Strange churchy stuff like singing

With increasing distance behind us, one of the things I've noticed is how foreign some "church" things are in light of not being "at church" services regularly, but instead hanging out with other believers having conversations, encouraging one another, discussing the way of life, etc.

Singing or church music, for one, is an interesting thing for me. 

In a recent visit to a local church service, I was moved emotionally by a couple of songs - you know, the tunes and the words - and for a brief moment, I remembered that I'm also moved emotionally in very similar or even stronger ways by secular music, at times.

When I think about how we "do singing" or music in churches, it really is interesting in light of church history and history in general. What we do in most churches today is nothing at all like what was likely experienced in the Old Testament, under that older covenant, nor the New Testament, under the new.

Up until the time of Jesus, people went to the temple in Jerusalem or a local synagogue OR if they were not Jewish, they went, IF they went, to a "pagan" temple and could have experienced a wide range of very different things from ecstatic experiences to hearing an oracle to temple prostitution, etc.

Temple was for sacrifices, generally speaking. You show up, you bring sacrifice, you give it and you leave. During the festivals, there was more going on with different ceremonies, etc.  In synagogue, you kinda had what we might think of as a "church service", but vaguely mirroring what we'd say is a church service.

Paul encouraged the early believers to teach or speak to one another in psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs AND to sing in their hearts to God, with gratitude. The outward focus was to teach or speak to one another - you know, the words and such were the focus, not the tune.  And you'd sing in your heart TO God.

Most songs they sung back then were antiphonal - meaning NOT having four part harmony or killer sub-woofers to knock out that Chris Tomlin chorus. Words were the focus. Psalms were the actual Psalms from the Old Testament. Hymns were songs about God and spiritual songs were about life with God.

Sure, over time the environment created by homogenizing and standardizing words and music created a mood or atmosphere like people expect today, but that was not the point of those gatherings - to have mainly singing and the emotional rollercoaster that it *can* bring with familiar or new tunes.

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Think about how often you actually look someone in the face and sing to them.  Or if it's too hard to sing to their face with eye contact, just saying, "This song is for you" and then singing to them. It is RARE that people do that - at least where I live.  But we often assume that's a main thing God wants "at church".

[If you've not read "Pagan Christianity" by Frank Viola/George Barna, it's worth your time to unpack a lot of things that we take for granted when we think about God, going to church, or anything having to do with church or church history in the past two thousand years.  So much is disconnected from "The Way". There are plenty of other sources, that one is more accessible for most people comparatively.]

Singing and church music is one of those things that is very disconnected from where it started.  Singing is good and is almost a cultural universal - meaning almost all cultures everywhere have something like it. But it means different things or has a different purpose in each of those place - even with religion.

My tribe of origin focused/focuses on how you sing and really thinks it's important NOT to sing with any kind of instrumental music when with other believers. For some of them, it's an issue of salvation - meaning that if you "go to church" and "worship" with a piano, you're going to hell. 

For many churches these days, music and songs are THE thing that people go to church for. They'll tolerate some announcements and a sermon, but they're there for the songs.  Songs that "take them back" to good memories or times when they struggled. Or songs that really relate or connect to them.

And there's something about doing the kind of thing communally that is powerful.  Anytime you do things with other people, in concert, no pun intended, it can be very powerful and very bonding.  And that can be to a "church song" OR a Motley Crue or Taylor Swift song for that matter.

So, for a time, I've quit singing, for the most part, when we visit churches and their worship gatherings.  Oh, I still sing to God on my own, but I'm re-learning what that means in a larger gathering. A lot of what I have experienced has been really bad theology or downright wrong teaching in the guise of music.

I know you're not supposed to question things "at church", you're supposed to just go along with what everyone is doing - but that social pressure has ebbed away from me.  I am sure that others are singing to God and maybe to each other, but that doesn't seem as real to me anymore. 

I'm sure that it might come back around in another time.  For now, I imagine just saying the words of a song out loud - like if we didn't sing them, we just said them - and how weird it would be, both because of the actual words sometimes making no sense and/or NOT being something that anyone would normally say and/or because of the ridiculous number of repetitions.

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Yes, I get it.  I am coming from a very strange place for some people and it's hard to relate.  But I think it's worthy of exploration to think down to the granular level of what we say and do. I think Paul did more of that in his writings that we sometimes perceive because we read our experiences back INTO his words.

There is a place for tradition that functions in a way to carry meaningful things forward in a way that others can receive, experience, and pass on to their followers, children, etc.  Sometimes we don't look closely enough to see that we're occasionally passing on a form, but not its function or its content.

What I see more as time goes by is that worship service songs or music is way more about us having an emotionally cathartic moment than it has anything to do with "worship" to God.  I'm not against people feeling deeply about God, but let's lean into that more - like a lot more, and see if he is in your songs.

[I will say, I've also been to plenty of congregations where the emotionally cathartic moment brought by terrible songs or terribly sung songs was more one of "Just kill me now. If this is what heaven is going to be like, I'd rather not go there."]

For me, singing isn't an end in and of itself.  Paul told people to keep doing it because a lot of different people came from singing culture, albeit different from our own.  He co-opted what was there and encouraged its use to carry the message of grace, love, and encouragement under the good news of Jesus.

We don't greet one another with a holy kiss anymore, usually, unless we're in Italy or places where they might still greet one another with a kiss. That'd just be weird for most. We shake hands or pat each other on the back or maybe even hug.  We physically connect to show acceptance, but we don't mandate kissing.

In the same way, we can do what the purpose of singing or songs was or is without just thinking "Oh, singing is worship to God for sure!  Just doing it is worship, even if I'm not paying attention to or understanding the words we're all singing." It's worth spending time mulling it over on a deeper level.

And that brings us the whole idea of "worship" - which I'll drill down into (again) another time - but a lot of what we do as "worship to God" is worth looking at more closely as well.  Why?  Because we're often chained to things that we were never intended to be chained to.  It's for freedom you have been set free.

Grace and peace.