On the Performance of Music in the Church

Colossians 3:16-17 "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom; teaching and admonishing one another in psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord. And whatsoever ye do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God and the Father by Him."
So often we hear songs sung proclaiming the glory of God, announcing a desire to give Him the glory, yet sung in such a manner as to exalt the performer. The audience often responds with applause, saluting the performer. Much of this may be due to the fact that most of our concepts of performance styles come from worldly performers concerned with promoting themselves. Rather than follow this model, we ought to seek to emphasize the message, not the messenger. Rather than seek applause for sounding great, let us seek the silence of a message sinking in. Rather than seek the plaudits of being a great singer, let us seek to be invisible, that the message may be heard more clearly. Our goal and method of performing music in the church ought not to be the entertainment of the crowd but rather the preparation of hearts for the message.

The Assault on Honesty

Proverbs 6:16-17 "These six things doth the Lord hate, yea seven are an abomination unto Him. A proud look, a lying tongue, and hands that shed innocent blood."
Once, a mans word meant something. Once fights and duels were fought over the accusation of deceit. Yet, today men throw that accusation out like candy. The Lord is clear in His Word that any form of deceit is an abomination. God sees lying as a serious sin. Yet today we here phrases like "A little white lie." To God there are no white lies or brown lies or green lies. He only sees the filth of the sin of lying. Maybe we ought to take another look at we accuse people of. Just because a person states something that is not true does not mean that he is a liar. Lying involves knowingly imparting false information. May we begin to watch our speech that we do not fall into this serious sin, nor flippantly accuse others of this sin. May truth once again stand important to all.

Evangelism according to Jude

"And of some have compassion, making a difference: and others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire; hating the even the garment spotted by the flesh." Jude 22-23. Thus is given a commandment to the Christians to reach the lost. Many today are turning away from confrontational preaching. Yet Jude makes it clear that it has a place. Others take to another extreme. They preach as if they are glad that sinners are on their way to Hell. Jude tells us that we must reach some through compassion, meeting their needs. We ought to offer food to the hungry and shelter to the homeless. Yet we ought to help them solve their problems. The Bible never records Jesus or the Apostles giving money to beggars, rather it shows them healing them, meeting their needs. Some we can reach for the Lord in this way. Others we must turn to verse 23 for. We must preach to some in such a way as to make sin and judgement clear to them. We must make them see their true condition. When we preach "Jesus loves you" to them and do not preach "All have sinned," we do not reach them because they don't care that Jesus loves them. We must make them fear their eternal doom. Yet while we do this, we must remember to preach the truth in love. John Wesley was famous for preaching on Hell with tears in his eyes. We must not be glad when a sinner goes to Hell, but rather sorrowful. We also must remember that we are not to hate the sinner, but rather the lifestyle of sin. We must love the sinner and reach out to him. Let us go forth and reach some with compassion, and others with fear.