People Aren't Singing and What to Do About It: One of Nine
so i gave my reasons for not singing at church when i do not sing.
i thought now that it would be good to talk about the nine other reasons that have been made popular by this post:
http://blog.ncbaptist.org/renewingworship/2014/06/11/nine-reasons-people-arent-singing-in-worship/
let's dialogue about each point.
one at a time.
if you have an alternate viewpoint or see a weakness in my arguments, i honestly welcome them.
but let's keep it civil.
so on to reason one from the blog:
They don’t know the songs. With the release of new songs weekly and the increased birthing of locally-written songs, worship leaders are providing a steady diet of the latest, greatest worship songs. Indeed, we should be singing new songs, but too high a rate of new song inclusion in worship can kill our participation rate and turn the congregation into spectators. I see this all the time. I advocate doing no more than one new song in a worship service, and then repeating the song on and off for several weeks until it becomes known by the congregation. People worship best with songs they know, so we need to teach and reinforce the new expressions of worship.
so this happens to me quite often actually, for two reasons.
one. i don't listen to worship music. like at all. except for when i am at church. to see my current groove find me on spotify (though this can be slightly confusing. when we go on road trips with the family we listen to the playlist that includes arcade fire and the frozen soundtrack). so when i hear a new song at church, i have literally never heard it before.
two. i travel around to different churches and conference where new songs are introduced.
but here is what i have found that has worked for me.
i mouth out the lyrics, this takes no knowledge of the melody or even the rhythm.
i stand and raise my hands.
i focus on the song and WHO the song is to.
i find it interesting the approach the blogger gives to solve this problem. one new song once a month.
every statistic coming out continues to show that the average attendee comes to church once to twice a month. so they could potentially only hear the song once. that is not enough to really learn the song.
i don't know if this has to do with my american individualism or even if this is a bad thing but i like the idea of becoming the solution for a problem you find.
in other words, if my reason for not singing is that i don't know the songs, instead of becoming reactive and progressively embittered toward the leadership, what if i were to become proactive.
share with your worship leader your heart.
your desire to sing songs to JESUS in the congregation but you are having trouble with all the new songs.
ask if you can have a copy of the set list before the weekend and then download the songs on iTunes.
i don't know what church the author has gone to, but i have never been to a service where two new songs were introduced. i think this is going to far. but does it ever happen?
i can only speak for myself and my ministry and say NO. it hasn't.
now let's take a step back from this argument. the basic argument is people don't sing because they don't know the song. but as i think about it, is the reverse true?
if people know the song, will they sing?
and i have to answer (at least for myself) and say not always.
as i think about it, we can group all of the songs we sing into four categories:
one. songs i know and like.
two. songs i know and don't like.
three. songs i don't know and like.
four. songs i don't know and don't like.
obviously, there is no problem with those songs in category one. these are the songs that really connect with us. usually they are tied with some critical moment in our spiritual life. one gentleman i talked to referred to these as 'the songs of the faith.' but let's not dilute ourselves. these aren't the songs of THE faith. these are the songs of our faith. we are most happy when the set list is full of these.
we have a problem with category two. a big problem. it is a struggle all the time. we all have these songs if we are honest. maybe we don't like the feel or the melody or the lyrics. we try to spiritualize it. sometimes it's just because we have sung the song to death and it has lost all meaning for us (i could sing of YOUR love forever). nine times out of ten when one of these songs come up, i am spending half the time getting my heart right.
the third category is the sweet spot. this is exciting. there have been so many times when i am sitting in a coffee shop and a new song comes on. something about it just grabs me. i ask siri to tell me who the artist is and then find them on spotify. the funny thing about these songs is you try to sing along as soon as you can. even if it is only a couple of words. even if you mumble half way through the chorus.
the fourth category is the worst. you don't know the song. and you don't want to know it. because you don't like it. honestly this is where a lot of new worship songs land for me. i feel the lyrics are cliche, the rhyming obvious, and the feel all too familiar. i don't want to learn these songs. this is my problem.
as i think of this reason, one more thing comes to mind, and i say this to myself too.
why can't i see that worship generally and musical worship specifically can stretch so far beyond the thirty minutes in a church building?
worship is more than singing.
singing is more than at church.
and what does it really hurt my spiritual life if for 5 minutes i am 'forced' to sing a song in category two or four?
so these are my thoughts from reason one.
again, please share your own thoughts!
