Discursus On Music

As much as I would like to be a full-time student, I have other responsibilities. That is true for all of us; even "professional academics" have other areas of their lives. As an active pastor, I sometimes get the opportunity to attend conferences on various areas related to the ministry.

I have spent the day looking forward to attending a conference on music and worship at my son's school. In preparing for this, I dusted off an old piece I had performed about 30 years ago as a voice student in college. I will not be performing tomorrow, but I wanted to take it out for a spin vocally.

I enjoy music. It was my undergraduate major, and I spent several years teaching music to classes of autistic and multiply-disabled students. I have served in churches as a worship and music leader, a choir director, a soloist, an instrumentalist, and even in desperate times a pianist. Making music is a way to communicate yourself to others, and to praise God with all your being. (Sing for an hour, and tell me you haven't had a workout!)

We have the text of many early hymns in the NT and in the extant literature of the early church. What we do not have is any real idea of how these were sung. I can't say I have done extensive research on this (although it would make a very interesting project), but since there were no recording methods or even musical notation that we fully grasp, we can just guess at how these hymns sounded. It does look like the early church practiced congregational singing of some kind, however.

I want to encourage you to sing to the Lord. You don't have to be an expert, or even much of a singer at all. In the church I am serving, we have a number of deaf people, and they "sing" using ASL. I have started to learn to do that as well; it is another way to praise God. What God wants is praise from the heart, not a fear of doing less than a polished performance.

There is, of course, a place for the trained musician in leading in worship and in expressing praise through performance. Don't be intimidated, though, by those who are gifted in music. We all have different gifts, and we use them to honor the God. But we all can praise God in whatever way we can, and He is blessed by our praise.