Welcome back.

I grew up with Spanish Hymns, “Cuan Grande Es El” (How Great Thou Art) and “El Vino a Mi Corazón” (He Came into My Heart), but I can’t say that I am hymns person. When I lead worship, I do one to two hymns about every 4 weeks or so. Recently, and ironically on the same day I got a note saying “please, more hymns”, while my senior pastor said to me, “please, no hymns.” Pretty funny.

I do hymns because they have great meaning, but I don’t do them all the time. There are bad hymns just as there are bad modern worship songs, and what I mean by bad is bad lyrically and melodically. The melodies of some hymns are just odd.

Theology? Sure, hymns have plenty of good theology, so I do hymns. BUt modern worship songs have an honesty, vulnurability and melodic enjoyment that hymns sometimes lack. Then again, a hymn like “O Worship the King” and most of the re-written modern hymns that are currently being done rock my world.

Then there’s $. Hymns make $ right now. That’s why many artists are doing them. It makes sense, hymns are hot, people miss them, the boomer generation is getting older, more nostalgic about their roots, the Christian market is being saturated with the latest “Passion” worship song that sounded like last year’s Passion song, so let’s record some hymns with electric guitars and sell some records, oh yes, and sing good theology and teach the kids to respect history. I’m fine with most of that, except the $ part of it. See Jesus turning tables in the church lobby.

Will I do more hymns as I get older? I grew up with about 25% hymns and about 75% modern worship (of the day) and lots of “música de la revolución” (Revolutionary Music). So I will at most, do about 10-20% hymns as I get older, because that’s how much is IN me to begin with. I’m okay with that. I enjoy all the great hymns as much as the next traditional person, but not all day long.

I’m into modern worship, modern rock, pop/acoustic stuff, groove oriented passionate music, with a taste for Latin, urban and hip-hop. I’m into hip-hop. I’m not into traditional Gospel, adult contemporary or country. I appreciate the genres, it’s just not what I prefer to do, I’ll do it 10-20% of the time. I’ve done just about everything in the past – Vineyard, Maranatha, Tommy Walker, Ron Kenoly, Integrity, Hillsongs, all big sounds except for Vineyard which is now almost obsolete.

I’ve done the brass section, 6 singers, multiple teams, rotating vocals, Gospel choir thing. Most contemporary churches either do the Willow Creek big gospel/pop contemporary thing, a’la Joel Osteen’s Lakewood Church, or the old contemporary (“Shout to the Lord”, “Come Now is the Time”, “Open the Eyes of My Heart”) songs.

I do mostly modern worship songs, the usual stuff these days – Tomlin, Crowder and Hughes, with new local guys such as Phil Wickham and my own original material which sounds like Juanes and Coldplay (so I think). No wonder North Coast Church in Vista, CA has 13 worship services all with the same preacher and message (video venues). The only difference? The styles of worship. Division? Consummerism? Worship wars? I don’t know. Music unites us but it also defines us. The church is the only place where we confuse style and preferences because of the faith aspect. Outside of the Church, we all know what we like and why and we stick with it, choose according to it, buy, spend, etc. all based upon what we like.

Can you imagine yourself suddenly liking hip-hop if you’re not into hip-hop? Can you see yourself into country if you’re not into country just because it has God/Jesus in the lyrics? I don’t see it. I’m okay building churches around worship styles because more than spiritual this is about culture, taste, what shaped us as jr. highers, even what songs helped us connect with love and relationships (see Madonna, “Like A Virgin”, boy, now I know I’m old!).

Music is not about preference, it’s about identity, it’s about who we are, like the color of our skin. I can’t stop being what I am, I just have to learn to appreciate everyone else, keep growing, be united and accept others. Some churches deny this and they make everyone listen to the same style, on the name of Christ, faith and unity.

Some people may listen to what I do on Sundays and say, “more hymns” or “more slow songs” or “less new songs” or “more Shout to the Lord” and more “the FISH (Christian radio station)” songs. It gets weird, but all I can do is be true to myself, to culture and honor the people that come into church each week and lead them into the presence of God.

What’s your opinion of music inside the church and music outside the church and your preferences? Should we not bring those into the church because we’re about God? Or should we be more like North Coast and be more honest about what we like and build churches according to style?

Hymns Make a Comeback.

Into the future,

davidT