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“Speak to one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, [offering praise by] singing and making melody with your heart to the Lord” (Ephesians 5:19 AMP)
“singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs among yourselves, and making music to the Lord in your hearts” (Ephesians 5:19 NLT)
For close on six decades now, since the 1960’s, there has often been division amongst Christians, and amongst churches, debating the topic of hymns versus modern praise music.
I myself like a lot of the modern praise music that has come out in the last 60 years. But I also like a lot of the old hymns.
A very quick look at the history of modern praise music will show us that it was basically born out of the Jesus Movement of the late 1960’s and early 1970’s.
New young Christians put Christian lyrics to ‘pop’ and ‘rock’ songs. Songs like the Monkees ‘I’m A Believer’ were transformed with Christian lyrics to talk about being a believer in Jesus.
(A tradition that continues today with Christian bands like ‘ApologetiX’.)
Modern ‘pop’ and ‘rock and roll’ music was speaking to a generation. And Christian youth capitalised on that style of music to speak to that generation.
This was followed with ‘praise and worship’ music through people like Keith Green. And was quickly followed by music from the likes of John Wimber and Vineyard/Mercy Music and others of the 1980’s.
It became commonplace in churches thanks to the collections of music compiled in music and lyric books like “Scripture In Song” with their “Songs of Praise” (1981), “Songs of the Kingdom” (1981), and “Songs of the Nations” (1988) and other similar publications.
Then “Hillsong” music became popular with the likes of Darlene Zschech, Brooke Ligertwood, etc. At the same time Christians bands such as the Newsboys, Jars of Clay, MercyMe, etc, became popular.
All of this music spoke to generations of young people.
Now, as I stated before, I myself like a lot of the modern praise music that has come out in the last 60 years. But I also like a lot of the old hymns.
Modern ‘praise and worship’ music is just that – praise and worship music. Almost universally the music and lyrics focus upon leading people into worship. And, very sadly, often there is no solid doctrine in the words at all.
Hymns on the other-hand usually contained solid Biblical truths, principles, and doctrine. Just like the old stained-glass windows in some churches sought to convey Biblical stories and doctrine.
Christian musicians like Charles Wesley put into the lyrics of his hymns Biblical truths and doctrine, just like his brother John Wesley preached Biblical truths and doctrine.
The composers of hymns covered topics like these in the image below:
The Bible specifically instructs us sing praises to God. Verses like Psalm 95:1-2 for example: “Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord; let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come before Him with thanksgiving and extol Him with music and song”. Along with many other verses throughout the Bible.
Likewise, the Bible clearly instructs us to have a firm foundation and a firm knowledge of the principles and doctrines of the Bible.
Therefore, in our church and fellowship services there is, in my honest opinion, a place for both ‘praise and worship’ music and for singing hymns.
Praise and worship bring us into the throne-room of heaven, hymns teach us what the Biblical doctrines are, and why they are important.
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