Religious Fashion Shows

This is going to be an interesting blog post, and something that is very open ended. My thoughts are not your thoughts and so forth.

I want to talk a little bit about worship and the 'religious fashion show' that we put on. I heard a comment that modern worship music is shallow and repetitive, and that hymns are where the meat of theology are.

I'm not going to attack hymns out right. I think they do have some great relevance to speak into our lives. I think a lot of time and effort by some great Christians went into writing those lyrics. Now had God given us those hymns in a book and labeled it the bible part 2 and gave explicit instructions that if we were to add or subtract from it in our worship, then we would be lead to use only those for our praise.

As I see it worship music is a stem of our passion for Christ and his instilling of creative ability in his children. Psalm is mainly a book of poems and songs written by David (and a few other writers) as their expression to God. I think that as we sit and reflect on God, who he is and what he has done in our lives that what results is true, authentic worship. For people who are lyrically and musically inclined this authentic worship will sometimes result in music being written. When a worship pastor selects songs to be done in a service, I think there should be a lot of thought put into the selection. Mainly as to how this presents the throne of Christ and how it connects to you personally and to the people you're leading.

There are a lot of subjective issues in worship. For instance, Friend of God does not speak to me in any way shape or form and I have taken an issue with the song. People who know me know that. If I were to get up and lead worship there is no way that I would use this song to lead by because it doesn't speak to me or lead me to the throne of God and result in authentic worship.

To say that one form of music is preferable over another is simply that, a preference. There is no reason to be dogmatic over style. If you are living a life of worship (which is what we are all called to do) then I'm not sure I see a reason to attack one side or the other.

Now to say that modern worship music is repetitive? I would say that is somewhat correct. I would not however say that there is something completely wrong with that. There are not a whole lot of words to tell my God how worthy he is. A lot of times I am left speechless in light of His grace. The repetitive chorus gives you something quick to latch on to, something that you are able to let go of having lyrics on the screen(or in your hand). Something you can own, close your eyes, lift up your voice and just let God in a few simple words how amazing he truly is.

Does every song provide that same type of experience, does each song do that for each and every person? nope.

I don't want to dive into theology. There isn't enough time in the day. If your worship leader is doing his or her job they should be diving into the meat of the song before it hits your ears in the auditorium. If there is something that raises an eyebrow then maybe it should be shelved until you can figure out why there is a question. I don't care if it's catchy, it does need to mean something.

An exercise of sorts: make up your own lyrics if you can't 'get into a song'. Sing them in the instrumental riffs. Tell God what he means to you outside of the song. I'll tell you what, it's hard to find the words.

So on to hymns. I can throw the repetitive arguments at the hymns as well. 18 verses and 18 choruses later of Amazing grace or Just As I Am and I'm about ready to run up on stage and shove the worship leaders head in the piano or pipe organ. I don't care if you know all of the verses and can sing all four parts to the chorus, that gets stale and stagnant. Hymns are also extremely liturgical.

liturgy

1 often capitalized : a Eucharistic rite
2: a rite or body of rites prescribed for public worship
3: a customary repertoire of ideas, phrases, or observances

If you get down to the core of liturgy you see repetition, tradition, and...dare i say it, staleness. The hymns have a hard time today because they are almost to wordy. They are also as in the case of a King James translation difficult to understand to people who didn't grow up on them, or don't speak old English. The reason people don't want to get rid of hymns is because of a word in that first sentence, tradition. This is the way we've always done it and this is the way we should continue to do it.

I'm not a fan of that statement at all. Change has been a HUGE catchphrase politically, but it has been at the forefront of the church for centuries. Jesus came on the scene as a catalyst for change, he wanted to do away with the Jewish liturgy. No body liked that to much either. Christ's statement to his disciples was, you're going to do greater things than I have done, now get going. You know what that says to me? KEEP MOVING FORWARD. Today's worship phenomenon is not going to be where it ends, and the hymns are no longer where it is at.

Yes modern worship music connects with me, but I hope that out of the inspiration from others as I grow in my faith, and grow in my age I will continue to connect and adapt as an influx of new worshipers lead music for me and other believers throughout the world.

I don't want to pick something I'm comfortable in. I want to invade the worship of those to come after me, that I may be able to speak life to them as well.

As far as the Religious Fashion Show goes, I was reading in Matthew 22(the Message) the last statement in that chapter was Religious Fashion Show. It's in reference to the religious leaders trying to trip up Jesus at every turn just so they could have something to justifiably mad at him with. It goes without saying I think that we see our own religious fashion show going on in churches today. In more ways than this issue, but we see it here too. I say it's all hymns, and she says it's all modern music. You're the pastor what do you say it is?

There is no kosher answer without throwing one or the other under the bus.

If we're living a true authentic lifestyle of worship then we should want our life to reflect and invade any worship style. It may not necessarily be what we like, but our heart should be able to commune with other believers under any circumstance and worship the creator with one accord.

If you can't get past the issue of music in one church there is always another church somewhere else that might be more to your liking. I would suggest going to that church rather than causing problems at the one you're currently attending. Christ did not command us to cause division but to be united as one body under the Holy Spirit.