This is a joke about Contemporary Christian music.

Unknown ^ | 4*19*2022 | Unknown

[winoneforthegipper]

Agreed. I find light in Crowder as well. However WTK writing and composing is on par with the best of all genres.

[tanstaafl.72555]

I am torn on this stuff. On the one hand, there is the FOCUS. It was Jonathan Edwards, no theological lightweight! - who said that “I can think of no other reason for music (in the church) than to excite the passions for God.” I have no problem when I read the Psalms to see how it is APPROPRIATE to focus on awakening a hunger for God, a delight in Him, a love for the gospel, a devotion to Christ, etc. These are good and appropriate passions and because we are such dull and stupid creatures who so easily slip into boring obsession with self, I see no problem at all with stirring up emotions.
Repetitiveness also is not a problem in itself. Take a gander at Ps 136 if you think so. Repetition itself can hammer truth down deep within us.
THAT though, is the problem. We live in an age of absolute biblical ignorance, on a level that it is truly frightening. Most of our older hymns feel more “solid” NOT because of their melody, meter, rhythm, or some other musical metric, but because the authors were steeped in the bible. You get the feeling that if you cut Isaac Watts, bible verses would gush out. Hymns were methods of TEACHING as well as worship. The real issue is the vapidness, frothiness, and shallow sugary nature of the faith IN THE CHURCH AT LARGE and thus in the lives of many of the people gifted in song who attempt to lead us. They (rightly) understand that we should not be wooden creatures of habit, rising to sing a few obligatory lines in anticipation of the REAL reason to be there, which is the sermon /sarc. The problem is that in the rush to throw off the stale, dead, and largely irrelevant (so they see them, and I fear they are often accurate) liturgies, they have nothing with which to replace them. ALL churches are liturgical. Every one of them. Take the most independent fundamentalist church and they have a set form of worship that may as well be the common book of Prayer, for the regularity of it, even down to the liturgical prayers by the congregation. The same goes for the more pentecostal/charismatic churches. Everyone has forms and commonly understood practices of worship. Nothing wrong with that and a great deal of that is good. It is also true that joy, true joy, is always spontaneous and creative. So is true awe, humility, dread, reverence, and obsession with glory.

I believe what we need more than anything else is not to obsess about forms or engage in flamethrower wars over style and some of the truly horrific (and I mean horrific) effects of contemporary shallow “praise,” but to realize that traditional styles as well, as solidly deep channeled as they are, will remain a muddy creek of stagnant water instead of a deep channeled river if there is no explosive force of the Spirit of God. That is, we will continue to see the alarming pattern of a traditional church for blue hairs only, with no baptisms, no youth, no college age and eventually collapse from within, while the alt-churches will be sugary, scandal ridden, pop culture driven, heresy infected messes.
One of the best things that could happen to us would be to bless the “new” expressions of worship, but to insist they be tied to stuff like Cranmer’s book of common prayer (Anglican), the Westminster and London Confessions of faith (Presbyterian and Baptist), the Puritans (one could start with THE VALLEY OF VISION, PIERCING HEAVEN), John Owen’s THE DEATH OF DEATH IN THE DEATH OF CHRIST, Luther’s commentary on Galatians, Calvin’s INSTITUTES OF THE CHRISTIAN RELIGION (and especially his little tract A LITTLE BOOK ON THE CHRISTIAN LIFE). I could list pages of these, but just to say there is an overwhelming treasure trove of people’s writing who “prime the pump” as it were to read the real source of all this, the bible itself, and let the Holy Spirit supercharge and energize the real fount of worship, which is His word (and thus His person, in the Holy Spirit) through our lives.

That is what I want in worship. That is why I loved your post and thank you for it. Making fun of ourselves (delighted in the joke about cows and worship by another in the thread), is a non-mean way of self criticism. We just need God to come near us in our poor, sick, blind, culture.

Thanks again and apologies for the tome.
Tans

[cport]

Nothing good since Phil Keaggy (although I do like Jars of Clay and David Crowder Band)(oh, and Flyleaf). Point being, there aren't too many contemporary bands that are as innovative as Phil with regards to post-hymnal type Christian music that I would go out and buy their CD or digital copy and sit and listen to at home. That being said, I do get the reason people don't care for modern CCM, it's formatted so everyone that has a musical gift can participate in using it to glorify Him. I had a hard time at church getting into it musically and lyrically like my wife does, and my heart was closed during worship because of that. Until I asked her how she feels the way she feels.

She told me to close my eyes and picture myself bowing at His feet and praising Him, singing Hosannah and Alleluia, as in scripture. Then all of the repeatation and emotion charging music structure made sense. In a true scripturally based church, it is a conduit for the Holy Spirit, or can be. I realize it is not the only avenue and not for each person, but I have participated in services that have worship naturally extend into and way past sermon time due to a true presence of the Spirit. During these times there seems to be true fellowship and unity, and His presence extends into sermon, and have seen many souls saved during these times, which is the point.

This notwithstanding, my experience is that this can only happen in a church whose mission is the mission, not the McChurches that are so prevalent during these end times, tickling the ears of many with false prophets, including worship leaders waiting for their Jesus Corp recording contract.

[cport]

That’s crazy! As soon as I posted my post, I saw yours and realized that God does work in some mysterious ways. What are the odds that your were thinking many of the same things (with a way more informative presentation of liturgical aspect) in some other part of our FRverse. He is indeed an amazing God.

[Tell It Right]

One thing I like about new worship music, at least when it's in church, is newbie visitors can easily sing along to it on their first visit. That alone makes it worth it.

As someone who's done a little (very little) filling in as a church drummer and who's been around doing church work while the band practices (different churches in a couple of different denominations), I can assure you most church musicians can play a lot more complex styles than the simple repetitive modern worship style. Especially Pentecostal church musicians. LOL Years ago I was filling in during practice when we had a new worship leader who wanted us to play a song in the style (and the choir sing it the style) of Bohemian Rhapsody. LOL With other songs we'd sometimes we'd do the same song in different styles in the same service (i.e. the dismissal song at the end of the service might be a bluesy version of an upbeat song at the start of the service if the message of the song mirrored the preacher's message and we wanted to enforce the message).

I love me some God Almighty by Dave Crowder Band on their Church Music CD. LOL

[tanstaafl.72555]

"Concur. I loathe what the libs did to the Battle Hymn of The Republic."

I loathe the babble hymn of the republic. What a ridiculous and godless attempt to tie the purposes of God to a war which was AT BEST a misguided enlistment for a stated cause which was accomplished without bloodshed by every other western nation..... It is a horrible hymn which is smearing "Jesus" (obliquely) over a horrible wasteful spilling of blood in a war which should never have been fought. PS. I am not a peacenik and believe in the necessity of war...... just not that stupid, mindless and idiotic war.

[MercyFlush]

Thank you for your well informed thoughts.

I’d be much more interested in CCM were it not so monotonous and dependent upon an obvious orthodoxy of style.

At my own church the new pastor pushed the existing music ministries to the wayside when he came onboard. That included the children’s choir, adult choir, the hand bell ensemble, a very energetic song leader who led hymns and praise, and a diverse selection of special music. He replaced all of this with his wife who manages to suck the life out of every CCM piece she sings. No highs, no lows, and endless repetition.

If she performed Twisted Sister’s “We’re Not Gonna Take It!” it would be boring.

Consequently we’re having a bit of a revolt at church now that people are attending service again.

Hymnals are back in the pews after the pastor had removed them with the intention to dispose of them in favor of putting lyrics on a screen. Yeah, no.

I suspect he and his wife will soon enough hit the bricks.

Your comment about “the blue hairs” speaks to a phenomenon I’ve seen in several ‘praise’ churches where the old people were basically told to beat it with their preferences. They did. They also took their tithe money with them and THEN the leadership realized that 80% of the church budget was paid for by the blue hairs who are also known less respectfully as ‘Q-Tips’.

Interesting is I was struggling with my own tithing challenge this month and after reading your post I’ll be giving my tithe money for April to FR. Thank you for helping me sort that out.

[Hebrews 11:6]

You just can't harp on it enough.

I got that.

[Cecily]

“No highs, no lows, and endless repetition.”

I know exactly what you mean - “I love You, Lord, I praise You, Lord”

sung like a downbeat, monotone dirge. Very tedious.

[tanstaafl.72555]

Interesting is I was struggling with my own tithing challenge this month and after reading your post I’ll be giving my tithe money for April to FR. Thank you for helping me sort that out

Yikes. I should be more careful!!

I am a blue hair myself (what hair I have left, anyway). I find the "worship wars" extremely distasteful and a symptom of both the overall malaise in our culture and the judgment of God on His people. One of the things God HATES (he says so in Proverbs) is "one who sows discord among brethren"... whether it is a kid leading worship who looks like he fell face down into a tackle box and let his kids color all over his arms with crayolas, or some dude in a 3 piece suit who barely escapes Elizabethan prose and is as wooden and dried as a dessicated stick (both caricatures!), the thing we need is humble men (women too, but especially men) who are aflame with God and passionate about worshiping Him... helping others to do the same.

Here is for happiness, holiness and the fulness of God's Spirit in your church, as well as the body where I attend..... and all over our poor needy culture.

[cport]

That much is true about the talent; I was generalizing. My old church in my old town had a great worship team. Little did I realize how great until I started going to a men’s group on a weeknight that happened to coincide with their rehearsals. Before they got into rehearsing that Sunday’s program, they would warm up with some classic rock or blues. Those guys could really jam! They played YYZ one time, and even though the drummer was no Neil Peart, he was pretty darn good. And the guitarist had a pretty good effect pedal assortment, so he did a darned good Lifeson emulation.

[Flying Circus]

There are no stations in my area that play classical more than a few hours a week. All dedicated Classical stations seem to have disappeared over ten years ago. When they aren’t playing classical it is NPR propaganda or less enjoyable forms of music, like urban with a hefty dose of woke racism.

[MercyFlush]

“Yikes. I should be more careful!!”

I much prefer your candid honesty!

[Tell It Right]

One thing IMHO that's not appreciated is the musicians' ability to modify the song for the need. It didn't happen often, but when the pastor would tell the worship leader or one of the band members ahead of time what the message was going to be we'd discuss it in practice and figure out ways to change our music styles to support the message.

Years later when I was playing drums for a youth group band as a middle ager (I couldn't convince any of the teenage drummers to do it) I would often know what the youth pastor's message was going to be because he often needed another adult during the week to throw ideas at for his upcoming message.

So during the Saturday practices I'd ask the youth musicians what would we could do to the last verse and the last time through the chorus to slowly transition the sound to support the youth pastor's upcoming message -- particularly if at the end of the singing we'd continue playing the chorus melody as a backdrop sound while the youth pastor starts speaking to the youth to set the atmosphere of what his message will be.

If the song was about God's love but the message was about God's unchanging nature -- what music tricks make youth subtly think of things never changing. Or if the message was about God's power what music tricks make you think of power. Or if it's about God using us even with our faults, what kind of random rests or imperfections can we throw into the music to express our faults while also expressing energy or power to express God using us anyway. I'd bring songs with me to show how some of my favorite musicians would tweak their styles like that (at the time I had no recordings of the Pentacostal church band I had attended years prior to demonstrate these concepts). I was really proud of how the young musicians would stretch their boundaries and ad lib to emphasize the message.

[Theo]

Agreed.

[Ezekiel]

I got that.

It's a puntastic journey!

Laughter, the best medicine. Tis the season. The bones of Joseph -- nobody can leave Egypt without them.

Royal cubits were longer than regular cubits.

Why Does Hitting Your Funny Bone Hurt So Much?

(Some people have no sense of humor!)

The tradition is that Serach the search lady (daughter of Happy) was the one who tipped off Moses about where to find the bones of Joseph. They had been sunk deep in de Nile.

It really *is* a river in Egypt: Nile (נילוס) = 156 = Yosef (יוסף)

[johnwz00]

Perhaps you will be amused by this song:
https://youtu.be/y3AdnOtonJM

[smokingfrog]

3 chords & the truth

[JubJub]

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