Traditional vs. Contemporary Style Worship

[Gail]

This topic just never gets old, does it? :)

[Parade Orange]

GAIL ! TIMELESS! lol but i do want to share my experiences with this topic!

when i first became a christian i found a christian contemporary radio station!

i was so excited and discovered SANDI PATTY and such!

Michael Card! Steve Green ,TWILA PARIS ect not much later ect!

i asked innocently my christian peers have they heard these songs and artists and such

i wanted to spread the wealth!

i found out my church thinks this stuff is evil

i was in a quandary

anyhoo..

flash forward a few years later

im in a christian bookstore in the bay area CA!

im talking to a lady about the great music here and she recomends a song and i listened to it there on the store cassete player and told her this music is EVIL and they wont be singing this stuff in heavenly worship in HEAVEN

and she said that i dont know what they wILL BE DOING IN THE HEAVENLY WORSHIP!

thems thar fightin words

how dare she says i dont know what worship will be like in heaven!

even to this day i wonder WHAT DO I KNOW ABOUT WORSHIP SERVICE IN HEAVEN

i must admit that psalms 150 throws me offf

that bit about taking every musical instrument on earth and using it to praise GOD

1 Praise ye the LORD.

Praise God in his sanctuary:

praise him in the firmament of his power.

2 Praise him for his mighty acts:

praise him according to his excellent greatness.

3 Praise him with the sound of the trumpet:

praise him with the psaltery and harp.

4 Praise him with the timbrel and dance:

praise him with stringed instruments and organs.

5 Praise him upon the loud cymbals:

praise him upon the high sounding cymbals.

6 Let every thing that hath breath praise the LORD.

Praise ye the LORD.

MANY GOOD SDA'S IGNORE THAT

flash forward many many years later my buddy and lady friend and I are are visiting PLACERVILL SDA church

they were rocking out with grinding electruc guitars and drums

not exactly SANDY PATTI.... and we couldnt hear ourselves think

the music was very loud and i said something to my buddy and he yells 'WHAT'! so just as i started to repeat the music suddenly stops!

and the entire church hears me saying very loudly 'IS THAT GREY POUPON?'

[i dont remember what i said so lets just go with this]

and this lady infront of us looks back with a mean look!

welcome welcome welcome visitors to PLACERVILLE sda church

and no one interacted with us exceppt for that lady that gave me a mean look

i was acknowledge by her in that moment

flash forward to many years later

i go to a celibrate recovery 12 step program at a baptis church 2 towns away

the SDA church doesnt offer anything like this otherwise i would go

[i think thats because holy people have overcome and see no need for it]

but i need it cause im not holy yet

on more than one occassion i was invited to go to a church a few of the celibrate recovery members goes too.

i finally went over a month ago

GRAVITY CHURCH

ive never been to church where i was so warmly greeted by so many

not one assessed/ evaluated /judged/ apraised /rated/ catgorization me or asked me where do i go to church!

it was eye to eye contact and three of the twelve people or so shared eagerly and naturally what JESUS has done for them!

praise on their lips to our GOD at first meeting em!

i saw church being a church for the first time

and their music was praise music wth drums and electric guitar

i put in my ear plugs

but went back for christian fellowship again and again

[lazarus]

Worship should be done decently and in order. Not loud and irreverently.

I'm sorry you don't like loud. God likes loud!!! Loud is good and it is reverent too.

[Parade Orange]

i never heard a trumpet not loud

[fccool]

Lol

[ClubV12]

I came across something in Sister Whites writings about the harps the angels play.

She mentioned some kind of device on the bottom of the harp they would adjust on occasion. I'm thinking not to "tune" them as they would be "perfect", but to adjust WHAT??? Anyway, one angel would lead the group and they would touch the various strings to make their music.

Sanctified imagination kicks in,,,,

One harp is "adjusted" to be a trumpet, another a violin, etc. etc. an orchestra! I bet it was loud too, and yet, as they sang the words could be clearly heard and understood.

[GreatLakesGramma]

I'm sorry you don't like loud. God likes loud!!! Loud is good and it is reverent too.

So, God likes "loud" that makes you feel like you're being assaulted, and gives you a headache within minutes? "Loud" is relative. I doubt that God appreciates music loud enough to damage people's hearing, since He is the one who made our ears sensitive enough for that to happen, and He wants us to take care of our bodies, including our hearing, so far as it is in our power to do so. You don't have any basis for judgement when people say the music they heard is too loud, because you weren't there, and you don't know HOW loud it was. Any music that's volume is physically uncomfortable to the hearers is too loud.

I have been in churches where the organ is playing the hymns so loudly that I can't hear myself sing. When that happens, I don't sing, because I can't tell if I'm singing the right notes if I can't hear my voice. That music is too loud, whether it's a band or an organ. And if you can't hear the singer who's presenting the special music, because the accompaniment drowns him/her out, that music is too loud too, regardless of what type of music it is.

[Dr. Shane]

I doubt that God appreciates music loud enough to damage people's hearing, since He is the one who made our ears sensitive enough for that to happen, and He wants us to take care of our bodies, including our hearing, so far as it is in our power to do so.

I can't help but look forward to heaven where we can be blasted away with praise music and not have to worry about our hearing being damaged. Until then, we probably do need to take care of the ears. Of course music volume and music style are not necessarily related.

[lazarus]

Originally Posted By: GreatLakesGramma

I doubt that God appreciates music loud enough to damage people's hearing, since He is the one who made our ears sensitive enough for that to happen, and He wants us to take care of our bodies, including our hearing, so far as it is in our power to do so.

I can't help but look forward to heaven where we can be blasted away with praise music and not have to worry about our hearing being damaged. Until then, we probably do need to take care of the ears. Of course music volume and music style are not necessarily related.

Everything should be done decently in order. Music that is so loud that it is physically damaging or obscures lyrics is of course wrong. I wasn't arguing for that kind of loudness. People often assume that quiet and still is of God but we know from scripture that loud and active can be of God too. Let's allow Bible to create the framework rather than culture or preferences.

[Parade Orange]

LAZARUS u speak truthfully and rationally

how far is that gonna get u on this topic?

[GreatLakesGramma]

i never heard a trumpet not loud

I have. The volume of any wind instrument depends on the airflow, which can be varied by the musician playing it. A good musician can play their instrument softly, regardless of its size or type.

[GreatLakesGramma]

Everything should be done decently in order. Music that is so loud that it is physically damaging or obscures lyrics is of course wrong. I wasn't arguing for that kind of loudness.

OK, Lazarus, but the most recent previous posters who talked about music being too loud mostly mentioned the same kind of loud I did. So it seemed logical to me to assume you meant the same kind of loud too. I didn't go back and look at the post you replied to. Sorry.

[lazarus]

OK, Lazarus, but the most recent previous posters who talked about music being too loud mostly mentioned the same kind of loud I did. So it seemed logical to me to assume you meant the same kind of loud too. I didn't go back and look at the post you replied to. Sorry.

Sure. Like you said, loud is relative. I was simply saying that loud in and of it self is not bad. I guess we could say there is good loud and bad loud. Then again one person's good loud is another person's too loud.

My guess is that God's Ipod has hymns as well as Hezekiah Walker, the Gaithers and Manic Street Preachers.

[ClubV12]

I'm extremely hard of hearing, wear two hearing aid's, specially modified for max volume. In order to save what hearing I have left I'm real sensitive about anything that even comes close to to loud. Including church music.

When I can turn off my aids and still clearly hear the music, you can bet it's to loud, it's damaging the ears of the congregation.

Things you might think would damage your hearing. Driving down the road in a convertible with the top down. Riding a motorcycle more than 35 mph even WITH a helmet!

In both cases I wear ear plugs now (I have both a convertible and a bike). I spent many years racing, with open exhaust, around the pitts, very loud cars, even when using ear plugs (which wasn't often). Many of my racing friends have the same problem, extreme hearing loss.

[lazarus]

Good Loud!

[lazarus]

More Good Loud.

[aldona]

i never heard a trumpet not loud

Or a pipe organ at full volume.

Ever been to a live performance of Handel's Messiah? Try sitting close to the choir when they get to the Hallelujah Chorus. That's LOUD. And they have trumpets and drums, too!

AJ

[lazarus]

Ever been to a live performance of Handel's Messiah? Try sitting close to the choir when they get to the Hallelujah Chorus. That's LOUD. And they have trumpets and drums, too!

AJ

It's always incredible to hear and experience the Messiah performed I agree.

It's interesting how there is nothing new under the sun........Handel’s return to London was marked by the onset of new hostilities. News of Messiah had reached the capital, and Handel’s detractors were unstinting in their criticism. In their view, the Holy Scriptures had been turned into the “libretto” for a mere “entertainment,” since the Dublin performance had taken place in a theater and not in a church. In the eyes of many, this constituted a lack of respect that was nothing short of sacrilegious, and the fact that the soloists also had connections with the perverted world of the theater did nothing to improve matters.

http://www.laphil.com/philpedia/piece-detail.cfm?id=1440

[CoAspen]

Love a good pipe organ!!! Part of the experience is feeling it. Have been in a cathedral listening to an organ concert, NY city, and it is an awesome experience! Loud...of course! Sitting there and listening you felt as if the roof had opened up and your were heading up and away.

[GreatLakesGramma]

Originally Posted By: Parade Orange

i never heard a trumpet not loud

Or a pipe organ at full volume.

Ever been to a live performance of Handel's Messiah? Try sitting close to the choir when they get to the Hallelujah Chorus. That's LOUD. And they have trumpets and drums, too!

AJ

I have sung in the Messiah, in college. I was able to hear myself sing, and everybody else sing too.

[Nich]

I don't know about any other conference, but I do know that in our Ohio conference, there seems to be two distinct styles of worship service. There are those who believe in the traditional sense of the words "worship service" and there are those who believe that a worship service is more contemporary with a band, rock music, or some worldly approach toward leading people in the worship.

Am I the only person who believes that this latter form of worship is not appropriate for church worship? The house of God should be greeted and conducted with reverence. We are in the house of God worshiping a holy God...not entertaining the worshipers. The service is all about God...not us.

One thing that I learnt was that there is no instrument that is Evil in of itself, what makes the difference is on how it is played, but in some cases it it better not to use it. To learn more, you will need to get this AWESOME 8 part series that really straightened out this subject. It is entitled "Voices of a Dying Planet" by Brian Neuman which can be freely downloaded here: Internet Archive - Voices of A Dying Planet

The series covers much ground, not only dealing with worship music, but also none worship music, for the secular context.

You will learn of some of the physiological effects of certain types of music, as well as get the principles needed for you to know what music is appropriate for worship or that which will not harm you, within the secular context.

You will enjoy it.