Music and the Worship Service
Links updated October 2007
"Thy statutes are my songs in the house of my pilgrimage." —Psalm 119:54
The Liturgical Authority of the Old Testament. By Rev. Dr. Robert S. Rayburn, pastor of Faith Presbyterian Church (PCA) in Tacoma, Washington. "Christians will never grow up to real spiritual stature if their worship remains juvenile, concentrating on the simplest part of divine revelation and those parts that least distinguish the Christian mind from the mind of the world. God did not do that when he provided a manual of sung worship for his people."- With Hearts and Minds and Voices. By John MacArthur (2004). "In general, the rise of the gospel song in congregational singing signaled a diminishing emphasis on objective doctrinal truth and a magnification of subjective personal experience."
- Music and the Word. A review of the Church Music at a Crossroads conference held in Orlando, 2000.
- Understanding the Rules of Music. By Ian Hodge. "Popular music and modern church music are examples of a shift away from the older, more complex, more sophisticated, and therefore, more intellectually rigorous forms of music."
- Book Reviews of Apostles of Rock: The Splintered World of Contemporary Christian Music and At the Crossroads: An Insider's Look at the Past, Present, and Future of Contemporary Christian Music. From First Things 100 (February 2000).
- Shouldn't worship music merely stimulate emotional reaction or should it actually lead us further into maturity and discipleship? By Rich Mays, organist and choirmaster at Independent Presbyterian Church in Savannah, Georgia.
- Vain Repetition. By Kevin Swanson. "Some new worship methods are very similar to the techniques used by hypnotists or eastern mystics."
- The Music Stinks! By Dave Hatcher of Christ Church in Moscow, Idaho.
- Links on church music. At the site of the Church Music National Conference, and organization that sponsors workshops and symposia for those "trying to sort out the controversies engulfing music and worship in our time." Includes an online quarterly journal and book reviews.
- Introducing Contemporary Worship Into a Traditional Church. By Josh Hunt. Advocates praise choruses and other contemporary music, but describes some of the problems.
- The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly. By Dr. Jack Kinneer of Echo Hills Christian Study Center in Indian Head, Pennsylvania.
- Truly Spiritual Worship. By Joseph E. Rolison of the Protestant Alliance. Also here.
- Teenagers and Church Music: What Do They Really Think? Summarizes findings of a 1995 survey by a Lutheran researcher on the topic. You may be surprised.
- Church Music in the Nineties: Problems and Prognoses. by Carl Schalk, professor of music at Concordia University in River Forest, Illinois.
- Music, Worship, and Martin Luther. By Rev. Charles P. St-Onge, pastor of St. Mark's Lutheran Church in Ridley Park, Penn.
- Please Me, O Lord. By S. M. Hutchens (Touchstone magazine, May 2004). "Many of Evangelicalism's most beloved verses are off-putting to men (at least those who are paying attention to the words) because they seem to be proper to women, or even homosexuals." Also here.
- A Call for Reformation for Contemporary Christian Music. By Steve Camp. "Transitory, temporal, trivial messages that devalue Deity and raise 'felt need' affairs above eternal 'real need' concerns produce disposable, consumer-driven, cotton-candy music."
- Pslams, Hymns and Spiritual Noise. By Steve Camp. "Music is powerful and must be used wisely not frivolously ... after a few listens, it can be imbedded in your thoughts for a lifetime."
- Instrumental Music in the Worship of the Church, by Dr. John L. Girardeau (1888). An old-fashioned Presbyterian seminary professor presents arguments against the use of instrumental music in the worship service. Other books along the same line are on the same site here.
- Reforming Worship: Reverence, the Reformed Tradition, and the Crisis of Protestant Worship. By D. G. Hart, Touchstone, Fall 1995.
- Narcissism Goes to Church: Encountering Evangelical Worship. By Monte Wilson.
- Articles by Michael S. Horton:
- Articles by Dr. Paul S. Jones (Organist and Music Director of Tenth Presbyterian Church in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania):
