Looking around the church last Sunday I noticed that the majority weren’t singing. And most of those who were singing barely moved their lips. The only voices I actually heard were those on stage with microphones.
That’s been the case for years now–in churches large and small. What used to be congregational singing has become congregational staring.
Even when the chipper “worship leader” in contemporary churches bounds on stage and predictably beckons everyone to “stand and worship,” the people compliantly obey the stand command, but then they turn into mute mannequins.
What’s behind this phenomenon? What happened to the bygone sounds of sanctuaries overflowing with fervent, harmonizing voices from the pews, singing out with a passion that could be heard down the street? I suspect it’s a number of unfortunate factors.
Spectator set-up. Increasingly, the church has constructed the worship service as a spectator event. Everyone expects the people on stage to perform while the pew-sitters fulfill the expectation of any good audience–file in, be still, be quiet, don’t question, don’t contribute (except to the offering plate), and watch the spotlighted musicians deliver their well-rehearsed concerts.
Professionalism. It seems it’s paramount for church music to be more professional than participatory. The people in the pews know they pale in comparison to the loud voices at the microphones. Quality is worshipped. So the worshippers balk at defiling the quality with their crude crooning. It’s better to just fake it with a little lip syncing.
Blare. The musicians’ volume is cranked up so high that congregants can’t hear their own voices, or the voices of those around them, even if they would sing. So they don’t sing. What would it add? The overwhelming, amplified sound blares from big speakers, obliterating any chance for the sound of robust congregational singing.
Music choice. Sometimes people refrain from singing because the songs are unfamiliar, hard to sing, or just cheesy. Sometimes worship leaders choose a song that may thematically tie into the day’s sermon topic, but it’s unsingable. Sometimes worship leaders choose lame songs written by their favorite songwriters–themselves.
I admit. I’ve joined the majority. I’ve stopped singing. I’m not happy about it. I know I should overcome these barriers and just praise the Lord with my very unprofessional vocalizations. But I long for an environment that evokes my real heartfelt vocal participation.
(See Thom’s follow-up post here: Confessions of a Worship Wars Mercenary.)
(Thom Schultz is the co-author of Why Nobody Wants to Go to Church Anymore, and the director of the film When God Left the Building.)
There’s another factor to include, Thom, and that’s the lack of choral singing in the school systems except for the few that choose to take part in chorus. And that’s IF their school hasn’t drastically cut the music programs.
It’s surprising how many people will sing karaoke, but don’t feel comfortable singing WITH other people.
YES I completely agree with you. As a music teacher, this is something I’m so passionate about! It is such a shame that churches actually can’t use hymnals anymore – not because people don’t like hymns (because many in my younger generation DO love hymns), but because they don’t understand how to read music! It’s so very disappointing!
Sorry but as a music minister I have to strongly disagree with your statement. It would be encouraging to have young people reading music, but in Church you don’t have to read music to sing along just like you don’t have to read music a karaoke. You just need the words. Young people do not like the old traditional hymns. If you want your church to die out, keep catering to the older people and sing the hymns. I’ve seen it over and over. You never see Hillsong or Crowder without hundreds or thousands to worship there because they are singing old hymns. Young people want to sing contemporary songs with distortion, drums and other songs. The Lord said make a joyful noise, he said nothing about singing hymns over and over until you beat them to death!
JD,
I HAVE EIGHT WORDS FOR YOU, “WERE YOU THERE WHEN THEY CRUCIFIED MY LORD?”.
OK. I HAVE MORE THAN EIGHT WORDS. I VISITED A CATHOLIC CHAPEL ON GOOD. FRIDAY, 3 YEARS AGO. I AM NOT CATHOLIC. I AM PENTACOSTAL. BUT WHEN I HEARD A YOUNG MAN WITH DOWN’S SYNDROME SINGING ALONG,THAT HYMN, OUT OF TUNE, I THOUGHT THAT HIS VOICE WAS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL THAT I HAD EVER HEARD. I BELIEVE OUR LORD DID, AS WELL.
YOU MISSED IT. YOUR PRIDE IS IN THE WAY.
What hateful things to say about those you de to be “old”. There needs ,ideas and feelings don’t matter? Only the young. You should be ashamed of yourself.
And I do not agree with your comments.I am an eighty year old christian saved by the grace of God. My salvation never depended on singing it depended on the word preached by a spirit filled pastor called by God to preach his word to lost souls. I will be the first to agree the church is dyeing out but it is not because of the singing of the old hymns that has been used in church’ for far longer than I am old.There are more reasons for the Church decline than I could ever list here. Some people say It is because we took GOD out of the schools. My opinion It started when we took the mothers out of the home to work in the offices and factories and put TV’s in the home to do the baby sitting.As time has passed they now have computers and games Cell phones and social media to baby sit them and of course no computer cell phone game or social media will teach them about GOD. Another big thing is we as Christians sit around and whine about the Church pews being empty but we never invite any one that lives around the Church to come visit us or any one in the community we live in.we don’t invite the grocery clerk or the bag boy or the stranger on the street what about the policeman that just gave you a ticket.They may not be saved or maybe they are looking for a Church to take their children to. How many of these Church’s have an active visitation program set up.I know you probably can’t do visitation like it used to be but if we and others will get on our knees and earnestly seek GOD’S will, he will hear our prayers and answer them. He said he would. 2 chronicles 7 14-15 if My people who are called by My name will humble themselves, and pray and seek My face, and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven, and will forgive their sin and heal their land. So brother it is not about the singing it is about GOD loving Christians working in GODS harvest.. Luke 14:23 KJV Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled. That is some of the ways to grow our Church’s.I once heard a preacher say if you can get them with a hot dog I can get them with two. So in short it’s not the music that keeps them it’s the prayers of the members and good sound preaching.:Adisclaimer just so you know I am not a fan of the so called contemporary music.
Way to stoke the fires of “us vs. them”, JD.
First of all, who cares about the style of music, as long as it is scripturally sound, AND glorifies GOD.
We have a mix of traditional and contemporary music in our services. It is chosen because it fits the theme of the service, not because of the genre. We have a pretty even mix of older and younger congregants, and sure each person has their own preference as to style, but I look, and listen around, and see and hear a fairly high percentage of participation,
We need to get past the mindset of one genre being better than the other and listen to the message rather than the beat. Sure it feels great to be all pumped up during and after a song, but we need to ask ourselves if it really spoke to our spirit or rather to our emotions. We are supposed to “walk by faith, not by sight (emotions)” 2Cor 5:7
These days too much emphasis is placed on the experience WE get from the music, instead of realizing that worship is for GOD. And, if it is truly worship, it will bring us into His presence, regardless of the style of music.
Too say that churches are dying because their congregations are aging and they sing hymns, is an oversimplification of the problem, and has more to do with a church’s teaching than the music program. If the two are not sound, and don’t complement each other then the message of Christ is lost, and it becomes a social gathering, with no positive spiritual value whatsoever.
I am 62 years old. I sang hymns all my life but I don’t read music. I listen the first time and then I’ve got it. Not being able to read music is not a reason, to choose NOT to sing praises to the Lord.
I FULLY AGREE! I play trumpet at a professional level and involved in 4 groups in my city. The worship music neither worship or music. The melody is lacking in interest, the words are too often vague and about as inspirational as singing to one’s cat. I sit there in the Lord’s House with a bad attitude and I am troubled in my heart about this. Therefore, I stay away. There are countless thousands like me nationwide I am sure. I miss true worship music. Miss it so much. And yes….just look around…nobody is singing. Hello?
JD’s ‘shove-it-down-their-throats’ methodology is more of why there is a conflict. If he is a music minister, he should be very careful. The enemy hates competition. If JD feels fine with what he’s doing, he should worry for perhaps the enemy is also fine with it! ~ I pretty much agree with ‘kevinSings’ and the paucity of music education enabled by abandoning the hymnals, as Julie laments, is a huge problem as well. In my prison ministry, many of the inmates come from churches where they may even have served as worship team members. Almost none of them know the least about singing or anything about harmony! No matter, though, as most of the new songs can be sung in a monotone and have such vapid lyrics that they could be secular songs! If the church is failing, I’d say it was from boredom; no challenge. JD claims the young people do not like old hymns, but it seems to me that we tell them they should not like them. After all, JD claims the answer is karaoke!
JD – Although you make valid points, distortion, drums, Crowder & Hillsong don’t amount to a hill of beans (no pun intended) unless people approach worship in the right way. As Ravi Zacharias out it doing a workshop on worship, ….”Unless you worship Him individually, you cannot worship Him corporately.” Zacharias further said, “Worship is the submission of all of our nature (ourselves) to God.”
You can have the best songs, hymns, lighting, etc etc – but unless people approach it in the right manner making our Lord the focus, then I don’t care where you go to church…. it will be meaningless!
JD, Its not about catering to one specific generation. God didn’t make exceptions nor will he ever. I do understand that there are churches that do cater to a specific ‘kind’ of people, but i don’t think this is the case. Singing is an act of worship that depends on our relationship to God. Modernizing a church is a great move, but changing the cornerstone of worship is another. i support greatly the argument of set up and carryout.
JD have you ever read the actual words to some of those “old hymns”? Those words are powerful and full of scripture then most of the christian “worship” songs today. A lot of them were born out of hard-time, heart felt worship to the Lord. There are also a lot of young people who only enjoy the moment and do not understand what worship is…it is the beat that draws them. When you talk about catering to the “older” people, remember what the scripture teaches in Proverbs 16:31 “A gray head is a crown of glory; It is found in the way of righteousness” and Proverbs 20:29 “The glory of young men is their strength, gray hair the splendor of the old”…many of those “older” people have fought fierce battles in the trenches of this worlds wickedness (and I am speaking spiritually) for you to be able to even stand in a church today. I love Hillsong and David Crowder and churches play their songs to death and repeating the same chorus lines over and over and over and over and over again for 20 minutes. My suggestion is to honor all those called saints, remembering the glory of the young is their strength, and the glory of the old is the battles they fought on their knees and honor them with something that touches their hearts also.
Joy, I agree. Andrea Bocelli can’t “read” music either.
I don’t know if I am considered young by others or not (I am 36) but I love hymns. I can’t sing them well and I have only been in the church for 13 years but I do so love when they are sang at church. I even attend hymn sings at other churches with my husband when I can. The voices stand out so strongly as opposed to when newer songs are played. It seems like everyone gets pulled into them and you can’t help but sing along. That being said I love the new music as well but mainly only sing them loud when I am home. My kids tell me how out of tune I am every time 🙂
People at my church sing. People at the 2 other churches I’ve visited in recent years sang. Maybe it’s that I’m so involved in worship that I don’t notice that people far from me are not singing, but I hear the people around me singing. I see the people in front of me involved in worship, including teens. The one church I’ve been to in my life where it was conspicuously obvious that no one was singing was a Methodist church in the early 1990’s where everyone was standing and holding their hymnals but I did not hear one voice around me. Being a self-conscious teen, I did not sing either. That was a strange experience.
I can’t believer all the responses here that contend not having the music is not a factor. I’m sorry, but it absolutely is. As a professional musician, I deeply resent trying to sing along with an unfamiliar song because I don’t know it; And I have never understood why contemporary churches are so adamant in not providing the printed music. It doesn’t get in the way; people who don’t read music have never been confused by having the music in front of them — they just ignore it. I, however, am shut out from participating in worship or giving my best because I don’t know the tune. And please don’t tell me “yes, you can sing along.” No, I can’t — I do my best to pick up the admittedly repetitive and vapid tunes, but I do not feel I am fully participating or giving God my best. In fact, I am so focused on trying to guess what the melody might be that any meaning of the song is completely forgotten. Sorry; the conventional practice of just providing words is completely wrong-headed, and its the main reason no one sings anymore. If the music is not important, why provide the words? Why not just force
everybody to guess on words and music both?
I agree with you, strongly. My experience has been the same.
Lack of music notation leads to everyone singing the melody. A few
might pick up on harmony parts, but without notation, the harmony
is harder to find. Is that what we really want? Everyone on melody?
Why are we throwing away this simple and effective means of giving people
information? (and instead leaving them to wonder where the song goes
next)
If music notation is not needed, why do we provide printed scripture?
People can just “pick that up by listening”, right?
Some think printed music is too expensive, but then they spend tens
of thousands of dollars on sounds systems, which when used incorrectly,
covers the voices in the congregation.
With all due respect is this about your performance or worshiping God?
Perhaps a metaphor will help. On Sunday mornings we are part of a garden that
hopefully, flourishes in praise to God. Whether you’re in the worship band
or at the mixing board, or singing in the congregation, you are part of
that musical garden, and it is so good when that garden makes great sounds.
As a long-time musician, arranger and composer I’ve learned a few things about
what helps that garden flourish and what does not. Providing musical notation
can be a great help in getting to that point.
Does it glorify God to create an environment where people cannot flourish
musically? Is God honored when we stumble around, trying to find our way
through a song? I want to sing those parts, I want to hear my neighbor do the same,
I want to hear the piano player come up with really cool chord voicings, and
I want to hear the drummer throw in some fun cross-rhythms. Ahh – the garden
in full bloom.
To answer your question – it’s about every plant in the garden performing well,
and by so doing, bringing honor to God.
Well stated!!!–my thoughts exactly. Too often, I endure the so-called “worship” part of the service for the very reasons you state. Amen!!!
JD,
Your appeal to numbers is telling.
I’ve seen thousands of young people sing to Pearl Jam. Great music but not Holy.
If I can find a church that sings real songs and not the junk on the wall I will start going back to church again! I get nothing from the junk on the wall and it has about got to the point that preachers are afraid to preach the real gospel anymore for fear of making someone mad.
Sorry JD, but you are wrong. Many young people do like to sing hymns. Many of them love the liturgy. There are many young people who feel that church music should be different than what they hear everywhere else. You don’t necessarily need to be able to read music, but it helps, especially when you sing parts, which I regularly hear at college chapel and evening prayer services. The churches in the area that most students attend have good acoustics and well maintained, well voiced, and well tuned pipe organs. They also have organists (some who are professors at the university) who are more than capable of leading and supporting congregational singing.
Distortion and drums do not improve singing, especially when songs are generally written with a soprano or tenor in mind. This cuts off and alienates the majority of people who fall into the category of alto and bass. Add in the fact that this overpowers everyone else, they have no reason to sing.
There is a difference between overpowering music and having a place for less confident singers to “hide.” Good acoustics encourage confident singing. Less confident singers feel as though they have somewhere to hide even though they are singing loudly. They hear everyone around them, but cannot pick out specific voices. As a result, they feel that incorrect notes won’t result in them being singled out.
Couldn’t click respond to JD’s comment below,
but Yes, Young people do love to sing hymns, and the reason young people flock to see Hillsong or Crowder is because it’s a CONCERT, most are not going to Worship God when they go to those, they are going to hear a concert. just as if they were going to any other rock concert.
And if they are only going to church to be entertained by the ‘concert’ then your right THEY WILL leave as soon as the entertainment is gone, or stopped, and it shows more their heart was not into the WORSHIP of God, but the entertainment they were getting.
JD, those “young people” you’re so keen on attracting… are sick of the side-show. They want substance.
I don’t think it’s simply a music problem.. I’ve been in church for as long as I can remember and have been a participatory member all my life. I’ve taught children’s choir for almost 25 and they do not want to sing hymns unless we jazz them up (Thank you Chris Tomlin)! But again, I don’t think that is the crux of the issue – I think people are getting lazy all the way around (well on Sundays) – they come in and expect the worship team to make them feel good, get them pumped up, they expect the pastor to preach an uplifting message (and please do not tell me I have responsibilities as a member).. we have become spectators in church and look at the leaders of the church to bless us, make us feel good about ourselves, and get us out in time to beat the crowd at the local restaurant for lunch. Gone seem to be the days when there was personal conviction, personal responsibility – what can I contribute – It shouldn’t matter what the pastor is preaching (as long as it is Biblical), It shouldn’t matter what style the choir, worship team, or Sally’s grandma is singing.. You come to church to corporately worship with fellow believers and that means you must participate not just have your ears scratched. If you can’t find God in an upbeat song, or a hymn, or whatever – that is something you need to address with God not blame the leaders!..
I agree in principle Julie, but what does reading music have to do with it? On the contrary, if they are standing up and singing hymns and being active and joining in, then they are singing…vocalizing. They either know the words already from joining in on Sundays and singing, or they are reading the words to the song in the hymn book. Why does anyone have to read music? They are standing at the pews singing, not playing an instrument. The people onstage are the ones playing the instruments. Unless you are making another point, I’m just not sure what you mean. Sorry!
“Why does anyone have to read music? They are standing at the pews singing, not playing an instrument.”
Are you unfamiliar with the fact that most hymns are written in 4-part harmony, and successfully singing the accurate part requires a modicum of music-reading skill?
If not, I’m not really following your point.
Printed music notation (as in a hymnal) is very useful for singers as well as instrumentalists. Printed music helps you find your part, and just like reading aloud, you can look ahead to see where the next notes are going – unlike the guessing we must do when singing only with words.
Music notation is a quick, shorthand method of communicating what notes to sing. The basics are not difficult: Your voice should follow the direction the notes are moving (up/down/stay the same) with a change in pitch that corresponds to the distance up/down the notes change. Combine this with listening carefully, and you can find the pitches.
Isn’t it difficult to worship while so focused on notes, finding your part and looking ahead?
No.
That same argument could be made against reading words (the Psalms, for example) during worship. Can you focus on worship while reading words and looking ahead?
Some people struggle with the fact that they did sing a part (alto, tenor, bass) in choir growing up, but when they go to church and sing a new song, the parts aren’t there to read and follow. There are many people who can sing harmony when they can read it, but can’t hear it as well. It’s hard to guess a bass line or tenor line to a new song. I guess it doesn’t matter though, since the most popular new songs really don’t have a place to sing along in harmony. It seems to me that many of the new praise songs are more “solo” oriented. That’s sad. And if we sing songs that are written in the key of many popular worship leaders, it is too high or too low to sing.
Incredibly ironic that JD wrote “The Lord said make a joyful noise, he said nothing about singing hymns over and over until you beat them to death!” There is so little variation in the contemporary music. And let’s sing that chorus over and over until we’re all hypnotized. Even Tim Hawkins poked fun at that aspect.
The contemporary songs would be better accepted in our church if the lyrics were not repeated over, and over, and over until they are beaten to death. We mix the older hymns in with the contemporary songs. That seems to work OK…….except for the repetition problem.
Since I do read music and I like to sing, I will tell you that if I’m presented with a new piece of music, I’m NOT singing if I don’t see the music. The words are not enough. I can read music and I can fully participate if I can see the music, but not if it’s not there. And, I would also say that while there certainly are wonderful examples of contemporary music that can be incorporated into worship, why is it that we must discard and discount hundreds of years of tradition. Is there a problem with learning some Bach and Handel, some Martin Luther and John/Charles Wesley or some Ralph Vaughan Williams along with Hillsong? I don’t think we need to trash tradition altogether because some people don’t “consume” that type of music. And, there isn’t anything wrong with all of us experiencing something new and edifying – and that goes both ways – we can learn new songs and old songs. And we can have the music there for people who want it in order to participate in worship.
Interesting article and loved reading the comments on the page. Sit back a bit David if you don’t mind my forthcoming rant…
There is this attitude that occurred around the mid ’90’s, that more emotionally charged worship music was more relevant to the masses, hymns were passé, and even my beloved Integrity music’s offerings were becoming somewhat worn. As a music director in my church at the time, I was somewhat persuaded that the newer songs ( a la Hillsong, Vineyard et al) were better, and far more hip and in touch with generation “why”, the EMO generation of Smashing Pumpkins, Counting Crows, Stone Temple Pilots and the like. I was told that we had to appeal to this generation. That they were the ones we had to reach because they were so much more ahead than us baby boomers or generation x’s.
My instinct at the time was, yes try and accommodate them, but also stick to things that people know. This was rejected by the powers that be in my own church, and dare I say it, in a lot of churches the world over. Consequently, we have a lot of mediocre, emotionally charged songs with very little spiritual input that very few people can sing because we have to keep up with the “hits” – every Sunday!! Not good for congregational singing on the whole.
On the other hand, I have to disagree with the author about his “professionalism” statement. In years past, most churches had only an organ present as an instrument for worship leading. As far back as I can remember, every church I went into that had an organist, had an extremely competent one. When more instruments like guitar, drums, bass, brass, keys,and most notably, vocalists were added, I found the standard slipping dramatically! Anyone who could play only two chords, had only a modicum of talent in any department browbeat the Music Director or Pastor to have a part in the worship team. More dangerously, Pastors wives who fancied themselves as singers, whether they had the talent or not, not only took on this mantle, but that of worship leader as well. I say “hear hear” to the rise of professionalism in church music – it was sorely needed and was there a long time before the ball was dropped. Now let’s see if the songwriting can rise up to match the lyrical content of those old hymns, or even Integrity Music’s Praise and Worship. I somehow doubt that it will.
JD,music minister… I learned to read music by following along in the hymn book growing up. I have two adult children, four teens, three preteens (and younger) children who prefer a church that sings hymns, not just radio-worship music. Music has driven them out of the youth groups – they don’t feel it’s worship, they feel it’s entertainment & that’s not what church is for.
Today’s youth want ‘authenticity’ I hear over and over as a churchy catch phrase… they also want to be treated as if they are smart and capable of understanding God’s word as it is – not watered down, babied, and worship songs with real depth is part of that.
Your losing kids by treating them as such. You’re losing church members because they want deeper, ‘authenticity’ and that means worship of God – not songs that song to each other, not surface-level repetitive dribble!! (And, before you think it, we did not raise our kids with hymns-only, but including them and our family enjoys a wide range of music styles)
Get JD, it’s all his fault! 🙂
When the very rare Old Hymn is chosen as the next piece, I look around and see everyone singing. I sing out loud with joy in my heart.
Recently a young person in front of me actually came up to me after the service and commented to me that he enjoyed hearing my great voice. I thanked him but informed him that it was the young man next to me, and we both thanked him. The hymn was a wonderful old song that everyone knew, and all five verses were full of praise to God and scriptural truth, a veritable 3 minute sermon.
The “chorus” after it was one short benign, meaningless collection of about 6 words, that were repeated over and over for about 6 minutes or more. Some Sundays I have to look around when I come in to church, thinking I dropped in on an Aerosmith concert by mistake, because of the distortion guitar solos. I have actually seen an 80 year old lady climb over her husband with her fingers in her ears, and run for the exit. But she is getting better, now she sits quietly in the chair (the pews were removed), with her fingers in her ears, or she and her husband wait in the lobby until the “music” stops.
A chorus one Sunday when I was an usher, went something like this:
How long. How long. How long, Oh Lord, How long.
(Repeat)
(Repeat)
(Repeat)
(Repeat)
(Repeat)
8 minutes of that was too much for a young lady friend of mine, who got up while the song was still going and decided to visit the rest room. On the way past me, she said quietly to me, “How long. How long. How long is this song?”
Our congregation today is at about 30% of what it was 10 yeas ago. So much for changing with the times to draw people in.
The majority of people don’t want to sing hymns. We want to reach people who aren’t in church not the ones already there!
And you think hymns can’t reach people? Oh my goodness! What to you think people sang for hundreds of years? I suppose none of them were ever “reached”??? How then did people ever get saved down through history?? Why can’t we appreciate different kinds of worship music, as long as it is INDEED worship music?? Some of today’s “worship songs” could be sung to your boyfriend instead of to God. Worship songs need to have a clear message about worshipping God. You never had to worry about that with the old hymns.
JD I was just wondering can you give me a single scripture that says it’s okay to have instruments in worship?