As a reviewer, I am called to weigh in on matters of style. When I say whether one folk band is as good as a different folk band, it is my own opinion. People can believe it due to my experience in the field, or disbelieve it due to my subjectiveness (because reviews are inevitably and inextricably subjective, if we get right down to it). That’s just my lot as a music reviewer.
But it would be foolish to try to compare genres and say which one is better or worse than any other. To say that indie-rock is better than pop-punk is at best elitist and at worst downright ignorant. To say that alt-country doesn’t hold a candle to techno is absolutely subjective, in that there’s no real way you can compare the two. Sure, you can find a couple comparisons, but they’re so general that they’re mostly useless. It would be like saying whether a dump truck is better than a BMW; they both have engines, and they both have wheels, but they still aren’t comparable in any meaningful way. Comparing genres is even less substantial than comparing bands within a genre.
Thus, it is with trepidation that I approach the topic that has been weighing heavy on me lately. The trepidation is compounded because this idea deals with a part of religion that people hold very dear: worship.
See, when I was a camper at New Life Ranch, NLR had a very distinct style of worship. It was pretty calm and very reverent. There were entire sets of songs that I have not heard anywhere else other than NLR. Seeing as I am a huge music person, this is part of what drew me to New Life Ranch. I have had some of my most important worship experiences within the walls of New Life Ranch.
As it is with all things, the Ranch has changed over time. As modern worship has exploded, New Life has adopted many of the songs from the Hillsong/Charlie Hall explosion and dropped off some of the older tunes. This is not a bad thing; ministries must change, or they will die. What is bad is what I have noticed as we move further and further into embrace of modern worship.
This is not purely a New Life phenomenon. Although I noticed it here, I have thought back to my church and ministries back home, and recognized some of it there. The problem is this: worship has become epic to the point of distraction.
See, Hillsong is a small army of extremely talented songwriters that seem to have set out to accomplish one thing: write epic songs. Any Hillsong tune you sing will have an epic chorus or bridge; all their songs have huge emotional swells that crest over a particular part of the song. This is not bad; this is good songwriting. The songs inspire emotions in people, and the experience is tremendous.
The problem is that the songwriting is so good that it’s dangerous. The songs so easily provoke an emotional response that it’s easy to want to sing certain songs just so we can have that emotion. If we are not careful, we will find ourselves worshiping and seeking out the emotion as opposed to worshiping and seeking out the Lord.
This isn’t to say that all epic things are bad, or that emotion is wrong. I’m not advocating hymns only, nor do I support banning instruments from worship. But if we get into a habit where all we sing are songs that gratify our desires to find that emotion, instead of gratifying our desires to speak to God in a meaningful way about what he has done for us, we become like the Israelites in the Old Testament, who brought sacrifice upon sacrifice to no good end. God didn’t want misguided sacrifices. He wanted real worship, which was living rightly. He wanted the real thing, as opposed to what the Israelites thought was best.
And there are many people who connect with these epic worship songs in real ways. They are able to connect with God and glorify him through the singing of the songs and the production of emotion that is resultant. I pray that they continue to find God in these moments, and not find the joy that music brings. I have no problem listening to these songs; they are great. But singing along to a rock song and worshiping the Lord should come from different parts of ourselves. We should have a personal response to the Lord, because he has a personal relationship with us. Worship songs help draw us to remembrance of that which he has done for us. Just singing is, well, just singing. The connection with the intellect (Lord, I am able to say “blessed be your name,” even now when I am single, I don’t know my future, etc.) is vital to true worship.
And sometimes a song of joy is necessary; a song that just expresses the joy that God has been good to us. The intellect may not be engaged at all during the experience. But the impetus (Thus God has done for me! Rejoice!) is why you are worshiping.
I fear that those who accustom themselves to receiving an emotional experience from worship and attribute it to God moving in their life will be sorely disappointed when the joy of singing a certain song or songs wears off. They may attribute their inability to “worship as they feel God” to a dry spell in their life. It is never good to attribute that which is really our selfishness (“I can’t worship the way I want, so I can feel God!”) to what God is doing in our lives. There are some pretty dramatic warnings about this in the gospels.
That’s why I’m concerned about epic worship. It’s not the worship songs themselves, but the feelings they produce in Christians that concern me. I think that we should have balance in worship: some hymns, some older songs, some modern songs, some silence, some prayer, some verbal praise to God. We do all these things in our daily lives as Christians; why do we limit our “worship times” to simply music, or, as is put forth here, one kind of music?
Furthermore, we do not live our lives in a continuously epic manner. It seems odd that we would strive to have a consistently emotionally intensive experience every time we go into corporate worship when that is not comparable to how we live our lives. The Christian body is not supposed to be a group of people who come together to feel good, then go out into the world to do their thing on their own. The Christian body is supposed to be woven into how we relate to the world. The body is not a once or twice-a-week event; it should be a continuous lifestyle, of which corporate worship is a part of and a reflection of.
Intending every corporate worship session be emotionally intensive would be like friends having a deep conversation every time they see each other. To wit, there are people who do have intense conversations every time they meet. But the vast majority of friendships reflect the lives of the people who are in them: there are high times, low times, intense times, far times, and everything in between.
The body of Christ should be like this. And it is not simply emotional, epic worship that makes it not like this. There is so much more that needs to be done. But it is the place of emotional worship that is the facet I am dealing with right now. I think we need some more balance, and the balance to epicry is reverence; the appreciation and awe of how big, grand, mighty and powerful he is, and how small we are in comparison. Be still and know he is God. Let that emotion fill you, as well as the rapturous.
May we never confuse our emotions for God. May we be ever more reverent of Him. Amen.