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Internet Monk
August 30, 2011
Someone Has to Put a Foot Down
Today, Im writing about one song.
Churches everywhere sing it these days.
Many, many well-known artists in the Christian music industry have covered this song.
It has a pious, emotional backstory that people find inspiring.
It rose to #8 on Billboard Christian Songs in 2009.
It was #4 in the US iTunes Top 100 Christian Songs for 2010.
The David Crowder Band version of the song was a big hit that was nominated for a Dove Award in 2010.
It was #16 in the CCLI Top 25 Songs used by churches and ministries in the period between October 1, 2010 and March 31, 2011.
I have read comments about this song like this: This song is starting a revolution. Simply singing it can change your heart. Continue singing it throughout your day and you find yourself intimately in Gods presence.
No one seems to have a bad word to say about this song, except during a tempest-in-a-teapot controversy that arose over one line in the lyric that was deemed too mushy for worship music.
I am sure a lot more could be said about this song from its admirers. But as I stood in a megachurch in the suburbs of Chicago on Sunday listening to and trying, with difficulty, to sing this song for the first time, I was amazed at the violent sense of dislike and utter bewilderment I felt within me. This may be the worst song I have ever heard in a Christian service! I thought. And yet it formed the emotional peak of the worship gathering. The band was clearly into it. The audience, er, congregation seemed to enjoy it. The pastor could only say, Wow! as he came forward to speak after the songs conclusion.
My jaw may have actually dropped. Surely he was joking. I, for one, had found the song completely incomprehensible.
The band had just led the congregation in the popular worship song, How He Loves, by John Mark McMillan.
Believe it or not, Im so separated from the evangelical consumer-industrial complex these days that this was the first time Id heard it. Not impressed. In fact, it seems like almost every time I attend a service that uses praise and worship songs, I come away shaking my head over the degeneration of quality and content in our congregational repertoire of music.
■First of all, the poetry is dreadful, almost incoherent.
■Second, the lyric is incredibly clumsy, almost unsingable.
■Third, the metaphors are strained and mixed to the point of utter confusion.
■Fourth, the only real power the song has is the continual repetition of the line, How he loves [us] as the band builds intensity, à la a million other pop-rock songs.
■Fifth, it is individualistic to the point of being narcissistic, despite part of a verse that, inexplicably, is written in the plural. Whether one sings the controversial sloppy wet kiss line or not, this turns out to be just another song about me and Jesus and how he meets me in my experience without giving any context of the church, the Gospel, or the words of Scripture. It represents a perfect model of personal spirituality without religion.
If I were still a worship and music pastor, there is no way on earth I would allow this song to be sung in corporate worship, much less make it the focal point of the service!
So let it be sung by the folkie pouring his heart out to an audience! But this little personal inspiration piece is simply not appropriate for the corporate worship of Christians who have gathered to celebrate the Gospel and hear Gods Word.
Stop basing your decisions about music on the Top 40″ model. Guard the corporate worship service and stop taking the easy way out, pandering to the tastes of audiences who want primarily to have their ears tickled while chills run up and down their spines.
Build congregations, not audiences.
Make disciples, not entertainment or emotional thrill seekers.
August 30, 2011
Someone Has to Put a Foot Down
Today, Im writing about one song.
Churches everywhere sing it these days.
Many, many well-known artists in the Christian music industry have covered this song.
It has a pious, emotional backstory that people find inspiring.
It rose to #8 on Billboard Christian Songs in 2009.
It was #4 in the US iTunes Top 100 Christian Songs for 2010.
The David Crowder Band version of the song was a big hit that was nominated for a Dove Award in 2010.
It was #16 in the CCLI Top 25 Songs used by churches and ministries in the period between October 1, 2010 and March 31, 2011.
I have read comments about this song like this: This song is starting a revolution. Simply singing it can change your heart. Continue singing it throughout your day and you find yourself intimately in Gods presence.
No one seems to have a bad word to say about this song, except during a tempest-in-a-teapot controversy that arose over one line in the lyric that was deemed too mushy for worship music.
I am sure a lot more could be said about this song from its admirers. But as I stood in a megachurch in the suburbs of Chicago on Sunday listening to and trying, with difficulty, to sing this song for the first time, I was amazed at the violent sense of dislike and utter bewilderment I felt within me. This may be the worst song I have ever heard in a Christian service! I thought. And yet it formed the emotional peak of the worship gathering. The band was clearly into it. The audience, er, congregation seemed to enjoy it. The pastor could only say, Wow! as he came forward to speak after the songs conclusion.
My jaw may have actually dropped. Surely he was joking. I, for one, had found the song completely incomprehensible.
The band had just led the congregation in the popular worship song, How He Loves, by John Mark McMillan.
Believe it or not, Im so separated from the evangelical consumer-industrial complex these days that this was the first time Id heard it. Not impressed. In fact, it seems like almost every time I attend a service that uses praise and worship songs, I come away shaking my head over the degeneration of quality and content in our congregational repertoire of music.
■First of all, the poetry is dreadful, almost incoherent.
■Second, the lyric is incredibly clumsy, almost unsingable.
■Third, the metaphors are strained and mixed to the point of utter confusion.
■Fourth, the only real power the song has is the continual repetition of the line, How he loves [us] as the band builds intensity, à la a million other pop-rock songs.
■Fifth, it is individualistic to the point of being narcissistic, despite part of a verse that, inexplicably, is written in the plural. Whether one sings the controversial sloppy wet kiss line or not, this turns out to be just another song about me and Jesus and how he meets me in my experience without giving any context of the church, the Gospel, or the words of Scripture. It represents a perfect model of personal spirituality without religion.
If I were still a worship and music pastor, there is no way on earth I would allow this song to be sung in corporate worship, much less make it the focal point of the service!
So let it be sung by the folkie pouring his heart out to an audience! But this little personal inspiration piece is simply not appropriate for the corporate worship of Christians who have gathered to celebrate the Gospel and hear Gods Word.
Stop basing your decisions about music on the Top 40″ model. Guard the corporate worship service and stop taking the easy way out, pandering to the tastes of audiences who want primarily to have their ears tickled while chills run up and down their spines.
Build congregations, not audiences.
Make disciples, not entertainment or emotional thrill seekers.
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