Everything is Backwards

Paul talks a great deal about “boasting.” Boasting for Paul though usually entails a sense of self-reliance before God, not a braggadocious spiritual arrogance. When Paul boasts, then, he wants to boast in the things that honor God and not himself.

But far be it from me to boast except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world.–Galatians 6:14

Paul is not concerned about looking good. He loves to make God look good. So he boasts in God at the one place where Paul’s sin and need look the worst and God’s goodness looks the best: the cross.

Fish swim in the water unaware of the fact that they are wet. In certain segments of the Christian sub-culture, we have accepted certain norms and expectations beyond what the bible commands us and often do them only to keep up with the “real Christians.” I have given in to this rat-race many times, and seminary is a breeding ground for such spiritual competitiveness.

All it takes is a guy to say, “this morning during my quiet time I noticed how this Greek verb… [brilliant insight]… and I’m just thankful for that.” I don’t know everyone’s heart, but my own heart is pretty wicked (Jer 16:9). Now there’s a standard set of what the real Christians do and everyone else needs to measure up.

There’s spiritual in-group and an out-group. And those who don’t play along are misfits.

Evangelicalism has its own liturgy and conformity standards. We have our own music, our own movies, our own publications and websites, our own t-shirts and bumper stickers. Its a designer life for evangelicals.

I have often thought to myself that I’m Baptist in doctrine but Presbyterian in culture and personality. There’s not many of us, but I often finding myself not totally fitting in with either world.

I recently discovered that I’m not alone.

C. Michael Patton described his experience like this:

I remember being at a Christian retreat. It was a couples’ weekend retreat in the Pine woods of Texas. When me and Kristie got up the first morning, I walked outside of my cabin into the cool light fog ready to get the day going. But everyone else was starting their day differently than me. They were all doing reading their Bibles and praying. I found out this routine is called “morning devotionals.” Its what Christians do. One person was sitting on the dock of the lake, their Bible opened before them. Another sat on a park bench in prayer. Some were in the grass with their well worn Bibles looking toward heaven in contemplation. I felt an immediate sense of guilt not only because I was not in my own private place with the Lord, but because I never do “morning devotionals,” at least not like that. Neither was I compelled to do so (other than a sense of guilt for non-conformity). What was wrong with me?

We are all different kinds of Christians.

Experiencing a feeling of alienation from the “normal” Christian life is not at all uncommon. In fact, if you don’t experience this from time to time, then there might be something wrong with you! You probably have become the type of Christian who simply seeks to conform your Christianity to mirror the “standard” which has been set by your immediate Christian community. In this, you lose your individualism.

We should seek inspiration from those who do things differently, not necessarily conformation. You have a distinctness about you. Distinct problems, joys, passions, hopes, habits, hurts, intellect, spirituality, and temperament. You have a distinct Christian gait about you. All of these are your strengths and weaknesses. This is the way God made you.

It is true, your passions, for example, might cause you to neglect something that is important for Christianity (e.g. prayer for others). We need to be careful that this neglect is not absolute. But we also need to recognize that this passion of yours, when used of God, contributes to the total body of Christ.

We are all not going to be balanced in the same way. We need to understand this and give grace to each other to let each other be, knowing that God did not make cookie-cutter Christianity. If we all seek to conform to the “norm,”—whatever that is—then we can actually weaken the Body of Christ.

Amen, Michael! I’m glad I’m not alone…

Recent census data has revealed that the 7 county Cincinnati metro has surpassed Cleveland in terms of overall population, clocking in a 2,133,678 people. We’re getting ready to add to that number this summer. The region gained 12,550 people, compared to Cleveland’s decline of 8808.

This is very exciting news for us, because growing population centers bode well for new churches as people moving into an area are in flux; churches provide stability and relationships.

We have also been studying intently two areas of need in Cincinnati: the west end and more recently Mt. Auburn. From what can be gathered from zipskinny, the west end is about 80% or more African American with great concentrations of poverty. Mt. Auburn is a little more diverse, with about a 50/50 ratio of black to white and greater diversity of economic factors. Mt. Auburn is much more dense and has about 5 times the population of the west end.

About half of the west end is below the poverty line, about a third of Mt. Auburn is. This economic diversity could change the dynamics of ministry in the Mt. Auburn area, because the wealthier people have resources available to invest in their communities.

I’m hoping to travel again to Cincinnati this week to investigate further. I’ll keep you posted…

This series will now take an undoubted turn into the more practical elements of worship leading. Upcoming topics include leading a contemporary band, instrumentation, managing worship practices, developing your musicians, and the art of leading a worship service.

One of my favorite things to do is to breathe fresh new life into old hymns. Many have attempted to do this and about half as many butcher the classics.

A word of caution: just because it’s old doesn’t make it good. Many old hymns are just as trite as contemporary music; they just used bigger words while doing it.

The number one way to butcher an old hymn is this: screwing up the rhythm.

It sounds simple enough, but there’s actually a complicated reason for this phenomena. It will require a little history.

Music has two basic elements: meter (rhythm) and melody. European classical music heavily emphasized melody. The timing of a song could speed up or slow down at the whims of the conductor. S/he directs the musicians and they follow his or her timing.

African music, on the other hand, emphasizes rhythm. Drums and percussive instruments provide the foundation for layers of singing and chanting.

Since dancing requires a steady rhythm to keep dancing partners together, and since dancing was considered sinful, church music ministers were prone to resist rhythmic developments taking place in the larger musical world.

Jazz music, for example, successfully blended European and African styles to create a whole swath of new inventions: big band, fusion, jazz proper, and rock and roll.

If you listen to 90% of contemporary worship music, you can count 1,2,3,4 (4/4 time) over and over with the beat. Hymns, however, were written with entire lyrical lines in mind and matching numbers of syllables. This works fine with an organ, not with a drumset. Charles Wesley’s hymn “Christ the Lord is Ris’n Today,” for example, is based on 7 syllable lines (Ris’n is one syllable).

Rhythmic instruments simply don’t mesh well with strange meter, but the majority of worship leading instruments are rhythmic: guitars and drums. Piano and bass fit much better with a melodic style of music, but most worship leaders don’t lead from these instruments.

As a result, you will see many odd time signatures in a hymnal: 12/9, 2/2, and so on. These simply are not pleasing meters to the modern ear.

What many worship leaders will do is to try to have the best of both worlds; they’ll sing the old hymn but try to play it with a contemporary worship band. At the end of the line, some people will continue singing the next line like they’re used to, but the band waits until the next measure. Awkward glances ensue, the worship leader tried to hide his sheepish grin.

It simply feels weird. Ask Passion; they did a hymn CD and it was by far their worst recording to date.

You have three possible solutions: (1) lead it as it was originally sung with a piano or organ, not a guitar. The guitar simply does not work with this style of meter. (2) Totally rewrite the music and keep the old lyrics. Don’t try to force the old melody into a new genre, it will frustrate everyone trying to sing along. (3) Don’t sing that song.

I love the resurrection.

John 20:9 says this concerning the disciples on resurrection morning:

“yet they did not understand the Scripture, that he must rise from the dead.”

The fact that Jesus must rise from the dead indicates a certain purpose and accomplishment entailed in the necessity. The resurrection points to an overall purpose in the life of Jesus.

He was born to die. And he was killed in order to be raised. And he was raised in order to reign forever.
His resurrection means something for us, too. Paul says, “if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins” (1 Cor 15:17). Furthermore, Paul says in Ephesians 2 regarding Christians these four things:

1. “You were dead.” (vs 1)

2. “But God…made us alive” (5)

3. God “raised us up”(5)

4. God “seated us with him.” (6)

As Christians, our story is not an “I-believed-in-Jesus” story, or even “I-committed-my-life-to-Christ” story. Our story is a resurrection story. Before I knew Jesus, I was dead. Dead people don’t believe in Jesus; dead people don’t turn and repent.

Jesus came to my spiritual tomb and he breathed new life in me. When I was raised from the dead, the first thing I saw was my Lord, telling me to rise and live.

Not only this, he seated me with him; meaning that I will rule with him. With Him. I am not just raised and turned loose to go and do whatever I want, my life is now bound to his to live for him. Because he reigns, so do I.

So my story is that I have been wrapped up in Jesus’ life; when I was dead, he died on my behalf. When he arose, he raised me up with him. Since he rules at God’s right hand for eternity, I reign with him.

Thank you, Lord Jesus!

Successful radio stations have implemented the set list principle for decades. The basic idea is this: people like to hear songs that they know. Likewise, people have a limited tolerance level for hearing and becoming familiar with music they don’t know. Thus, radio stations have gone to a “top 40″ format or even a “top 20″ format.

These stations do this because if you tune in to their station for 10 or 15 minutes in the car, you’re going to hear a song that you know and will likely continue to listen. New songs are introduced incrementally.

This is a great principle for worship music. A classic worship leader mistake is to hear a new song, love it, and lead it that Sunday in church. Good worship leaders have more discipline than this.

Here’s my formula: have 2 months worth of music in your set list.

If you normally sing three songs every Sunday, multiply that by 8 (weeks) and have a set list of 24 songs. In my church, we sing about 6 songs per week, which makes our set list about 48 songs.

Your set list also needs balance. You’ll need both faster and slower songs, theologically complex as well as theologically simple songs (basic truths, not simple minded), older songs and new songs, hymns and contemporary songs, and so on. Be mindful of your congregation: don’t force them to sing a musical style that doesn’t fit their preference.

Your congregation will be able to appreciate and be edified by worship when they are familiar with the songs. Familiarity is key.

Once your set list is established, you can rotate songs in and out of the set list. I have a list of several new songs that I would like to do at my church, but I never introduce more than 1 or 2 new songs per month. So I take these new songs that are in queue to be taught at my church and patiently teach them one at a time over a period of months. Whenever I teach a new song, another song gets bumped from the rotation.

To build familiarity, whenever I teach a new song at my church, we do it for three consecutive weeks. The band my get sick of practicing it, but your church has only heard it once per week for three weeks. They may forget they even heard it until the third time around when it sinks in.

Of course, there are always classics that can be summoned for duty at any time, such as Amazing Grace or Great is Thy Faithfulness. But your congregation most likely will not know anywhere near the amount of music you know and so we, as worship leaders, need to think of their needs and desires over our own.

The NY Times has a helpful article about the process leading up to the current financial mess in the housing markets.

I was struck recently while reading through 1 and 2 Corinthians with how many times the word conscience appeared in some form or another. It appears 8 times in 1 Corinthians, 3 times in 2 Corinthians, and 6 more times in the 2 books of Timothy and Titus, and 3 times in Romans.

But what does it really mean?

Conscience, according to Paul, is how we live according to God’s will.

Michael Foster is a church planter in Cincinnati who recently posted this about a worship band he likes. Many of the thoughts that I’ve been expounding upon at length are summarized on his blog.

In this post, I’m going to make some recommendations for CDs and songwriters that I respect and appreciate.

Good worship songs are hard to find. When I was first learning to lead worship with Campus Crusade for Christ, I was given this hint for choosing songs: they had to be (1) singable, (2) playable, meaning that you had to be able to play it on the guitar, and (3) have good content.

But worship music is becoming more and more sophisticated and worship leaders are discovering that people have a high threshold for musical complexity in worship music. This is great, because you can only go so far with 3 guitar chords.

Let me begin with a disclaimer: the recommendations in this post are not exhaustive, but they are road ready, having been tested on my own congregation. Every worship set is like a meal: you need to have the main course, but also veggies and possibly dessert. This list is the Prime Rib.

1. Valley of Vision, Sovereign Grace Music. Bar none, this is the best worship CD that I have heard in 10 years. I’m not kidding. Sovereign Grace is committed to theological depth in their songs, but the music flat out rocks. We’ve sung many of these in my church, such as Let Your Kingdom Come, It Was Your Grace, Heavenly Father Beautiful Son, and more on the way. If you are hard pressed to find good musical expressions of the trinity, check out Heavenly Father Beautiful Son on I-tunes.

2. Stuart Townend and Keith Getty. I don’t own any of their CDs, but I have led a few of their songs and they continue to feed the give-us-some-music-we-can-chew-on movement. Some of their best known songs are In Christ Alone, How Deep the Father’s Love for Us, and Beautiful Savior.