Saturday, October 9, 2010

Contemporary Worship Music

I just picked up a copy of "Why Johnny Can't Sing Hymns" by T. David Gordon. Thumbing through it this afternoon, I came across a great quote regarding the modern-day church's use of contemporary worship music in order to not "lose the youth." In other words, we seem to think that if we only introduce some contemporary praise music to our worship services that we can keep the younger people from leaving the church. Here's what Gordon writes: "Though even here, one must ask why no other generation manifested such a fear. As I indicated before, the church of my father's youth did not compose hymns in a big-band style in order to "reach the young," and the church of my generation, while quite aware of the 1960's rebellion against tradition, did not abandon its hymns to rewrite the hymnal to sound like Jimi Hendrix or Eric Clapton. So why do we constantly fear losing this particular generation if we do not employ musical idioms with which they are familiar?" (page 158)

2 comments:

Chris and Christina said...

"the 1960's rebellion against tradition, did not abandon its hymns to rewrite the hymnal to sound like Jimi Hendrix or Eric Clapton."

this guy's obviously never heard glass harp's version of "do lord". although i have no proof it was ever used in the context of corporate worship it's exactly what a hymn would sound like if it was done by hendrix.

John Z said...

"It only takes a spark, to get the fire going... and soon, all those around, will warm up in its glowing..." I think this also was a 1960's spiritual.