I am an enthusiastic singer! Not a good one .. but an enthusiastic one. So I really enjoy the communal worship part of our service; singing praises together to God is a great way to help focus my mind from ME!ME!ME!ME!ME!ME! and back to the sovereign God I have come to worship. It’s a useful and joyful transition from the craziness of life into a meditative and contemplative mood.
That said, several songs of late have really grated as we’ve worshiped together as a body. Nails on chalkboard grated.
Kind and Merciful God; We Have Sinned
Kind and merciful God, we have broken your laws
and in conduct have veered from the norm;
we have dreamed of the good, but the good that we could
we have frequently failed to perform.
Uh, what? In conduct we have veered from the norm?
Not sure about you – but normal for me is pretty much putrefaction and sin-tainted wickedness. With any choice, I’d want to be as abnormal as I could be! I know we can do some quick mental gymnastics and realize that God created us good and desires us to be restored to that state in the New Jerusalem, but, I have tell you, that’s not really how it reads when you’re just singing along.
Not to mention “we have dreamed of the good…” Again, what? What does that mean? I’ve dreamed of good in an abstract way; I’ve meditated over righteousness; I wished I could be good once but screwed up? What does the lyric even mean?
Or consider the dreadful
In the Secret
In the secret, in the quiet place
In the stillness You are there.
In the secret, in the quiet hour I wait,
Only for You,’cause I want to know You more;I want to know You,
I want to hear Your voice
I want to know You more.
I want to touch You,
I want to see Your face
I want to know You more.I am reaching for the highest goal,
then I might receive the prize.
Pressing onward, pushing every hindrance aside,
Out of my way, ’cause I want to know you moreI want to know You,
I want to hear Your voice
I want to know You more.
I want to touch You,
I want to see Your face
I want to know You more.
I want to know You,
I want to hear Your voice
I want to know You more.
I want to touch You,
I want to see Your face
I want to know You more.In the secret, in the quiet place
In the stillness You are there
If there is a more narcissistic song to sing, I’ll be shocked. The word ‘I’ appears 23 times in 28 lines. I want this, I want that, I’m pushing aside things that hinder me from your presence. There is only one declarative statements about God here, albeit repeated at the beginning and end. What nonsense!
To be lazy, let me just steal a phrase here and point out that, in fact, Jesus is not your boyfriend. He’s not your mate in either the spousal or Aussie slang understanding of that term. I don’t want to touch him. Frankly, the idea gives me the homoerotic creeps. Contrary to about a million Facebook groups, I am not a ‘fan’ of Jesus desiring just to hangout and gaze droolingly at Him whilst sneaking occasional touches. As the kids used to say; IEW!
As a consequence of thinking this through over the past several days, I am now firmly convinced of the exclusive Psalmody position. The last discomfort with the lyrics has been enough to drive me back to study the Regulative Principle issue again, and I find that a Psalms Only position is the one position that is consistently, absolutely, unflinchingly biblical. Sure, we can quibble about ‘psalms, hymns, & spiritual songs’; we can bicker about meter; I’m not even prepared to embrace the full-bore ‘no instruments’ position of some free-church models, but I am convinced that the history of the Church, the confessions, and Scripture itself endorses and upholds an exclusive Psalmody position.
Does that mean I have to leave the church I am in? No, I don’t think it does at all. It is, frankly, a secondary (that is, non-salvific) issue. My pastor is faithful, reformed, and godly, equipped for all aspects of ministry, and labouring diligently. There’s nothing that would lead me to split from the church.
What, then? For one, I’ve arranged to see the music prior to worship. With this, I am able to read through it in advance and understand what I am being asked to sing before being required to sing it. For songs I can’t sing, I’ll stand reverently and seek to pray in a manner that compliments the point the song is trying to communicate. Lastly, although I doubt it will happen, I need to be prepared to give a gentle answer to those who might ask why I am doing what I am doing.
Now, where did I put that Psalter?
I’ve never really noticed that with “Kind and Merciful God” before — after all, it passed the Trinity Hymnal editors’ muster. But it’s true… as fallen humans our “norm” is to sin, and in ourselves we’re not going to just dream of good. And of what good is dreaming of good anyway. Now if the song author was using “norm” in the context of “norma”, i.e. standard or rule.
And “In The Secret” has got to be up there as one of the all-time worst so-called “christian” songs out there. I’ve considered writing a blog post on how much I hated the song. I didn’t do it… then at least… It’s an awful song and I fully agree has no place in a worship service context. Now I could really get on a soapbox about that song – I hate it – or make a statement that if a song reaches hit status on “christian radio” then it probably has no place being sung in church because the me-centered repetition of the word “I” is probably one of the things that got it so high on the charts; that or a chorus that whips up the listener/singer into a trance. But don’t we love songs that remind us just how awesome we are and how much God has to be glad he has us in his camp? ( / end facetious sarcasm)
Unfortunately there’s a lot of that out there. I already mentioned just about anything on christian hit charts. Even some of the stuff that tends to be a little higher quality… thinking of songs by the Gettys, or Sovereign Grace Praise* … even can still drop into the emotional me-centered trap super easily.
Yes it’s a secondary issue; no it’s not something to make a big deal of. That said, music is important and IS a big part of worship. It’s not a salvific issue, but bad music does still come across as not giving our best in worship. When it becomes difficult is when the message being communicated in music can almost seem to undermine the work of the teaching elder, by communicating a subliminal message that doesn’t line up with what we as Reformed believers believe to be truth… take “In the Secret” as an example, or a list of other songs I’m sure we could both agree on. As a general rule if it has a lot of “I”, “me”, “my”… *warning*.
I’m not sure I’m quite to the point of Psalter-only. I’m probably more in the camp of Psalter+Hymnal+RUF Hymnal and then beyond that it had better be seriously good to make the cut… but I digress.
so anyway… I remember hearing someone once say he was sure God got a good laugh out of hearing us sing songs about how much we’re gonna do this or that (“every blessing you pour out I’ll turn to praise”, “I will glory in my Redeemer”, etc.) Sure we will… by His grace! Not by our own fallen nature, that’s for sure.
I’d be willing to stretch to Scriptural paraphrases, since that is in large measure what the Psalter does with the Psalms. But I’ve really only examined the issue in terms of Psalms only – and that is my church background (PCEA). In conscience, I can’t go past that yet. I’m willing to – but for now the safer course seems to be the Psalms Only position.
Thanks for the feedback.