‘Sorry, I’m not able to help with music any more – I need to focus more on ministry.’
Out of all the phrases that have arrived in my inbox over the years, this is the one that reminds me that many evangelicals are still a long way from realising the importance of singing in the Christian gathering.
‘And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ’ (Ephesians 4.11-12). From verse 11 it’s clear that ministry involves teaching the Word by people set aside specifically for that purpose by God. But verse 15 also shows us that ministry involves Christians ‘truthing’ each other in order to build the church of God to maturity and unity in the Spirit.
Bringing truth to bear
We tend to assume that this truthing is spoken, but it would be strange if sung truth isn’t included as part of this ministry, especially as singing is so closely tied to feeding on the Word of God in Colossians 3.16. Of course, when we sing most congregational songs, we aren’t feeding each other directly with the Word of God – that only happens in its purest sense as the Bible is read publicly. Instead, rather like preaching, our songs bring truth to bear in minds and hearts as the gospel is articulated and applied. Preaching, of course, is foundational, as in Ephesians 4.11, but the purpose of preaching is to equip the saints to speak (and sing) the truth to each other in order to do the job of building the church. Therefore, truthing each other in speech and song is a crucial part of protecting the church from being children, tossed around by every wind of doctrine.
Right focus
Now, of course, there will be some musicians with such clear teaching gifts that it would make much more sense for them to be trained in that area, but please let’s not suggest that helping people sing truth to each other is any less part of the ministry of building the church.
From experience, the most skilled musicians that work with me are often also the more adept at many other kinds of ministry. This means that I often get emails like the one I started this article with, as music is often perceived as second class, or even worse, a distraction from genuine ministry. As musicians, we then face an uphill battle to maintain or grow the quality of our sung ministry. This is especially tough when the standards expected of church musicians are so high, and when ‘constructive’ feedback is never far away!
Who is writing our songs?
Our Church Fathers weren’t as naive. They treated the sung word with utmost care, and many committed themselves to write not just sermons but also songs, so that the truths they preached settled in hearts and minds. It’s a consequence of the relegation of sung Word ministry that our songs today are written by musicians rather than preachers. We really are much poorer for it. So, if you’re a pastor-teacher, please invest in sung Word ministry as well as spoken (though not all preachers will be good songwriters!), because you’ll be helping the Word dwell in your congregation richly, and you’ll be taking the building of the church as seriously as the songwriters of the Bible – including Moses, David, Solomon, Deborah, Isaiah, Paul (many think Philippians 2.5-11 is a song) and God himself. Please encourage the congregations you serve to see singing as an important part of building each other in unity and maturity.
Your investment in music
If you’re a musician and you love the Word of God, please work hard at handling the Word faithfully and carefully – this is the most useful thing we can do as church musicians. But we need the decades of investment that you’ve put in to your musical training to serve a hugely important ministry – the ministry of building the church through the proclamation and indwelling of the truth through song. Get serious about ministry. Pick up your guitar. Your church needs YOU!
