As I mentioned in yesterday's post, I'm going to take this week to write about church music.
This morning I found myself spending some significant time reading the Psalms. I have found that it is usually in times of sorrow, suffering, and uncertainty that the Psalms really come alive and have a lot to offer.
How freeing and comforting it is to cry out with the Psalmist,
"O Lord, all my longing is before you; my sighing is not hidden from you. My heart throbs; my strength fails me, and the light of my eyes-it has also gone from me." (38:9-10)
"Hear my cry, O God, listen to my prayer; from the end of the earth I call to you when my heart is faint. Lead me to the rock that is higher than I, for you have been my refuge, a strong tower against the enemy" (61:1-3).
These verses comfort me by reminding me that it's legitimate to feel stressed and burdened by sorrow and that it's appropriate and good to cry out to God in times like these. I don't need to have all the answers. I don't need to maintain a "peaceful, easy feeling" about everything. Trusting in God doesn't mean that I won't feel hurt, confusion, and sorrow. Yes, we know that it is God's will for us to "rejoice always," but the Psalms teach us that this doesn't mean we need to pretend like we don't hurt and suffer or that we need to keep a smile on our face at all times.
Now, how does this tie in to church music? From my experience and observations as a worship director, I think that many of the songs that we sing in church do a poor job of giving legitimacy to a range of emotions. Much of the worship music being written today assumes that we are feeling happy, settled, and thankful. This can lead many to walk away from a church service with their greatest emotions and needs unacknowledged and untouched. Of course, we'd all like to be thankful and joyful all the time. But that is not reality for most of us. We hurt, doubt, question, mourn, suffer, etc. And the Psalms tell us that these things are part of the human condition, even as Christians, and that we don't need to gloss over their existence.
It's my desire to see churches recognize this deficiency in many modern worship songs and do something to combat it. One of the reasons I am drawn to hymns is because they tend to do a much better job of connecting with a wide range of emotions. This is not to say that there are no modern worship songs that deal with suffering, sorrow, or doubt (Tim Hughes' "I've Had Questions" and Matt Redman's "Blessed Be Your Name" come to mind); but these types of songs are not the norm and the worship sets at most churches continue to convey the belief that the only acceptable emotions from which to worship are happy, thankful, and settled.
"Prone to wander, Lord I feel it;
Prone to leave the God I love.
Here's my heart, Lord,
Take and seal it
Seal it for thy courts above."
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