Worship music in America and the west is now an ‘industry’.
That’s not necessarily a condemning statement after all Jubal, the first musician documented in Gen 4 was listed with his brothers by their professions. One brother was in agriculture, the other in manufacturing and Jubal was ‘the father of all who play the harp and flute’. It’s what he did for a living which, by the way, included fathering, mentoring and developing other artists too.
But any time you get an industry forming then the mixed motives of human nature kick in to some degree. Sometimes the industry has to self sustain and churn out product just so that it continues to exist.
So do we really need any more worship songs? There are more being written and distributed now than in any previous generation.
When wrestling with this here are three thoughts that found their way to the conscious part of my brain.
1. God likes songs. The biggest section of His book is a collection of songs.
2. If the universe’s main function is to display His glory (Ps. 19 ) and it’s expanding at an accelerating rate then it seems that even creation cannot contain enough expressions to voice worship to its creator.
3. The very last statement of the Gospels says: Jesus did many other things as well. If every one of them were written down, I suppose that even the whole world would not have room for the books that would be written. I think the same is true of worship – there can never be enough expressions of response to the love of God.
Maybe I’m justifying to myself yet more worship songs being added to the mix but here are a few samples of the new ones including a 4/4 guitar driven version of ‘Be Thou My Vision’ that has proved popular in night clubs, festivals and even churches!
