Faith
Under Fire....
Battle rages in the Church music wars: Traditional vs Modern
By Cathy Lynn Grossman, USA TODAY
Good News Baptist Church in Chesapeake, Va., made a theological
choice to offer only traditional music that expresses Christian
doctrine.
Bye-bye to Be Thou My Vision, a sixth-century Irish hymn with
century-old English lyrics. Godspeed, Amazing Grace.
Nearly 50% of Protestant churches now say they use electric
guitars or drums in worship, up from nearly 35% in 2000, according
to the recently released Faith Communities Today study of 14,000
congregations.
But just because you don't like the tune doesn't mean it's
theologically incorrect, says Rick Muchow, music pastor for the
Saddleback Church founded by evangelist Rick Warren. "The Bible
does not have an official soundtrack."
The nation's fifth-largest Protestant church, with nine satellite
locations, runs several concurrent worship services Sunday
mornings at its main site in Lake Forest, Calif., each with a
different genre of music.
Good News Baptist Church fights the tide of contemporary music
with a traditional choir.
Muchow lists: a Gospel praise service; a "straight-ahead rock"
called Overdrive; one called Fuel that's "geared to 20-somethings
with more alternative music"; and a Traditions service with piano
and a singer. Traditions is the only service using hymnals.
In the vast main worship center, however, the sound is
"radio-style contemporary Christian with a small rhythm section,"
maybe an orchestra or choir now and then, and big screens beaming
down the words to be sung by praise choruses, Muchow says.
"There are all different kinds of churches for different kinds of
people. We don't worship music, we worship God," Muchow says.
Still, an unbending conservative guard of churches carries a flag
for songs and sounds of the past. Their pastors claim people of
all ages are drawn by timeless truths in classic hymns.
The fight can get fierce.
"There is an intense war being waged today for the heart and soul
of Bible-believing churches, and one of the Devil's most effective
Trojan horses is music," warns pastor David Cloud.
Cloud established a Web directory of hundreds of Independent
Baptist Churches in the USA and Canada. Every church on the list
pledges strict Christian doctrine, uses only the 400-year-old King
James Version of the Bible, and bans contemporary music.
Pastor Wayne Hardy's Bible Baptist Church in Stillwater, Okla., is
on the list although he laughs at Cloud's claim that rhythmic
music is Satan's beat. Hardy suspects part of the rise of
PowerPoint praise choruses on sanctuary theater screens and drum
cages by the pulpit is that "CEO-type pastors have to attract
crowds in to fill their megachurches."
Hardy draws 500 souls to Sunday worship at his church where music
choices are guided by the idea that "holiness is more appropriate
in worship than trendiness. God is our audience in worship and God
doesn't have the same demand to be entertained."
Worship music has a job to do, says Ken Hedrick, music pastor for
the Good News Baptist Church in Chesapeake, Va., says, "It's not
neutral. Its role is to praise and glorify our Lord, teach
believers and edify them. It prepares our hearts to hear God's
word."
Hedrick leads a 20-piece orchestra with an organ, two grand
pianos, strings, trumpets and trombones and a 30- to 50-voice
choir. Sunday services draw more than 300 people weekly, including
dozens of teens and young adults. But no percussion section pumps
out a beat "that causes our bodies to do things they shouldn't be
doing," he says.
Hannah Brown, 17, who plays violin and piano and sings in the Good
News choir, agrees, saying, "I believe this music is more
glorifying to the Lord, more focused on God, not on me and making
me feel good."
Tommy Kyllonen, also known as Urban D, the Christian hip-hop
artist pastor behind Tampa's Crossover Church, is down with the
new music.
"We have a big world and a big God. As long as people are
worshiping in spirit and in truth, we can worship in any way that
reaches our hearts," he says. After all, the Bible calls for
believers to "sing a new song to the Lord."