Whatever church you belong to people really care about which songs we sing. St Anne’s is no different. We want to proactively choose the songs which will serve us the best as we seek to worship the Lord, to give him glory, and to become more like Jesus. Here are some of the things we try and think through as we choose songs at St Anne’s.
Firstly why do we sing together anyway?
- Because we are told to: there’s over 50 commands to sing in the Bible, and singing is mentioned 450 times.
- Because we are shown to: God’s word models singing constantly for us- Moses, Miriam, Joshua, Deborah, Hannah, Asaph, the Priests in Ezra and 1 Chronicles all sing. Kings sing; David, Josiah, Jehoshaphat, Solomon, Hezekiah. The Prophets sing; Isaiah, Ezekiel, Amos, Habakkuk. Mary sings, Paul and Silas sing in Prison. All God’s people sing together in Revelation. Creation sings, God the Father sings in Zephaniah and Jesus sings with the disciples.
‘Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom with psalms, hymns and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts’. Colossians 3.16
What do we want the hallmarks of our sung worship to be?
- Scriptural – ‘Let the word of Christ dwell in your richly’…As we sing God’s word dwells in us, so our songs should be full of Biblical truth about who God is and what he has done for us.
- Congregational – God’s word dwells in us as we ‘teach and admonish one another’ (admonish means to teach/remind/parent), so our sung worship is about us singing together as a church family, not the band singing or performing to the congregation. This means the songs need to be singable and mostly familiar.
- Spiritual – ‘psalms, hymns and songs from the Spirit’, as we sing we meet with God by his Spirit, and he is at work within individually and corporately connecting our spirits to his Spirit.
- Emotional – Colossians 3 tells us to sing to God with ‘gratitude in your hearts, elsewhere in scripture people worship with lament, or joy, through tears and shouts of praise. Our sung worship needs to engage our hearts and not just our heads.
- Transformational – As we sing, as God’s word dwells in us, as we teach one another, as we express our gratitude to God we EXPECT to be changed, as big truths about God from his word move from our heads to our hearts, as God’s spirit works in us to equip us and send us out to live for Jesus.
Things that we try to remember when we choose songs:
- The Passage – if our sung worship is about God’s word dwelling in us richly then the passage will shape not just what we sing, but also the tone, and feel of how we sing. The whole service is built around the word of God, and our sung worship is part of that word ministry, of God speaking to his people by his word. The passage should be our starting point each week.
- The People – One of the greatest blessings of singing together is that it unites us around King Jesus. We try to remember the congregation as you choose songs, think of how these songs can serve them well, point them to Jesus and minister to their hearts. We also want to remember the occasion too and choose songs accordingly: is it all-age? Are the children in at this point? Is it Holy Communion? Is it Christmas? Is it Easter? Is there a Baptism?
Our Gospel Journey/ Worship Curve/ Liturgical Progression
At St Anne’s we believe that the shape of the gospel should shape our gatherings, and the shape of our gatherings will shape the thoughts words and actions of our congregation.
So:
- We begin with who God is: with adoration and praise, magnifying his greatness, power, holiness and love. It’s often wonderful to begin with an upbeat, very well-known song or hymn.
- We reflect on who we are before God: This might mean thinking about our sin, our fallenness, and our need of a saviour, it might be a song where we call on God to speak to us or empower us.
- We look to the cross and the resurrection of Jesus: this is our only hope in this broken world, and we proclaim the Good News together.
- We respond to all he has done for us, (and said to us) in praise and thanksgiving, and in recommitting our lives to following and worshipping him in the coming.
Things we try to hold in tension as we choose songs
- Hymns and Songs – A good stylistic blend is valuable regardless of how recently they were written.
- Old and New – Enjoying the songs of the past as well as singing a new song to the Lord
- We and I – We try to balance songs where we proclaim together with songs we sing individually to God
- God focused and us focussed – Some songs focus on God, others on us and our response to him
- Familiar and Unfamiliar – It’s important not to sing too many unknown songs in one service, so we can sing together
- Doctrinal and Responsive – It’s good to get a balance of rich truth and our response to it, it’s so valuable to pick some songs that leave space for us to respond to what God has been saying, and how he might be choosing to move amongst us by his Holy Spirit.
- Proclamation and Implication – Similarly it’s good to proclaim both the truth of the gospel & how we will live it out
Of course, if we all followed this to the letter each week our services would become too similar and a bit awkward and repetitive. This isn’t a tick list that we must follow, it’s more like a flexible mindset, to allow the gospel to shape and inform the journey we go on as we sing, and to try and cover all the basis well. Please do pray for our worship leaders as they take time to choose songs carefully each week!
