5. Does your church music promote unity in the church?
Last week we talked about the kinds of songs churches employ, and I contrasted hymn-like songs with theologically lighter songs. For many many years, these were the two extremes of the constant "worship wars" within most churches. These battles have calmed in recent years, but other wars are being raged, as RELEVANT magazine recently discussed. Today the issues impact individual lives instead of entire congregations. Personal preference has become king.
Last week we talked about the kinds of songs churches employ, and I contrasted hymn-like songs with theologically lighter songs. For many many years, these were the two extremes of the constant "worship wars" within most churches. These battles have calmed in recent years, but other wars are being raged, as RELEVANT magazine recently discussed. Today the issues impact individual lives instead of entire congregations. Personal preference has become king.
In this we see that the enemy of church unity is personal pride. And unfortunately, we live in a culture where we are all consumers of that which we want. Selfish pride sets in, and it is hard to eradicate. Instead of letting Scripture be the lens through which we see the world, we allow Scripture to be seen through the lens of culture. If we don't like something about a certain church, it is easy to just leave for another church. What we want, our personal preferences, trumps what we need, the family and accountability of a church family.
So, the first step in fighting for unity in the church is to seek the Lord in combatting pride in our own lives. At my church today, our speaker for the summer preached a sermon on church unity and reminded us that the counterattack of quarreling is to pursue that which promotes peace and mutual upbuilding (read Romans 14). Each person has preferences and desires all their own, and we cannot seek to impose our beliefs on another (unless it is a matter of scriptural absolutes). As a church, we ought to first and foremost fight for peace with each other, through the grace bestowed upon us by the sacrifice of Christ.
How does this then translate into our music? Clearly we will never satisfy everyone with what style of music we utilize, and there really is nothing we can do about that. Radically changing part of the stylistic schematic of your church may satisfy certain members, but will alienate others. As I always try to convey in the songs I choose when leading a congregation, the music is only a medium by which to support the lyrics. This is why the theology of our songs is so crucial! As we sing songs and recite theology to ourselves, we are promoting peace in Christ. We sing of the saving work of Christ on our behalf, which he used to bring us together as His body. If we truly are His Body, we may have some squabbles amongst ourselves that we have to manage, but we are all still working toward the same goal: to exalt Christ. To make a song all about the music and not the lyrics is the grossly mishandle that aspect of the worship service.
(This is not to say that the musical side is not important at all, but we will talk more about that next week.)