There seems to be a new trend of criticizing “worship” music. I read this blog the other day where the author talked about how annoyed he is with worship. He, and others, complain that certain lyrics are too “Jesus is my boyfriend”-esque, that some lyrics just aren’t true in his own heart, that some worship leaders try too hard to manufacture emotions, or that some songs are just dumb or cliche. I suppose I understand where these people are coming from, and it certainly causes me to look over the song choices for upcoming weeks, but I can’t say that I relate. Here are some thoughts on the subject…
1) Singing and making music to God is one of the things that really makes me come alive. It makes me tick. It stirs my affections for Him.
2) I don’t think the songs we choose at Origins are cheesy, cliche, or irrelevant…at least I hope not.
3) Worship, as a life, and through music, is a command.
4) If you don’t like it, provide some sort of constructive feedback to your leadership, don’t write a freaking blog about it. That goes for all of you Origins folks too. Listen, you can’t offend me. If you’ve got feedback of any kind, I want to hear it.
5) I could be wrong about this one, but I don’t think I’m one of those metro-style or emotionally awkward worship leaders. While I appreciate quality music and especially dynamic music, I am not organizing a song for the purpose of manipulating your emotions. If I back away from the mic and do a section a cappella, it is because it is powerful for me personally to hear voices being lifted up in praise. If we build up a certain section of a song, well, it’s really just to create quality music. Quality music has ebb and flow, it is dynamic, it is flowing. That’s it. If you get the vibe that we’re trying to manipulate, or if you feel like me intro-ing a song is just talking too much, please let me know. Again, you can’t offend me.
So why bring this up? Well, it really does have me thinking about what songs we sing, what they say, if they’re biblical, and whether or not I can relate. We’re introducing a song called “It is You” this week that I hope and pray doesn’t disgust anyone, isn’t cheesy, and speaks truth. It’s a pretty simple song…lyrics like ~”will you meet us here? we have come to worship you. god of mercy and grace. it is you praises are for”, etc. There is, however, something that the conservative backgrounded peeps may not be used to, “As we life up our hands…” To expand on point #5 above, if I ask you to lift your hands, it’s not because it’s a proper way to do things and it’s not to try and conjure some emotion that wouldn’t otherwise be there. Instead, I think there’s something to be said of us taking a certain posture towards God. In scripture we see bowing on knees, face to the ground, jumping and dancing, lifting of hands, quiet reflection, and more. I believe as we get out of our comfort zones, we create the potential to encounter God in a unique way. Come Sunday morning, you’re free to sit, stand, kneel, jump, or whatever you want…but I encourage you during this song in particular to try lifting your hands. If you relate at all to the blogger, then singing something that isn’t true probably won’t sit well with you. So singing, “as we lift up our hands” while we’re all standing there twiddling our thumbs is a tad silly, isn’t it? Again, I’m not going to force anyone into anything, but I don’t want us to be a congregation that just goes through the motions. I suppose the other option is to metaphorically lift your hands, or perhaps to just not sing those lyrics.
I first heard this song done by The Stillpoint Band down at Hill Country SW and it always engaged me in worship. Unfortunately, the only recorded version I could find out there was by the Newsboys and I don’t like it at all. But rest assured, it should make for a great song Sunday morning! Check it out below, but a little disclaimer: I just recorded this during my lunch break and thus didn’t bother to set up a mic and plug in my guitar. The audio is straight from the camera so won’t sound as good as usual. I also widened the lens angle so you’ll have to see my face on this one…I heard that just the guitar was awkward, but this feels more awkward for me!
First I will comment on Jason Boyett (the original Blog Post that spawned your post.)
Jason’s post brought up a lot of emotions in me that I haven’t experienced in a while. Back when I was growing up a conservative Baptist, I was turned off by the Christian music scene in general partly due to the feeling that I was being manipulated and that so much of the “worship experience” was a stage production. After reading what this gentleman had to say on the matter, and now that I have ‘come back’ to worship as a practice and means to connect with God, I have to say that for me the negative communication most likely comes from the person or people leading the worship. If the person behind the drums is not playing the drums to worship God, but rather to avoid sitting and listening to music he doesn’t care for, then I have to wonder if that attitude is not the exact issue tainting his overall experience in the first place. I sort of feel that if he wanted to truly worship God in a different way – he would. He would write songs and make helpful suggestions to improve his situation. But of course, this is just my humble opinion and in complete agreement with point #4 of this blog.
I do think he has a valid point that worship reflects many areas of our lives. In all things, we shall worship the Lord. I would respond to his statement that we are ignoring the Bible by worshiping the way we do by saying that to NOT worship through song would be leaving out an important area in many lives – thus disregarding the same passage he references.
To comment on this post, Jason Carroll’s response.
I think Origins does a fantastic job of leading worship. Being a musician myself, I struggled to find a church where the music wasn’t distracting. So many churches would either have the right mix of intent, but not the talent to carry it out effectively; or vice versa they would have the talent, but not the heart and it would show. There is a delicate balance between leading people in song and performing for them. I think we do a good job with that balance and we don’t carry it over the top with verbiage about “feel His love pour all around you!” phrases that can distract if that is not the intensity being felt by everyone in the room.
We make it about the music. Having been on both the listening and the leading side, I can safely say that no one on the worship team is in it for recognition or attention. I have been part of worship teams that were more focused on how many songs he or she got to lead and where to stand and wear versus what we were providing the congregation. I don’t get that from anyone in the worship team and I am so thankful for it!
In summation, I would say that yes – not everyone will be worshiping at the same intensity and there will be those that are not fully met on both extremes. But as worship and this topic pertains to Origins, I think that as long as we continue to do it for the Lord and not for ourselves, we can’t go wrong.
Wow, Blake, thanks for the in-depth comments! It’s great to hear more about your background story and I love the encouraging feedback.
bro i love your worship, in fact i like your covers better than most origionals