The church’s song, like music itself, is a gift of God. Music is a joy and delight with which God graces creation. We do not bargain for it. We do not deserve it. It is simply freely given, there for the hearing, a joyous overflow of creation’s goodness. from The...
Music expresses that which cannot be put into words and that which cannot remain silent.
When people are trained to appreciate the art of music for its own sake, they also want the best music for sacred purposes because they know the sublime sense that grips them when they hear good compositions well rendered. Such music enables people, in fact, to...
Popular music is engineered by people in the entertainment industry, and sales are the arbiter of success (hence the enormous sums earned by the writers of often-played commercials)… At the other end of the power spectrum is great religious music. Here the texts deal...
Last Sunday, we stood for a hymn. I opened my mouth to sing and found a sob. Soon, I was weeping from the sheer joy of being there, my wife and son on one side, three friends on the other, and around us good-hearted and faithful people drawing close to God. I am sure...
When someone insists that we should only use the best music in worship, I scratch my head. Is the best music simple or complex? Written or spontaneous? Short or long? Do they mean the best aesthetically, pragmatically, emotionally, or historically? We usually have in...
The hymns are bigger than any mistakes; you fumble around with the hymnal and sing the wrong words—you’re on the wrong verse—but the hymn expands to make room for all these voices, even yours. We speak as a body; we have set the intent together, so rather than...
With the decline of public arts and music education, the church has become the last reservoir of amateur expression in music. It’s the place where young musicians are given a chance to develop. from Culture Making: Recovering Our Creative Calling
We encounter the sweet and the bitter; together they make up a mixed song that we sing to God.
No matter how corrupt, greedy and heartless our government, our corporations, our media, and our religions and charitable institutions may become, the music will still be wonderful… Let this be my epitaph: THE ONLY PROOF HE NEEDED FOR THE EXISTENCE OF GOD WAS...