Sunday, August 25, 2013

What's in a Name?

One of the biggest complaints I get from people (not that I get a lot) is that we don’t sing enough hymns.  I completely disagree.  We sing a lot of hymns.  I believe the real issue is that people don’t understand what a hymn truly is.  Colossians 3:16 says “Sing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to God with thankful hearts.”  Now what people typically think, is that praise songs are considered psalms, songs from a hymnal are considered hymns, and they have no idea what to do with spiritual songs.  But is that really what the Apostle Paul meant when he wrote those words?  I don’t think so. 

When Paul says to sing “psalms” what I truly believe he meant was that we are to sing psalms from the book of Psalms.  Before it was named the book of Psalms it was simply known as the “Book of Praises” because almost every psalm contains some note of praise to God.  These psalms were set to the accompaniment of stringed instruments and served as the Temple Hymnbook.  And even though we don’t have the original music for how these psalms sounded, I do believe that we still sing psalms in our churches.  The words of the book of Psalms are littered throughout the Baptist Hymnal and in our modern praise and worship songs.  Martin Luther’s “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God” (a Baptist Hymnal classic) is based on Psalm 46.  Chris Tomlin’s “Forever” (a very popular Praise and Worship song) comes straight from Psalm 136.  So, I believe we as the “Church” are still singing psalms.

Next let’s look at “hymns”.  Most church goers believe that hymns are only found in hymnals.  But is that biblical?  The word hymn in the Greek means “praise”.  So is it not just a song of praise?  If that’s so, then almost every song we sing during our congregational worship time is a hymn, whether it’s found in a hymnal or not.  But really, that makes sense.  For instance, the Baptist Hymnal is updated every 10 years or so.  Some songs are added and some songs are removed.  Are the new songs now considered hymns?  Are the songs that have been removed no longer considered hymns?  What about the songs that were originally considered “praise songs” but have been included in more recent editions of the hymnal?  Are they now hymns even though they were once praise songs?  I believe they are all hymns.

Finally, let’s look at “spiritual songs”.   Most people don’t know what to do with this classification of song.  I’ve heard this described as many different things by many different preachers, but I don’t know that any of them ever got it right.  Instead of doing any research, they just try to take the Christian musical styles of the day and turn one of them into the category of “spiritual songs”.  I believe what this really means is that these songs should be inspired by the Spirit of God.   So, if this is the definition, then songs from a hymnal, modern praise and worship songs, even songs from Christian radio would be included in this list.

Ultimately, I believe that all of the songs we sing in church should fall into one or more of these categories.  Most probably fall into all 3.  But really, I believe the key to understanding Colossians 3:16 is found in the last 2 words “thankful hearts”.  That’s the key to truly worshipping.  Regardless of whether it’s a psalm, hymn, or spiritual song, we are to worship God with thankful hearts.  And if we do that, then song types just won’t be an issue.

Worship Big!

Brad



Monday, August 19, 2013

Worship as a Team

One of the best things that I’ve ever done as a Worship Pastor is to make the change from me leading every song to having members of our worship team leading different songs.  So, on any given Sunday, we might do 6 songs and I am likely to only lead 1 or 2 of them.  That’s a big change from when I led all of them!  There were 2 main reasons for making this change.  1) our worship had become stagnant and felt the same week after week and 2) my responsibility as a Pastor is to equip our members for the work of the ministry as found in Ephesians 4:12 and by leading every song, I wasn’t doing that.  


So, about 5 ½ years ago we made the change.  I’ll be honest.  It wasn’t easy.  Our worship team was extremely nervous about stepping out front and leading.  They had become very comfortable standing in the background.  But it was good for them!  Eventually they got over their nervousness and started to embrace leading.  As they gained confidence they wanted to lead more and more.  Now, when we are learning a new song, I have team members asking me if they can lead it.  When we first started this, I had to beg and even force them to do it.  What a change!  
 
But not only has it instilled confidence in our team and made us stronger, I believe it has transformed our worship.  With different people leading each song, our worship never gets boring or stale.  People never know who will be leading what and it definitely keeps it interesting.  We also keep gaining new church members who want to get involved with our worship ministry.  They see the fact that being a part of our worship team means having the opportunity to be out front leading, not just swaying in the background.  People want that!  They want to use the talents that God has given them.  Because of this, I believe that we’ll just keep attracting people who want to get involved.  
 
Finally, one of the benefits of making this move that I didn’t foresee was the freedom it would give me.  I now have the freedom to listen more to what is going on around me.  When I’m singing and playing guitar at the same time, the vast majority of my concentration is going to my singing and playing.  But when I’m just doing one or the other, I can really listen to what others are doing around me.  I can correct little things that I was missing before.  It also gives me the freedom to think ahead about what’s coming next.  As a worship pastor, that is a HUGE advantage!  We can be finishing one song and I’m already thinking about the transition to the next one.  What a blessing!
 
We have a wonderful team here at MPBC and over the last few years God has really taken our worship and our worship team to another level.  And I believe a lot of it has to do with that decision that I made 5 ½ years ago.

Worship Big!

Brad