Years ago, our church in St. Cloud called an emergency meeting to discuss worship. People were furious that the worship style was changing. As a young college student, I was excited for the change in worship. I preferred the guitar to the organ. I preferred Chris Tomlin to John Newton. I didn’t understand why people were so upset.
During the meeting I remember a lady standing up and saying she was sad that we no longer sang a certain song at church. She said the song had helped her through some hard times in life and whenever we sang the song it reminded her of God’s faithfulness. I don’t remember who said it or the song she was talking about, but I do remember my perspective changing.
During that time, I was struggling with
feelings of depression and loneliness in my life. I had Matt Redman’s song
Never Let Go on repeat. I loved singing that song at CRU and church because it
also reminded me of God’s faithfulness. When that lady was talking, I flashed
forward in my mind to a time when I might be in her position. I realized that
worship could lead to conflict because there is so much emotion behind the
songs that we sing.
I don’t know if the meeting accomplished its intended purpose, but my idea of worship changed because of it. I realized all the fighting was about preferences. These debates led to hurt feelings and people leaving the church. I don’t think worships songs are supposed to lead to feuds but instead lead to the building up of others.
Worship happens when we engage our hearts and minds on God and his Word, and the overflow of our emotions comes out in singing. This takes place privately as we listen to worship songs or a song comes to mind while we are going about our daily activities in life. Worship also takes place corporately as we gather. Hopefully we can gather again soon!
There are two aspects of worship that we need to keep in mind.
Worship is vertical
This means that worship points us to God and He is the focus of our worship. All our songs should be centered on Him and His work. Our songs should honor and magnify Him. This is obvious to most of us, but the next idea is not as obvious.
Worship is horizontal
Col. 3:16 says, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.”
Worship is meant to build each other up! One way to teach and admonish one another is through singing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs. How many have walked into church feeling like you don’t want to be there? Maybe you’re feeling angry about where life has taken you; feeling self-conscious about your body type; or feeling guilt and shame because of sin in your life?
Congregational singing is meant to remind us of the truths of scripture. Singing reminds us of the gospel and that Christ has died for our sin. Singing reminds us that Christ is the solid rock on which we build our lives. Singing reminds us that it is well with our soul when life’s troubles come. Singing reminds us that we can draw near to God during trials. Singing reminds us that there is a future in Christ.
When we corporately sing these truths, we are directing them towards God and directing them to one another. Worship is far less about style and more about the words and message. One of my professors said, “people don’t leave the Sunday morning gathering quoting the three points of your sermon, but they leave singing the worship songs.”
Here at Appleton Community EFC we value worship. In the broad sense, worship is a way of life (Rom. 12:1-2) and in the narrow sense it deals with the songs that we sing. A lot of thought goes into the songs that we sing. We want people to leave singing that God is sovereign and in control not about reckless love! Shots fired!
I love a good healthy debate on worship but it should be about the message of the song not the style of song.
Application
- Live out the “one anothers” and place others preferences above your own – We all have preferences including myself. I have favorite songs that I like to sing. Some mornings I am not “feeling” every worship song. Maybe the morning we sing “It is well with my Soul” it is not meant for me but for the person next to me. I am singing to remind them of the truth that God is in control of the situation.
- Listen to a wide variety of worship songs – Don’t listen to your favorite artist on repeat. Find songs from different genres of music.
- Subscribe to Appleton Evangelical EFC Spotify account – I have created a playlist of all the songs that we sing. This is for you to get to know them and sing along. Some of the songs I love right now are songs I didn’t like at first.