Worthy Worship Wars

The question of worship music is one that is appropriate for consideration on this blog. When modern day Christians speak of worship they are usually referring to the music that begins a service at the church building. Often there is debate about what style of music should be used. We define services as contemporary, progressive, traditional or integrated. The goal in these labels is to help define what style of music the church service is employing in its worship. We used to think of the whole service as worship. Webster defines the worship of God like this,

“The act of paying divine honors to the Supreme Being; religious reverence and homage; adoration, or acts of reverence, paid to God, or a being viewed as God.” 

Perhaps the church body would become more healthy overall in its relationship with God if it got the idea of worship right. True worship is something that issues from the heart. It manifest itself in adoring Jesus in song, adoring Him in the giving of our offerings, adoring Him in the taking of the Lord’s supper, adoring Him in the act of baptism and adoring Him in the opening of His word. There are a multitude of additional ways that we can worship (i.e. personal evangelism, thankfulness for provision, etc.) they all have one thing in common. Worship comes from the heart. Since it comes from the heart it is the result of what our hearts are focused on. If we understand the fundamentals of worship then we can begin to better consider the mechanics of music.
Music is a framework for the words of the song. If you have music with no words there is nothing to sing. If you have words with no music you have a poem. To have a song to sing you must have both. Music can either compliment the lyrics or detract from the lyrics. But beyond the complimentary nature of music it can set the focus of our hearts. Music can be sensual. If our hearts are focused on sensual things I believe that is contrary to worship. Sensuality by its very nature focuses our hearts on the bodies of people. Music can also be transcendent and thus our hearts follow that focus to the transcendent realm of God. We can all think of times that our souls have been enraptured by a song. I have heard transcendent music coupled with man centered lyrics and it almost puts you in a place where your worship is of man. Both the lyrics and the music should move our hearts toward God. I think that Bob Kauflin in his book, Worship Matters: Leading Others to Encounter the Greatness of God
 has done a lot of good work in this area, and is well worth any music leader consulting his material. Does style matter??? In Colossians 3:16 Paul encourages them to sing psalms, hymns and spiritual songs. You could argue that these represent different styles of music. But perhaps the style issue would become a moot point if our goal in the music we sing in our church gatherings was the exultation and glory of God and not a sensual appeal to the entertainment of men. After all we are here because of God He is not here because of us.