Songs of the past – “what was I thinking?”

Songs of the past – “what was I thinking?”

Perception changes over time. When you’re caught up in the moment it’s not always easy to everything clearly, it can also effect other things. With songs, I’ve noticed, our tastes seem to change. Sometimes I think we are just over exposed to a song which can mean we either start to dislike it (or get bored with it) or we start to like it (or more likely get used to it). When we look back we can often be surprised (and a little disgusted) at the songs we used to like. There is that “what was a thinking” moment.

Songs are very emotive and we connect songs with times in our lives and a certain way we felt. We get attached to songs we may not like at all because it reminds us of a good time in our past. We continue to listen to it to reminisce. When we hear a song we haven’t heard for a long time it can conjure up images and feelings from the past, I think we can sometimes mistake the enjoyment of that feeling for enjoyment of the song.

I’m starting to wonder how much this also impacts us in a church setting. I’ve certainly seen songs anointed for “a time” and others, like Amazing Grace, appear to be timeless. Are there also songs that worship leaders, worship bands and churches cling to because of feelings from the past it brings up? Is God still anointing these songs or are worshipping that moment in our past rather than him.

Festivals are often something most of us can easily link a song with. When I hear songs like “Praise You” by Martyn Layzell and “Beautiful One” by Tim Hughes they remind me of being at Soul Survivor in 2002 with a large group of friends from church. It was a really enjoyable time but some of the songs were for that time and others we continue to use now. There are songs I think I’ve used in worship, probably incorrectly, because I personally have more of a connection with them. It might not be something the church shares which isn’t good when you’re meant to be leading the church into worship. I’ve also seen churches continue to use old hymns that God really did not appear to be using in services anymore. They continued to use them because the Church has a connection with them rather than what God wants them to be singing.

There’s something Mike Pilavachi said that this reminds me of; it was something like  “the anointing isn’t in the act, it’s in the obedience”. He was talking about when God told Moses to hit the rock with his staff to produce water. He obeyed. The second time God told him to speak to the rock. This time Moses hit the rock with his staff and water flowed again. God then told Moses “because you did not trust in me enough to honor me as holy in the sight of the Israelites, you will not bring this community into the land I give them”. (Numbers 20)

The act Moses carried out still brought the same results but he put his faith in the act rather than in God. We need to be aware in the church of how much we rely on acts/songs/preaches/structures etc… that have worked before and make sure God is still calling us to use them.

Lyric Projection: Helping or Hurting?

We all (well most of us) love technology. It increases at an amazing rate. Who can really remember not having a mobile phone now? There is the assumption that technology always brings improvements. I’m not convinced this is always the case, not only can technology not be helpful but I think some of the technology we use to help can actually be a hinderance.

Take the mobile as an example. It’s great that at any point in the day and just about anywhere you are you can call someone. The downside is that means at almost any moment of the day someone can call you. Finding a quiet moment in the day has never been so difficult.

Now let’s get to the real point of this blog, lyric projection. There are big plus points to this, especially when compared with the OHP and even song books. The biggest plus is the easy and the speed at which you can get song lyrics on to the screen which allows the worship to be taken off the planned set list if necessary. There’s no need to stick with a song that isn’t right for that moment just because the lyrics are displayed. Like the OHP this is very fluid for those following the lyrics. There is no scanning through a book to find what song is being sung.

Now the downsides. For this we need to look back at not only the early church but even before that. In Numbers we see Miriam and Moses leading a group in worship. They had no lyric projection, OHP, song books or even anything printed at all. Leading worship required great faith in God and great reliance on God rather than technology. The times of “spontaneous” worship or “singing in the spirit” where common place then, mainly because that was all they had. Our technology is fantastic and to those that enter a church that don’t know the songs it can break barriers for them but is it holding us back from something much greater.

People go to gigs and sing a long, there aren’t words on screens, yes they know songs from CDs but there will still be songs they don’t know. You don’t have to sing every song and if the songs are too difficult to pick up then should we be using them anyway?

Matt Redman wrote the song “the Heart of worship” after his church at the time in Watford decided they had become too reliant on the worship band and they got rid of it for a time. They stood in silence for large periods of time as the church learnt to worship but over time songs emerged from the congregation and they were able to reintroduce the band bit by bit. Could or should we be trying the same with our OHPs and lyric software? Have we put worship and God in a box that we need break out of? Are the things we have developed and used helping or hurting?

Many people often say faith is spelt R-I-S-K and leading worship like this right now is certainly a risk and needs the church and leaders to have faith but just think what God could do.

Chart songs in worship?

This is an issue that I’ve been a bit interested recently. It first came into my thoughts when I was just listening to my iPod and I came across a few songs that had some (in my opinion) amazing lyrics. When I’ve had teaching on songwriting I have often been told that song writers need to find new ways to say the old truths of the bible. Here I was discovering people doing just that but they were in mainstream songs.

I’ve read a few articles and forum posts about this subject and there seems to be a few different views, those against it appear very hard-line and even those that do agree with using the songs seem to have a few “rules” that are at odds with the way the some hymns were created and how we use some modern worship songs.

The first of these is not changing words. I can see where people are coming from, some of the benefit of using these songs is that people know them so if you change them then you lose that. Also there is a view that songs are art and you don’t change that. On the flip side I’d like to point out that people who cover songs often tweak odd lyrics, worship songs often have minor changes during worship (like changing I to we etc…) and some churches have permanently changed lyrics to worship songs (for example one church has change “Here I am to worship” to “All my life I’ll worship”). If we’re making changes to these songs then why not mainstream songs. It’s also easy to forget that some hymns were originally popular mainstream songs of the time but had their lyrics completely re-written. I remember a sunday school song from when I was younger that used the Match of the Day theme tune.

I’m not saying we should necessarily go to those extremes but some changes could be used and why should we limit how a song can be used?

The main argument I have read against the use of them is that they weren’t written to glorify God and so shouldn’t be used as such. My first reaction to that was “surely it’s about how the worshipper uses the song and where they’re heart is rather than the song writers”. Initially this was just a view I had and I had no scripture to back it up but I also didn’t have any to say that songs need to be written by Christians.

At my church small group this week there were a few lines of scripture which immediately reminded me of this topic.

Philippians 1:15-18

15 It is true that some preach Christ out of envy and rivalry, but others out of goodwill. 16 The latter do so out of love, knowing that I am put here for the defense of the gospel. 17 The former preach Christ out of selfish ambition, not sincerely, supposing that they can stir up trouble for me while I am in chains. 18 But what does it matter? The important thing is that in every way, whether from false motives or true, Christ is preached. And because of this I rejoice.

Here Paul is talking about preachers but my initial thought was surely he could be talking about song writers too. If the song declares God’s truth and glorify’s Him what does it matter who wrote it or what its initial intentions were for. If it helps people engage and worship God then surely that is great isn’t it?

I’m going to follow this up by looking at “do we use too much scripture in our worship songs”, this might be some time next week. I’m also going to try to build a list of songs I think could be used in worship which I will continue to update.

Do we over-craft songs?

I’ve been taught by other songs writers (who know more than I do) that we need to spend time crafting songs. I’ve been told stories of songwriters who have spent ages researching about the stars and galaxies just to find one line. On the on the one hand I think that’s great but then I hear stories of mainstream song writers who write popular songs in 10 minutes. Arguably some of these 10 minute writes are more catchy and still (sometimes more) lyrically strong. So do we over-write or over-craft a song?

There is something great and raw about these quickly written songs. They are the out pouring of the heart, unrestricted and holding nothing back. There’s no political correctness or questions or “is that really what I mean” or “is that really true”, it’s just one persons cry. The best comparison I have of these in a church setting is the spontaneous times in our worship. The songs that pour out in those times are often so simple, but are also so honest and catch something that often 6 months of writing and crafting can’t. God of all comfort is a great example of something that is so simple but is also so easy for thousands to grab hold of.

If we look back to bible times, there were no overhead projectors, no songbooks to hand out but the likes of Moses and Miriam still led worship. Anything that was sung either had to be memorised or spontaneously created. There couldn’t be weeks or months of crafting a song, but there is no doubt that their worship was full of passion and their songs captivated their hearts and allowed them to cry out. Have we over complicated our song writing? A poll was taken in the UK to determine which song was the greatest or most defined the 00’s (2000 to 2010), the song that came out on top was Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol, possible one of the simplest songs musically and lyrically of the decade. 

It is unlikely great songs like Bohemian Rhapsody were written in 10 minutes but some recent hits around the world like “Sex on Fire” and “Tim McGraw” did. Do we craft out the passion and our hearts cry. Some songs don’t or nearly don’t see the light of day. This is often because we don’t think they’re good enough or don’t meet certain criteria in our eyes but we can often be so wrong and miss something. Here I am to worship is a song that certainly has been crafted but almost never saw the light of day. It was only because someone else fortuitously heard the song and recognised something else the writer couldn’t see that millions have now heard and sung the song.

Many people pick up their theology from songs and as a result many song writers feel a responsibility to be biblically accurate in their song writing. While I agree to an extent, our hearts don’t always cry out the biblical truth but that’s no really how we feel. If we can’t honestly sing songs or connect with what a song is saying how can we worship using it? Some songs have come close to confronting this, for example “When the tears fall” has the line “When hope is lost”. We know hope isn’t lost scriptually but that is so often how it feels. The psalms are full of songs where David is crying out. How much scripture did he have to base this on? Surely he was just making his private cry public.

Are our songs filled with too much scripture? That is something I want to look at next as I think that has effected our over-crafting but that is for another time.