  In fact, if anything, Christians should be as well equipped (by the church) as anyone to cope with suffering!

On Worship Music and Suffering

Today I came across a moving post on Kauflin’s blog that reminded me why it’s so critical to uphold a high standard in the music of the church.  If we merely settle for “self-expressive” worship songs, and fail to endeavor to actually build up the faith of our churches through songs that express Biblical truth richly and meaningfully, then I believe we fall far short of what we could accomplish in our music.  Kauflin writes about a pastor, Terry Staufer, who he had briefly met last year whose 14-year-old daughter was tragically murdered recently:

Providentially, Terry has been studying the book of Job, and recently wrote a post on the Sovereign Grace CD, Come Weary Saints, a CD we put together for those going through challenging times. When we’re putting together songs for a project, along with trying to write music that people will want to sing and listen to, we always aim to write songs that are rich in biblical truths and the gospel.

Kauflin quotes this bereaved father from his blog:

My wife Juanita commented that one song, It Is Not Death to Die, gripped her from day one. I remember her saying that when we first listened to this album. Now we know why.

Wow.  And now I’m even more deeply convinced that we as churches need music which deepens us, stretches our faith, enlarges our view of God, and enables to express a wide ranges of sentiments (praise, celebration, lament, etc.) in a way that helps us to grow yet still deeper roots in our knowledge of Him.  That’s what worship has to do with suffering.  If the songs we sing as a church bring us little true God-centered comfort when life is normal (read: difficult), then they are of little use.  Our worship music must help us grow in the grace and knowledge of Jesus Christ, strengthening us through the massive promises of God toward us in the gospel.  As Kauflin writes:

Music can only comfort us emotionally and for a brief time. The gospel comforts us in every way and forever.