This weekend, people around the world will gather to worship. For most of us, music and songs will be a critical part of that worship. Even when “worship wars” seem to have died down in many churches, we still have style preferences that really do separate us a bit. Over the years, I have attempted to address these issues in various ways on this site. Maybe one of these older posts about worship will grab your attention today:
8 Indicators Worship Music is Not Good
6 Ways to Sing Better in Worship this Weekend
10 Distractions Regarding Worship Music
Why We Must be Open to Different Styles of Worship Music
8 Traits I See in Good Worship Leaders
6 Reasons I Miss Singing Hymns
7 Ways to Help a Musically-Challenged Older Believer Worship
10 Ways to Pray for Your Worship Leaders this Weekend
Let us know your thoughts!
One of the things that troubles me most is the way that congregational singing is disappearing in a growing number of churches, displaced by the singing of the vocalists in the worship band. I don’t think what is happening in a church service in which the worship band’s vocalists monopolize the singing can be regarded as corporate worship. To be corporate, worship, whether in the form of singing, prayer, and so forth requires the participation of everyone who is present.
The same thing happened in the Middle Ages. As the role of the choir increased in church services, the role of the congregation decreased until the its role was reduced to that of passive onlookers. The same thing is happening today.
One of the results in Middle Ages–just as it is today–was that the music of the church service ceased to be accessible to the members of the congregation.
Part of the problem today is a constricted view of the role of music in church services. It is seen as putting the congregation in the right frame of mind for the sermon. This view may in part be attributed to revivalism and the Sandy Creek Revival tradition in Southern Baptist churches. Music is essentially seen as a form of preparation for the main event–the sermon. It is not valued as a form of worship.
When a congregation sings, however, its members are not just exhorting each other. They are conversing with God and God through the words of the hymn or song is conversing with them. In other words, they are praying. The hymn or song provides them with words with which they can express how they think and feel.
I have run across a number of articles lamenting the decline of prayer in our church services. I suspect that the decline of prayer and the decline of congregational singing are a part of the same phenomenon