Ten Principles for Church Singing (Part 2)

 (Go here for Part 1)

6. We should strive for excellence in the musicality and the poetry of the songs we sing.

I’m not for a moment suggesting elitism. A tine has to be relatively simple for hundreds or thousands of people to sing it at the same time.  But we can still insist on undistracting excellence (to use Piper’s phrase). We want the cross to be the stumbling block, not our poor musicianship or faltering powerpoint.

While I believe a wide variety of styles can be used in worship, I am not a musical relativist.  Some songs are better than others. Some styles work better than others. And when it comes to lyrics, we should avoid obvious sloppiness like using thee and you in the same song or heaping up trite cliches. I heard a song on the radio a couple weeks ago whose chorus had something about a fragrant rose in the early spring and an eagle soaring to spread its wings. If your church sings this on Sunday, love your worship leader all the same. But if you’re the worship leader picking this song, try for something with a little more artistry, something that doesn’t sound like it came from a random page in your inspirational pocket calendar. Keep Reading...