Second, the bold quotations at the beginning of each section are questions I have received from both inside and outside St. Andrew's and the church regarding our services.
Third, all Scripture passages in this piece are quoted from the New International Version of the Bible.
Finally, if you would like to discuss any of the points presented in this note, please contact me via a personal message, either on Facebook or via email at awitte@standrewsomaha.net. I will be happy to discuss further with you.
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"Why is there music in worship, anyway?"
“Music takes us out of the actual and whispers to us dim secrets that startle our wonder as to who we are, and for what, whence, and whereto.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson, American Poet (1803-1882)
I have had it asked of me—as recently as this summer—why we need music for worship, or so much of it. First, I would like to point out that it is perfectly possible to have a functional, uplifting worship service without the use of music. It would be difficult for me to fully participate in, but I realize that there are people for whom music is not a great joy. Furthermore, it seems to me that a well-worded, Scripture-guided message framed with passionate prayer can stand alone as a fine worship experience; any readers who may have attended Pastor Michael's Good Friday Tenebrae service in years past could attest to that.
That said, there are abundant references to using music in worship in Scripture—in addition to the obvious Psalms and Song of Solomon/Song of Songs, which exemplify such worship. To highlight just a few of the others:
- Then Moses and the Israelites sang this song to the LORD : 'I will sing to the LORD, for he is highly exalted. The horse and its rider he has hurled into the sea.' — Exodus 15:1
- David told the leaders of the Levites to appoint their brothers as singers to sing joyful songs, accompanied by musical instruments: lyres, harps and cymbals. — I Chronicles 15:16
- About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the other prisoners were listening to them. — Acts 16:25 (Hopefully this rings a bell, from Bruce's sermon "To Save Me" August 29/30)
- Speak to one another with psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. Sing and make music in your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. — Ephesians 5:19-20
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"I guess I understand the motivation, but it still feels like entertainment."
"Words make you think a thought. Music makes you feel a feeling. A song makes you feel a thought."—E.Y. Harburg, American Librettist/Songwriter (1896-1981)
One of the traits of our congregation—one I find to be wonderful!—is its overwhelmingly positive reaction to the creative use of dynamic and varied music in worship. This, along with our pastors' deep love of music, is the main reason there is so much of it involved in our services. The question, then, becomes one of presentation.
To me, music is most effective as a set-up for or reinforcement of the message when it grabs people's attention and keeps them actively involved in the experience. Thus, I do my best to ensure the musical presentation has as much of the desired impact as possible—to make sure the congregation is left either receptive to the upcoming message or with tangible reinforcement of the message just received. If part of the experience is a feeling of being entertained, I would invite the reader to use that heightened sense of awareness to zero in on the pastor's message; to turn that feeling toward the thought, and combine them. Based on the questions and comments outlined above, I worry that the music is being compartmentalized into its own, separate entity by some in the congregation; this could not be further from the intent.
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"I understand why we have hymns and praise music. Those are about Jesus, God, and faith. How does secular pop music fit in?"
"Meet people where they are—not where you want them to be."
—Karen G. Schneider, American Librarian
This, I think, is at the heart of people's questions to me about our music. What role can music that is obviously not Christian in nature play in a Christian worship service? In order to fully address this point, I will ask the reader also to contemplate the question of other items from popular culture—television, movies, books, and the like—and their place in worship. For me, the two are linked in a very important way in our services, as I will explain.
Before going any further, I would point out that there is an entire school of thought that promotes using only Scripture as the under-girding for sermons, and asserts that the use of anything else—be it a movie or television clip, part of a book, or even a PowerPoint presentation—is extraneous and takes the focus off the more important things. In the interest of brevity, I have over-simplified this position; in kind, I will abbreviate my response to it. I would invite the reader to refer to the book of Matthew, Chapter 25. Although I could use any of these parables as an example, I will simply quote one:
[Jesus is speaking] "Again, it will be like a man going on a journey, who called his servants and entrusted his property to them. To one he gave five talents of money, to another two talents, and to another one talent, each according to his ability. Then he went on his journey. The man who had received the five talents went at once and put his money to work and gained five more. So also, the one with the two talents gained two more. But the man who had received the one talent went off, dug a hole in the ground and hid his master's money.
After a long time the master of those servants returned and settled accounts with them. The man who had received the five talents brought the other five. 'Master,' he said, 'you entrusted me with five talents. See, I have gained five more.'
His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'
The man with the two talents also came. 'Master,' he said, 'you entrusted me with two talents; see, I have gained two more.'
His master replied, 'Well done, good and faithful servant! You have been faithful with a few things; I will put you in charge of many things. Come and share your master's happiness!'
Then the man who had received the one talent came. 'Master,' he said, 'I knew that you are a hard man, harvesting where you have not sown and gathering where you have not scattered seed. So I was afraid and went out and hid your talent in the ground. See, here is what belongs to you.'
His master replied, 'You wicked, lazy servant! So you knew that I harvest where I have not sown and gather where I have not scattered seed? Well then, you should have put my money on deposit with the bankers, so that when I returned I would have received it back with interest.
'Take the talent from him and give it to the one who has the ten talents. For everyone who has will be given more, and he will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken from him. And throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.'"
— Matthew 25:14-30
This is one of the most widely recognized of Jesus' parables. Notice that the majority of Jesus' message here is a story—possibly fictional, possibly real—of a man entrusting his servants with money as he goes on a journey. Jesus uses this example presumably because it would have been a familiar situation for his hearers at the time—regardless of whether they were already his followers. What he does, then, is reach out to people through an experience they have already had or known, outside the spiritual setting, and then he relates that experience to God. He meets them where they are.
This, always, is where I come from with the popular music we use at St. Andrew's. Readers who are also attendees will surely notice that we use Christian music for the congregation-involved and choir-presented portions of our services, and that music from popular culture is used differently. It is used as either a set-up for or a reinforcement of the Scripture-guided message in the sermon; in the case of the Beatles project, the music itself was altered to both set up the message and deliver it. It is to fulfill this effectual purpose I always approach this music, and it is with this in mind that I guide its presentation. To me, it is essentially the same as using a passage from a secular book or a clip from a movie or television program to further a point. The only difference is that we use live musicians to personalize the experience for the congregation.
In pursuing the ideal of the United Methodist Church's motto—Open Hearts, Open Minds, Open Doors—it seems only fitting to me that we try to bring people to a (perhaps unfamiliar) spiritual place through familiar experiences. Some of our visitors may feel that coming into relationship with Christ is like being dropped into a foreign country where the natives speak no English; I envision our responsible use of this music—and books, television, and movies—as a friendly translator who, in time, will teach the visitor the native tongue.
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"It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see."Ultimately, musicians can only control how the music is presented; the interpretation is left to the discretion of the hearer. For what it's worth, the intent of this director is always that the music further the message, because worship is all about God.
—Henry David Thoreau, American Poet and Naturalist (1817-1862)
*: It should be noted that there are those who insist that we should use exclusively the instruments explicitly mentioned in the New Testament—the human heart and voice. I am not a proponent of this particular belief, as I feel it to be unnecessarily exclusive and a bit puritanical; that, however, is a discussion for another note.
