Have Christians Stopped Singing?

  • When I was a kid growing up in church, we sang hymns. Songs about God. From a book. Never more than three in a row. There was little emotion attached to this experience. Nobody dimmed the lights.

    And we all sang. Loudly. Or at least we mouthed the words.

    Today, worship is not something you do – it’s something you feel. We no longer sing about God, we sing to him. There might be seven songs in a row without a break. We are expected to feel something. The lights are low.

    And we’re not singing any more.

    As I visit churches around the country, I’ve frequently observed that the majority of attendees do not sing. They stand motionless, looking at the words on the jumbo screen. It’s particularly noticeable in so called seeker-friendly congregations. I’d guess that only a quarter of the men sing.

    According to LifeWay Worship Director Mike Harland, the modern stage-driven worship atmosphere gives people an excuse to be spectators instead of participators.

    Lillian Kwon writes in the Christian Post, “While the congregation is left in the dark under dim lights, stage lights place the focus on the gifted worship leader — who has in-ear monitors and who sings songs in a key that best fits him or her. The worship leader can’t hear the congregation or see the congregation and ‘they don’t even know that the congregation is not even singing,’ Harland said.”

    Harland offers a number of ideas in the article. I’ve written extensively on worship in this blog and in my books as well. I also include a section in my new DVD.

    So have you noticed that people in general – and men in particular – aren’t singing any more? What can we do about it? Comments are open.

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    January 3rd, 2011 | David Murrow | 15 Comments | Tags: ,

About The Author

David Murrow

David Murrow is the director of Church for Men, an organization that helps congregations reach more men and boys. In his day job, David works as a television producer and writer. He's the author of three books. He lives in Alaska with his wife, three children, two grandchildren and a dachshund named Pepper.

  • http://www.WildmenMinistry.com Jan Broucinek

    We don’t have much trouble getting men to sing at our meetings. Last night we had 34 guys at our Largo FL meeting and I would venture that 75% or more were singing – loud.

    The issue isn’t the lights, or the large screen. The issues as I see them (and as you’ve pointed out elsewhere) are:
    The key the songs are in, can a man hit those notes?
    Are they man-friendly or are they a love song to another man – Jesus?
    Is the music loud enough that a man can’t hear himself too well. Most men don’t like the sound of their singing voices.
    And does the song speak to a masculine heart? Is there challenge, adventure, risk, battle, brotherhood, and so on?

  • davidmurrow

    Jan, it is not surprising that 75% of the attendees at a men’s meeting would sing. After all, these men have made the extra effort to come out on a Tuesday night. I would challenge you to take a headcount this weekend in your church services, and get back to me. And don’t just count the people who sit toward the front!

  • http://displaced-men.com Jim

    Excellent article. You are so right re: many men choose not to participate in the worship service and their reasons run the gambit from I cannot stand the music to I cannot sing. Maybe these are legitimate reasons but the men are left out of an opportune time to come into the presence of God.

    It is likely that the worship leaders see the lack of participation but are unaware of the reasons.

    The worship leaders function is to point the audience to God and not to call attention to their selves. I for one do not care to learn a new song every Sunday, nor do I want to hear some variation of a well known hymn all this does is take me out of the worship loop and it does not help me worship God.

    In reality the worship leaders have seemingly forgot Whom it is we are worshiping. It is not what the worship leaders wants to do on Sunday its about what God wants. He wants our attention, He demands our attention,

  • http://Website Joel

    Your article is right on the money. I regularly observe our congregation (in a very seeker-friendly church) during “worship” (singing). If it’s a sappy love song such as “Jesus I Am So In Love With You”, at most a third of the men are singing, maybe two thirds of the women. If it’s a robust song like “Blessed Be Your Name”, a song that proclaims faithfulness towards the Lord through bad times and good, most of the men are singing and nearly all the women. The choice of song definitely makes a difference.
    In the past, you’ve touched on the subject of the Church reducing the definition of worship to merely singing. I would love to hear you expand on that subject. What could truly Biblical worship entail other than a stage concert?

  • http://blog.stevelowe.org Steve

    1) Turn it up.

    The church I regularly attend runs about 100-105dB, and most people are singing their guts out. We went to another church last weekend that was running about 85-90dB. I didn’t sing, nor did most of the guys around me.

    2) “Jesus is my boyfriend” songs don’t encourage guys

    As has been mentioned, the sappy romantic songs don’t register well with a lot of guys, Include some hi-energy, fast-tempo songs.

    (I’m a geek, have a dB meter app on my iPhone, in case you’re wondering how I know SPLs)

  • http://Website Keatsy

    I run a small outreach church in NSW Australia. We have a majority male congregation and we don’t sing at all. Christian songs mostly have relevance to christians but they are misunderstood by those who are new to church. Our aim is to encourage people to look in a God direction as we journey together with them through life.
    Worship is done personally through our lifestyle, our commitment to Him and our action to others. It is also difficult to find current volumes of decent christian worship songs that are male focussed/ strength/challenge based that you could use on a weekly basis without continuous repetition
    (eg: Blessed be the Lord my rock, who trains my hands for war, my fingers for battle) .
    God bless you David, love what the Lord is doing through you.

  • http://Website Mike

    Men dont worship anymore because it is simply not real to them any more. The songs that we sing mostly have come out of another churches vision and we are simply copying it. The worship songs and the style that they are sung in should come from the heart of each church.
    Also, having a female song leader means that the men are being led in a style that is not natural to them and chances are, in a key that they cannot sing in anyway.
    I also agree that men do not want to sing about asking God for a hug. They want to be like the Biblical David and worship God and thank him for the victory in battle.
    Maybe it also comes down to the fact that in days gone bye, the songs that were sung in church were a statement of faith and the people singing them actually needed God to answer their prayers in worship. But now days few in the church of the western world feel they really need God to answer their prayers. Just a thought.

  • davidmurrow

    Update on this: yesterday I visited a one-year old “church plant.” I sat up front and turned around to see who was singing. Sure enough, only about 25 percent of the crowd of about 150 worshippers were joining in.

    One of the problems in this church was the choice of music. Most of the songs were, quite frankly un-singable. The crowd didn’t seem to know the songs and the lead singer chose to drag out certain phrases, making it difficult to follow. On one song I noticed several people simply gave up singing after the first verse. When they finally sang a familiar hymn, Amazing Grace, the majority sang.

    So is worship meant to be a spectator sport, or is it about participation? Comments are open.

  • James Layton

    I’m a new church planter, and have been wrestling the singing thing for quite a few years now.
    I’ve been in church life for about 25 years (i’m 40) and have always felt awkward singing, especially fast songs. It’s not something I would like to do in front of my friends because simply it isn’t ‘manly’.

    I don’t feel like a bloke when I sing & especially clap in church. I find it emasculating. I realise most of my issues with singing stem from this, which is basically insecurity. However, we are dealing with an insecure generation, and if we want to reach them, we must look at this.

    Singing is an emotional response for men, so to be asked to do it as soon as you walk in the building is comparable to asking your wife for sex as soon as she gets home from work. (Try it sometime, then duck!) Like women, we need to be warmed up first…

    In our church we have split the gathering in two parts. The first half is very user friendly, dialogue based, and great for non- believers. Singing at the start has been replaced with discussion groups (men love to talk) Coffee in the middle, which is an exit point if people want to go home, and then we do all the singing/worship stuff at the end of the second half.

    Working well so far.

    So I don’t think the issue with singing is as much about not knowing the songs or being able to sing them, as it is about simply not looking like, or feeling like a man when you do it.

    James

  • http://www.churchformen.com David Murrow

    This is a great idea. There’s a pastor in Wales, Highfields Church in Cardiff, who has added an intermission to his worship services. He dares people to “get up and go” once the sermon is over. Almost nobody does. They enjoy a break with juice, coffee and tea, then sit down for a Question and Answer period. The men love it!

  • http://www.facebook.com/karen.reyburn Karen Reyburn

    This is very true. I believe it stems from the church departing from singing the very words of God, and making up their own idea of how God would like to be praised. He gave us an entire book – the book of Psalms. Why not sing that, simple and unadorned? Clearly our brilliant ideas of how we think God would like to be worshipped are resulting in nobody really praising Him at all: they stand and watch as a band entertains them. The entertainment culture of which we are a part has crept into the church, and we have to remember that God takes worship of Himself very, very seriously. Surely we should do the same: stop looking to our feelings to decide how to worship, and look to the Word of God.

  • Tim

    I go to a church that worships without instruments, and no amplification during the songs. If people stop singing, we know about it very quickly, and do something about it, sometimes even mid-song. We have someone up the front who leads the singing by singing loudly and conducting, whom we call “the precentor”. If people aren’t singing, the precentor may stop after the first verse, and pitch the tune a bit lower. The rule we tend to have is “The melody should not go above Eb for congregational singing” (this isn’t fixed, but it’s one I’ve heard people say).

    Likewise, we have a book with maybe 400 songs in it, and the precentors won’t precent one unless they think that they know it themselves, and that the congregation does too, or, in the case of very easy ones, if there are a number of loud people who know it :) .

    Interestingly, I met a man at a folk music concert who said that in Wales, singing is part of the definition of manliness, thus their singing culture. I have the insecurity thing going too, but because everyone else sings, I have no qualms.

    I agree about unsingable tunes. We have about 10 of those in our book, but we never sing them.

    As for songs about loving God, they can be good, if done Bible-style. Psalm 18, for example:

    I love you, LORD, my strength!
    My rock, my fort, my power!
    My God, my hiding place,
    my safety and my tower!

    There are places that sell books of the Psalms arranged especially for singing. Those can be a good place to look for worship songs that are less emasculating :) .

  • Kristen

    Mike said,

    “Also, having a female song leader means that the men are being led in a style that is not natural to them and chances are, in a key that they cannot sing in anyway.”

    Mike, welcome to our world. Women are quite used to having men lead everything, in a style that’s not natural to us. We put on our big-girl panties and deal with it. Having a female worship leader doesn’t need to be a problem for men if they’ll do what this blog talks about so much, accept challenges and deal with them. :)

    Why are Christians not singing? Because the worship leaders have made the worship be about them being professional-style, on-stage musicians, rather than humble servants doing what the saints need to help lead them into worship– no matter how simple and unglamorous that servanthood is. People need easier, more singable songs. The dark auditoriums and the stage lights need to go. We need to be communities worshiping together, not laypeople being led.

  • Cathy

    I don’t sing because it’s impossible to sing.

    1. The bass guitar is so loud, I cannot hear the tune. Literally. Turn it DOWN, guys!
    2. There is no music (musical scores.) The melody is new. How am I supposed to learn a tune I can’t hear and can’t read, let alone harmonize to it? Give me a hymnal. Even a person who can’t read music can see that the notes go up and down, and that there are a lot of notes here that must go fast, and not very many notes there so it must be slower.
    3. The words are repetitive and insipid. Give me some lyrics that can come to mind later in the week and feed me and remind me of God’s teaching, not, “I love You, I love You, I love You, I love You, I love You, I love You, I love You, I loooove You.” Seriously? It’s all about me now?
    4. Either the worship leader is singing the verses in the wrong order, or throwing in extra choruses, or extra lines, or whatever, or that guy running the words projected on the screen is totally incompetent. Whichever way it is, sometimes as much as half the words on the screen have already gone by before they’re projected.

    Our family gets up three hours early to attend a service with traditional music.

  • http://www.churchformen.com David Murrow

    So would you say if a person goes to church but does not sing, is he sinning?