Church Music Part I

The one thing we know for sure is that God hates drums. At least, that is what I was told at one point in my life. I am always amazed by those who call themselves mature Christians, but believe the most foolish of things.

Over the last few decades the church has been involved in what many call "The Worship War". On one side you have contemporary music and on the other side you have Traditional music. One side believes God hates anything that is modern or electric. The other side believes that God loves all music so why not sing songs to beats that we like.

Many churches have drawn the line in the sand. The new music sounds just like rock and roll, and we know that rock and roll is of the Devil. The beat causes people to think about sex. Other churches have decided to throw away the sacred hymnals and sing praise chorus in their place. While some churches have decided to have two worship services. The early one for the old folks who hate electric guitars, and the later service for young people, not disciplined in life enough to get up at 9:00 AM for worship.

So here is my 2 cents on this issue.

A 'C' chord is a 'C' chord regardless if it is played on organ or electric guitar. 4/4 time is the same. There is no such thing as an instrument of the devil, and humans have always used the sounds of popular music to worship until the 20th century.

A couple months ago I was sitting in the fellowship hall with a southern gospel musician. By the way, I have no beef with southern gospel. This man was telling me that he believed that God only wanted people to listen to hymn music and southern gospel music. I tried to explain to him his error, but he wouldn't hear it. So, let me write it here with the hope that maybe one day he will read it.

Southern gospel music is an American invention and has only been around for about 75 years. For this man's thoughts to be true, it would mean, that every Christian before the 20th century was listening to music that did not please God. Also, every Christian around the world that was not born in the U.S. is listening to the wrong music. This idea is both incorrect and full of self-righteousness.

I am amazed by the mind-set of those who are thought to be the most mature believers. Many of our most mature believers expect our youngest believers to transform into them on Sunday morning. We demand that our youngest believers worship like our oldest believers. I am not certain that this is Biblical, and I am even more certain that our more mature believers should be thinking about our youngest believers.

I am also certain that very few people listen to piano and organ music all day long. I have never once visited someone and they ask me to sit down and listen to this great organ recital they got from Wal-Mart last night.

To me, the most important thing about Church music is doing it well. I personally do not care what style the music is. I do care if we don't do our best. There is nothing I hate more in worship that to see a soloist sing without practice. It bothers me when song leaders lead scared and not confident. As long as it is done well, all forms of music are fine with me.

In my church, we sing hymns most of the time. Personally, I like it this way. However, every now and then, we slip in a special music that rocks the house. We never tell anyone that it is coming, and I have noticed that afterwards everyone is still alive and no one is worshipping the Devil.

Next week, I am going to write about songs and hymns that I have a major problem with. Thanks for reading.

The Fear of Failure

I believe the Southern Baptist Convention is the greatest collection of Christians in the world today. I believe our mission boards are wonderful, and our leadership is strong. This being said, there is always room for improvement. I believe the area of church planting is an area that must be examined.

I have come to the realization that many who work in church planting do not do church planting. They plan on others to do church planting. However, they themselves are no longer participating in the process. I believe this is true at both the national and the state level. If I was the boss, you wouldn't be a church planting resource leader unless you were involved personally in a church plant. However, I am not in charge so it really doesn't matter.

The reason I think so many church planting leaders are not involved in church planting is because it is hard to do. I think that the fear of failure causes them to justify their actions. I hear church planting leaders talk about the need for their families to be in an established church. I hear them talk about how busy they are helping others plant churches they don't have time to do it themselves. I believe both of these statements are false. They use these statements to justify their behavior. It makes them feel better about not being personally involved in church planting. I believe the real reason they are not personally involved in church planting is that the are afraid to fail.

It would look terrible for someone who is paid a good salary through the North American Mission Board to fail at planting a church. The truth is that it doesn't matter how talented you are or how much you know, a church plant can fail. It would be embarrassing for a trained professional who teaches others how to plant churches, to fail in a personal effort to plant a church.

I also believe this mind set keeps a lot of pastors from attempting great things for God. I believe that some Pastors are afraid to fail at a ministry activity. They ask themselves, "What effect would it have on the church if we put effort into something that is not successful?" Thus, many pastors do not plan to succeed. They plan to not lose, and by planning not to lose they end up doing nothing at all.

We need to pray that the fear of failure motivates us to do more instead of prohibiting us from doing anything. Each January, I layout the plans for the upcoming year to my church. I challenge the church to do great things. Some of the things I challenge the Church to do fail. However, the majority of them are successful. The failures cause me to try harder and look for different ways to be successful in the future. The successes are celebrated and gives us reason to plan more.

We need to use the fear of failure to motivate us to do great things for God. I encourage both pastor and layperson who is reading this blog to think about what they want to attempt for God next year. I want you to attempt something great. And I want you to attempt something that isn't a sure thing. Now let that fear of failure cause you to work hard. You will be amazed at what can be accomplished if you do not let failure get in the way of your success.

Revivalism Vs. Discipleship

The 1950's were a unique decade in Baptist life. Many Baptist think of this decade as the good 'ol days. I think of them as the start of something bad. In the 50s, the Seminaries began drifting away from the local church. The Seminaries began creating theology that the church was not interested in using. Thus, the church began to look to other avenues for direction. This led the local church to turn to evangelists and mega-church pastors for direction. This movement gave us the "Million more and '54" program. It also moved the church to a form of revivalism. The church decided that every service needed to be revivalistic. The disciple making model went by the wayside. It was replaced by emotional invitations and alter calls. The church decided that getting people down the isle was the most important thing they could do. I believe they were wrong.

It is my goal and desire to bring the church that I pastor back to discipleship. I hope to convince a lot of other pastors to do the same. I believe revivalism has done grave damage to the church. It has killed many congregations, and it has left our people with a terrible lack of Biblical knowledge. For the church to survive and challenge our culture we must be educated. If we do not educate our church members, we will never be able to defend our faith and the world will pass us by.

There was a time when the Church was the leader in everything. If you needed a hospital, you went to the church. We have Baptist hospitals all over the South. When you wanted the best music, you went to the church. All most every private college in America was started by a church. We went from being the cutting edge of everything to 30 years behind everything. If we do not begin to change, things will only get worse.

Jesus commanded us to make disciples. Over the last 50 years, the church has been busy making converts. Discipleship making must become a priority once again. We must challenge our churches to better themselves. We must stretch our minds and break our traditions.

There is nothing wrong with a revival, and I have an invitation every time I preach. However, making disciples is now my main priority. Discipleship is hard. You have to study. You have to be prepared. You may have to challenge yourself to learn more so that you may teach your people better.

I hope that all pastors that read this blog commit themselves to discipleship. I hope that all layperson that read this blog demand their pastors to disciple the church. If we do not, then we will continue down a road of revivalistic zeal without a real commitment to Jesus.

Sorry, No Blog This Week

I want to thank you for reading. I do my best to write once a week. This week a few things have come up that have taken away the time I use to write. Please come back next week, and I promise to have a new work.

bigrevcoop