Observations and Conclusions

For the last several years I have been making some very disturbing observations from which I have drawn some very uncomfortable conclusions. I have shared with you before that I have concerns regarding trends in worship music.  It seems to me that there is an almost fanatical move to eradicate traditional worship and replace it with the modern contemporary model that is patterned after the youth rally concept of the 80's.  I really don't have anything against contemporary worship music, and have utilized it throughout my career.  Likewise, I see no problem in utilizing multiple styles of music in worship.  The style and forms of music in worship will quite naturally reflect the culture of the participants.  Depending upon the congregations's education level, overall music background, and local cultural influences, I have utilized, features from folk, components from country, rudiments of rock,  sounds of soul, and the cornerstone of classical upon the occasion.

I have no fear of music styles and I do not believe the utilization of any style is a threat to the Gospel.  I do, however, find the tendency toward polarization extremely disturbing.  The active trend, fueled by popular culture is to go contemporary.  Therefore, the reactive archetype is to embrace more ancient styles and forms.  Are our only two options the scream of the electric guitar or the wail of the Gregorian chant? With the polarization comes new labels.  Now we must stipulate. Are we going to the traditional worship, the contemporary worship, or the blended worship service? Can we no longer simply go to worship?

Another trend that disturbs me involves the absence of music education.  Many of you remember the music teacher who would come to the class room and teach songs and music basics in elementary school.  That is no longer a common sight.  Fewer and fewer families are educating their children musically.  Don't worry though.  The various talent competition shows on TV are training our children about music.  They are learning through watching those shows what "real" music sounds like and what "real" musicians look, act, and dress like.  (In case that wasn't obvious enough for you, that was sarcasm.) In other words, popular culture is leading again.

With music education at an all time low, and popular culture running at an all time high, I fear that worship, as we know it is severely threatened.  As congregations embrace text only song sheets, and lyrics projected on the wall, our heritage of four part sung music is being eroded.  Choirs are being replaced by praise teams because of the lack of interest in singing.  The tunes and forms of more ancient hymns are being lost because they are not familiar to us in structure.  We are moving toward simpler and more infantile melodies in place of the majestic, the artful, the beautiful.

A silly but fun movie I enjoy watching on occasion is Sylvester Stallone's Demolition Man.  In the story, a 20th century cop is wrongfully accused of a crime and sentenced to suspended animation in a cryogenic prison.  Following a Buck Rogers type story line, he is awakened in a very changed 21st century.  While the story is very campy and light, the writers seemed to make some interesting commentaries on society.  One of the more comedic elements in the story revolves around what passes for popular music in this supposed Utopian future. Advertisement jingles from our day have become the popular music culture of the post nuclear world.  "The Oscar Mayer Wiener song is considered top 40 material.  Interestingly enough, with the devolving of music I see taking place in our world today I fear that future may not be as fictional a possibility as it sounds. 

I believe it is possible to maintain scriptural integrity, utilize a foundation of traditional music, and employ elements of various music styles in a balanced manner that would simply be characterized as worship, and need no other label.  I also believe the key to the church's music future is participation in the church choir.  (Oh, come on, you knew that was where I was headed.)  We need to see more people involved in choir and we specifically need to see more young people involved.  You young married need to find a place in the choir so you can learn more about singing and pass it on to your children.  You teenagers and young singles need to pour your energy and your enthusiasm into learning more about our musical heritage through participation in the choir.  The more people we have involved, the more we can explore that heritage and the more we can learn together.

Choir rehearsal begins at 9:00 AM on Sunday mornings.  We would love to see you there.  You enjoy hearing the choir.  You won't believe how great it sounds when your sitting in the middle of it.  Come join us and give it a try.

Something to Be Thankful For

When it comes to selecting choral music for worship, I believe it is advantageous to make use of the various holidays that fill our calendar. Granted, most of our holidays are not "Biblical", and the few that arguably ever were have drifted far in their observance from any scriptural anchor they may have once had. The fact is however, our hearts and minds become predisposed to the themes and ideas of those seasons as we are assaulted by the secular music, imagery, lawn decorations, and predawn sales events culturally linked to those holidays giving us the opportunity to address the subjects of those seasons with little or no introduction. Ironically enough, the one holiday for which I personally feel there is more scriptural and theological basis tends to get the least attention. That holiday is Thanksgiving.

Throughout history many cultures have observed periods of thanksgiving at the end of harvest season. Our Judeo-Christian roots are no stranger to this practice. The Old Testament is replete with instructions for the celebration of feasts that God commanded of His people, Israel. Of the seven high feast celebrations, three are specifically set aside as times of thanksgiving among the people. The celebrations of Firstfruits, and Pentecost commemorated the beginning of the time of harvest of barley and wheat respectively. These two events fall on our modern calendar between the months of March and June. The celebration of Tabernacles or Sukkot followed at the end of the harvest time in our September or October. Specific instructions for the types of sacrifices and required procedures for these holidays are given throughout Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy.

Admittedly, the New Testament gives us no instruction to celebrate any holidays other than the Christian Sabbath. We have no commands regarding Christian holy days or feasts. Although I adore the Christian themes they inspire, the holidays of Christmas and Easter have a checkered past and are basically the result of attempts at cleaning up pre-existing pagan rites and rituals and incorporating them into the Christian world. Our modern mythologies regarding a red dressed demigod and magical egg bearing rodents have done little to aid in that clean-up. Nevertheless, those holidays get more attention in and out of church than does a celebration intended to simply remind us to be thankful to God.

Since we no longer live in an agrarian society, our culture has become increasingly oblivious to the concept of harvest celebrations. The school calendar which prevails to this day serves as a reminder of how farm life one shaped our culture. As we have moved away from agriculture as a society, and have embraced consumerism, it seems to me that we have become less dependent on God and therefore less thankful to Him for His provision. When we relied upon Him to provide the rain and appropriate weather to make our crops grow we were more aware of his blessings. Now we pray for weather conditions that meet our travel and recreation desires more often than we pray for conditions on our crops.

No, there is no eleventh commandment to celebrate a feast of Thanksgiving in the month of November. But the idea of being thankful to a sovereign God who meets our needs as He sees fit is quite appropriate . Don't be surprised over the next few weeks when you hear music of thanksgiving and appreciation for what God has done in our lives. This month try praying for farmers and for God's blessing upon the harvest. What blesses the harvest does bless us. Be reminded this month that God has been good to us even though we don't deserve His goodness. Gather together to ask the Lord's blessing. Be amazed at the goodness of God.

Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled

The anthem we are preparing for Sunday, June 2, 2013 is a bit of a departure from most of our repertoire.  Let Not Your Heart Be Troubled, by Tina English (copyright 1983) has the feel of a 1970's or 80's youth musical, and the incomparable beauty of a text lifted right out of John 14 in the King James Version.  We have chosen this piece for this service because the preacher, Dr. Guy Waters, will be bringing a message from the very same text.

Tina English, born 1952 is an ASCAP composer with over 200 published choral anthems, musicals, hymns, children's songs and works recorded by the Imperials, Larnelle Harris and other artists. (Shawnee Press)
This particular composition has a very natural flow, which is particularly astounding when you notice that her text is the first 11 verses of John 14, with only minimal changes to the text.  But, the text flows right with the music.

While the composition calls for a solo, we have chosen to have our ladies sing in unison the lengthy solo which comprises 28 of the pieces 94 measures (approximately 30% of the piece).  The men join in singing with the ladies in unison, "I am the way, the truth and the life."  Then in measure 37 the first utilization of vocal harmony is provided by the men on the phrase, "No one comes to the
Father but through me."  Primarily a two part piece, four part harmony is used in key areas to emphasize the message of the text. Finally the piece climaxes as the two part choir sings a two part text.  The ladies sing, "I am in the Father and the Father in me. The words I speak the Father speaks through me." while the men sing another melody for the text, "I am the way, the truth and the life, no one comes to the Father but through me.  Finally the choir comes together on the text, "From now on you know Him and have seen Him."

While not the most challenging of choral compositions, truly it has a unique beauty and worshipful feel which the composer has intentionally brought to the piece that truly allows the text to take center stage and proclaim the peace, love, and comfort the Savior surely intended we hear in these words.

Let not your heart be troubled, 
you believe in God believe also in me.
In my Father's house are many mansions. 
If it were not so, I would have told you, 
for I go to prepare a place for you. 
And if I go to prepare a place for you, 
I will come again and receive you to myself.
That where I am there you may be also,
and you know the way where I am going.

I am the way, the truth and the life,
no one comes to the Father but through me.
If you had known me, you would have known my Father.
From now on you know Him and have seen Him.

I am in the Father and the Father in me.
The words I speak the Father speaks through me.
I am in the Father and the Father in me.
He abides in me, and I in Him.

From now on you known Him and have seen Him.

Confessions of a Contemporary Christian Musician

My recent contribution to our church's monthly newsletter.  

I must admit I have spent a large part of my adult life as an advocate for contemporary or blended worship and music.  However, even before I left my former denomination in 2004, I had begun to be concerned about the direction in which contemporary worship was going.  Having submerged myself for nearly seven years in traditional worship here at Main Street, and having completed my third Christmas season as choir director, I now cringe when I think about some of the things I took part in as a worship leader in days gone by.  My experiences at Main Street, the leadership of our Pastor, reading materials provided for me by the Session, and my own personal research, have led me to better understand the allure of contemporary worship music, and the deterioration of true worship that I had observed during my own time in the ministry.

In my former denomination, most of the pastors I met and worked with tended to view the worship service as an evangelistic tool for reaching the lost, a revivalist strategy going back to the second and third Great Awakenings of the 19^th and early 20^th century. Pastors were taught to design worship services, in part, to appeal to the lost, un-churched, and/or unsuspecting neighbor who might happen to attend a service. Songs from southern gospel, folk music, and even the occasional country song were quite common.  These song choices leaned toward sentimentality and building an emotional experience to “enhance” the worship experience of the participants.  Even the hymns were often theologically anemic, as most of the accepted hymn repertoire was the product of the same revivalist movements cited above. 

[This revivalist mindset can be illustrated by my own experiences. Toward the end of my time in full-time ministry, I began to make attempts to re-introduce some of the older, theologically rich songs of faith which I had discovered in my studies. I was shocked at the resistance I encountered from congregations and fellow ministerial staff.  I specifically remember being called on the carpet by a senior pastor for singing, “Fairest Lord Jesus,” a hymn that exalts the beauty and glory of Christ’s nature, in a morning service.  I was told I was going too “high church” and that I needed to put in more quartet numbers and more Bill Gaither songs so the congregation could “feel something.”]

With the emphasis on emotion and building a worship service that was more acceptable to the religious novice, the inclusion of contemporary music during the late 1970s was a natural development.  Many of the early contemporary Christian songs had the advantage of being based on scripture passages.  For me, these were actually a refreshing change from emotional descriptions of early morning strolls with Jesus in secret gardens, mansions and streets of gold, and post-mortem family reunions held around a family supper table in the clouds.  Unfortunately, as time went by, I have seen the contemporary Christian music I once enthusiastically embraced degenerate into sentimental love ballads about Jesus, which could just as easily be about a human loved one.  For that matter, some of them might be about your puppy.

For me, the allure of contemporary music was that it seemed to bring vitality and a greater emphasis on scripture back into the worship service, without alienating the evangelistic targets whom had been invited to the service.  This is the chief error I and so many others accepted. We were designing worship services to appeal to people who still did not know God or even why He should be worshipped!

It is not my intention to “demonize” any style of Christian music. The issue we must consider is, what is appropriate for corporate worship?  Corporate worship should not be a concert to captivate the parishioner. “But the acceptable way of worshipping the true God is instituted by Himself, and so limited by His own revealed will ….” The Westminster Confession, Chapter 21.1.  An individual may be encouraged or uplifted by various music styles. But are all of those styles appropriate for a time of worship?

As I said earlier, my seven years here at Main Street have caused me to reconsider my beliefs about appropriate worship. Pastor Strain has reminded us over and over, corporate worship is a time for God to be worshipped by His people.  If an un-churched, unregenerate person finds our worship service alienating, then we must be doing something right!  When this person visits, we should do all we can to make them feel welcome and their visit appreciated, but they should leave the service knowing we experienced something they did not, and in fact, could not experience.  Wouldn’t it be great for such a person to be touched by God in such a way that they sought a deeper understanding of what they were missing out on?

I am a student of worship, not an expert.  After all the years I have spent in leading worship, I find in reality I am but a novice.  All I once knew I have had to forget.  All I thought I knew, I am now learning again for the first time. I am truly hopeful that the old saying is wrong and it actually is possible to teach an old dog a new trick.  It is my hope in the coming months to share with you what I am learning as a student of worship and to share with you ways in which we can experience a greater enjoyment in singing praises to God.  Until next time, sing loud His praises.

Ron Simpson