They say that comparison is the thief of joy. And I would agree on most counts, but there is a subtle comparison that often happens in most almost-mega churches that pits two objectively good things against one another, in what is clearly unintentional but hard not to miss. By almost-mega I mean churches that only congregate in numbers as big as 1000 but do everything they can to mimic the churches of 5000-10000, that also give them all their ideas for praise and worship. If Saddleback and Elevation and Hillsong are Big-Eva, this is Mid-Eva. Or if you will, almost-mega.
The comparison that happens here is one of musical execution. Ah. You were expecting me to say something about musical style or taste, weren't you? No, no. Remember. I said two objectively good things. Modern worship songs are good things and hymns are good things. It's the comparison between the two that causes problems when not addressed.
In the best case scenario that comparison shows up at the end of a modern set list where the band stops playing and the music stops and the worship pastor begins to sing a simple hymn that most of his congregation knows from memory. Usually the Doxology or that Holy Holy Holy number. The congregation usually belts it out and doesn't even need the words on the screens. The whole moment seems unreal, and if he's smart, the worship pastor closes the set when they're done singing to capture the moment effectively. But have you ever stopped and asked yourself why that singular moment does that? The one with no need for words and melodies as far from the top 40 Christian worship hits, indeed hits so hard? Why is it when the music is removed and the words on the screen are removed and everything but the houselights being left off is removed from the worship teams involvement, does a singular song, usually out of date, connect with so many people?
Well, I've asked myself. And I think I can tell you why.
The problem comes down to technological adoption and the fact that, at one point, evangelical churches kicked their congregations out of the band. They did so to stay with the times and keep young people in the pews and it worked even though the church curmudgeons would like to complain about it. Modern worship music attracts people from outside the Christian context, and the dark-room, big-stage worship-tainment model does, in fact, work. But that isn't to say it works perfectly. Or even well. You know what I'm going to pick on before I even type. It's a short list of stuffy qualms that you would never bring up to the pastorate at your church, but bug you almost every time you go to church. Especially if that church is a mid-eva/almost-mega type church.
Why do the slightly behind-the-music-cue lyrics slides bother you? You know the songs, kinda, right? Maybe not how your church decided to sing them that week. And, of course, it changes every time you sing that song. Gotta keep it fresh. But in the back of your mind, you know a bridge was supposed to be sung just now and not a 4th chorus, then the bridge, and the lyrics slide still hasn't changed. Oh wait, now it's on the next verse, but they're still singing a 5th chorus on stage. These little bothers don't bother you enough to do anything about it but do bother you enough to stop you from worshiping. And that never used to happen when the hymnals were here. But it can't be as simple as using a book for words instead of a screen for words. Can it?
The grouchiest of us reform types will point to Paul's exhortations for orderly worship. But I'm just going to point to the hymnal and ask the church. Why did we kick the congregation out of the band? You see, the hymnal gave everyone access to the set list, which is now only available in Planning Center and alongside a click track. The congregation gets to play catch-up to the worship leaders who no longer teaches their congregants new songs. Sure, they play new songs, but they play them because they hear them from the same Christian radio stations and Spotify playlists that the congregation listens to. Nobody is teaching this church how to praise and worship, even though learning is going on a plenty all around it.
When was the last time you had input into the songs sung at church? Or is that K-Love's exclusive job alongside Elevation Worship? When was the last time your worship pastor let you know how they were going to sing a new song so you could sing it well? Have you ever wondered why you singing well isn't important? Why an entire church singing well isn't important? You know it's possible. We just did it for the Doxology. But week in and week out, we settle for what could be a better way of singing congregationally in lieu of a select few singing to a congregation, moderately involved in the encouragement of the crowd trying to follow along.
What happened here isn't a change in style, though style is a part of what happened. It's a twin happening of a change in technology alongside that style change. And the result of what happens when the church doesn't keep up with how tech affects the church.
Because before words on a screen with moving lights and dynamic smoke machines got the green light, a simple, single blub, overhead projector did. It got that green light because there were no hymnals with the modern songs in them. The hymnals weren't broken. The same way a well-tuned classic car isn't broken, but also can't fly. Cars can't fly, not because they are bad, but because they are designed differently than things that do fly. And modern Christian music, empowered by the rapid development of music media, through the technologies of Tapes, CD's, MP3's and Streaming Audio, is designed differently than hymns. And not just because the hymns use an pipe organ.
Hymns and hymnals don't exist as media outside of the ones using the media to sing the hymns. Yes, you can record them, but as a songbook, they are meant to be sung, not heard. They contain the information necessary for congregations to sing corporately. They are not ancient versions of audio files; they are the inverse, ancient version of audiophiles. We sing hymns to corporatly praise the God we believe in. That can be done with modern music but not via modern music media. A CD, MP3, or Streamed digital recording, on its own, doesn't teach you how to sing any given song on it. But a Hymnal does teach you how to sing every song in it. The single bulb overhead projector was an attempt to catch up to the music, but the music itself was being made to be listened to. not to sing congregationally. Yes, you could sing along. The way a teenager in the late 90's sang along to their CD of DC talk. But your entire church would need the miniscule lyrics sheet in the back of the CD case's cover to follow along. No one at Tooth and Nail records was printing books for congregations to use while singing, so the church secretary and youth pastor did what they do best and improvised. They typed the words onto a transparency, and the worship wars were off. Except they were never wars because each side was fighting an enemy unrelated to the other.
The oldheads and their hymnals were fighting practicality, and the youth were fighting sound ecclesiology. But neither knew it and thought the other guy would cry mercy me before the end of it.
There would have been no controversy or anything resembling a war, if the congregations trying to get a drum kit and a Gibson onto the stage also got sheet music of "Lord Light The Fire Again" into a hardcover book with lyrical order they wouldn't deviate from. Because music media and music literacy are two different mechanisms. One flies, and the other rolls. Modern Christian music isn't meant to be sung congregationally, though we want it to. That's why it takes a tremendous amount of time to get enough of a congregation familiar with a modern song, to be able to stop singing from the stage, and listen to the congregation sing it acapella with just the piano keeping the melody. You couldn't do that after one sing-through on a random Sunday. But every hymn not only could do that, it was expressly designed to do that. The addition of musical notation educated the congregation on how to sing corporately, while the simple accompaniment never got in the way a more elaborate performance of the music itself, might have. Because the performance of the piece was not the point of the hymns, congregational singing was. But performance is the point of modern church music. That's why there is rehearsals, set lists, and click tracks. That's why the control of the lyrics is hidden from the congregants and in the sole possession of the worship team and producers. That's why the songs feel weird when the slides don't keep up or get changed too fast. Because the words on stage don't and can't match the congregation's own singing. Because the music being played as worship today is the downstream result of a performance and consumption-focused kind of music. Only made possible by consumption-based music media like tapes, CDs, and Streamed Music.
Hymnals are the functional opposite.
This is also why people hate hymns written with new bridges or choruses. Because all that is familiar about the former congregational singing, now stripped from the congregation, is torn in two as congregant who could have sung "Amazing Grace" or "Come Thou Fount" doesn't know the words or tune of the additional parts of the song. They must listen to the classic rock station on their commute like a heathen. It's not that a musician forced to make pennies on the download found a niche market to squeeze.
If the modern, almost-mega church worship pastor wants to right this ship, he needs to get the congregation back in the band. And it doesn't necessarily have to look like a dusty old book. That could look like sheet music with the words on the screen, so we know what's being sung. Or just he bouncing Kareoke ball the uber-reformed types mock him with. They would both do a better job than what's being done now. Because the addition of either would put the focus back on getting the congregation back into the driver's seat. But that same pastor has to be brave enough to leave the hymns alone in the name of creativity, for the sake of congregationality. Because no matter how good or bad of a job he's doing, if he's functionally not leading the congregation because he's too busy functionally performing, the congregation is going to be functionally left behind in their ability to corporately worship.
And it will only be noticed when the Doxology trick from the third paragraph stops working.
Because all the old-heads will be singing old hymns again, corporatly, with a much larger congregation and a much closer, Christ-centered setting than any church's worship arts budget could compete with.
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