Church musicians have thousands of reasons to shine

Jonathan Aigner asked which praise song readers would like to ban. I put it to a vote of experienced church musicians, and the clear “winner” was “Shine, Jesus, Shine.”

A week ago, Aigner (a Methodist church music director) offered a thought experiment: if there were a charitable auction to ban (at least temporarily) one contemporary worship song, what would you pick. Here's a brief summary of his impassioned argument:

I wish I could ban the whole money-grubbing, golden calf-creating, pop star-copying, Spirit-impersonating, consumer audience-targeting worship industry, but I can’t. Not by myself, at least. I can’t even ban one whole song. But it might make for a fun blog post and some decent discussion.

After an hour or so of thinking, I came up with a mile-long list of dumb “worship” songs. But then it hit me. While there are a ton of crappy contemporary worship songs, there is one that I hate on a deeply visceral level, more than any other crappy worship song that has been inflicted on the church during the recent commercial worship hijacking.

The year was 1993. It was a simpler time. A 21-year-old, soprano-singing Thris Comlin had yet to ruin his first hymn. And most of us were blissfully unaware of the derivative musical empire that was being erected in the land down under. Darlene “Too Many Consonants, Not Enough Vowels” Zschzschzschech penned a cute little ditty for her “worship team” to sing at Hillsong Church in Sydney.

It was called “Shout to the Lord.”

This sort of concern is a major thread on a closed Facebook group of traditional church musicians. I put it to a vote, nominating four songs. Three are perennially popular — Shout to the Lord, Ten Thousand Reasons, In Christ Alone — while King of My Heart is a more recent CCM hit. Providentially, I left the poll open for others to add options.

The Votes Are In

I got 238 votes — 228 for specific songs and 10 that said “all of the above”. One song clearly won going away: “Shine, Jesus, Shine.” Below are the 21 nominees and the number of hymnals that include each hymn (according to Hymnary.org).

Votes	Song	Author	Date	Hymnals
42.1%	Shine, Jesus, Shine	Graham Kendrick	1987	31
12.7%	Gather Us In	Marty Haugen	1982	32
8.3%	Ten Thousand Reasons (Bless the Lord, O my Soul)	Matt Redman	2011	3
6.1%	All are Welcome	Marty Haugen	1995	17
5.7%	Lord of the Dance	Sydney Carter	1963	41
4.4%	Oceans (Where Feet May Fail)	(Hillsong)	2013
3.9%	Here I Am, Lord	Dan Shutte	1981	47
3.1%	Good, Good Father	Chris Tomlin	2015
2.2%	On Beagle's Wings (aka On Eagle’s Wings, aka the “You Who” song)	Michael Joncas	1977	4
1.8%	Amazing Grace	John Newton	1779	1,230
1.8%	I Am The Bread of Life	Suzanne Toolan	1966	23
1.8%	In Christ Alone	Keith Getty, Stuart Townend	2002	14
1.3%	Come, Now Is the Time to Worship	Brian Doerksen	1977
0.9%	Shout to the Lord	(Hillsong)	1993
0.9%	One Bread, One Body	John Foley	1978	26
0.9%	All Praise and Worship
0.4%	Strong and Constant	Frank Andersen	1973
0.4%	Companions On the Journey	Carey Landry	1985
0.4%	I Sing a Song of the Saints of God	Lesbia Scott	1929	22
0.4%	I'm Trading My Sorrows	Darrell Evans	1998	1
0.4%	King of My Heart	Bethel Music	2016

Even with this strong showing, there was disagreement among the musicians. Clearly many if not most of the musicians knew only a handful of these nominees, and so voted for the worst of the ones they know. For example, with the California ACNA parishes and diocesan activities where I have sometimes worshipped, the musical lingua franca are “In Christ Alone” and “Ten Thousand Reasons”; the latter was a communion hymn for a 2015 consecration. I voted for this one not because it’s the worst, but because I’ve seen it (and the catchy ear worm chorus) turn a worship service into a chance for people to rock out.

Some of the CCM big names are there: Hillsong (as nominated by Aigner), Marty Haugen (two nominations), Graham Kendrick and Matt Redman (for some very good Reasons). Interestingly, almost 10% went to six post-Vatican II Catholic hymns from 1966-1985. One is a former Jesuit with a controversial lifestyle while the other is a current member of the S.J. A third is by a (then) nun, while I believe the other three authors are priests

As Sesame Street would say, one of these things is not like the other; one of these things just doesn’t belong. With 1000+ hymnals, the 240-year-old “Amazing Grace” is a legitimate Christian hymn, even if a highly emotive one that some find trite or cliché.

While I thought I’d never say this, I’d like to add a word of defense for Mr. Kendrick. Like others, I find it objectionable for a worship service, but a music scholar I respect (who may not want to be associated with this blog) said that it was never intended for this purpose. She said it was originally used for evangelization at Christian street festival in England (although that’s not what the semi-official history says). If that’s the case, then I can’t fault the author or composer for bringing it into worship, but instead (as with any other song taken off the radio) would point to the music director or even the pastor.

It's a Free Country

In reading over the visceral objections to Aigner’s posting, I want to argue my own point of view (if not necessarily his or the voters in the poll). All of us are voting for things we don’t like and (I believe in most cases) are inappropriate for a worship service. However, in the consumer-driven American church marketplace, in a big enough city just about everyone can find a church that suits their worship preferences. So all the people who love these songs — including some of my closer friends — are free to rock out to them this Sunday or any other Sunday, no matter what Aigner or 238 Facebook subscribers say.

It also appeared that some of the readers didn’t realize that blogs — particularly like other humorous commentaries — are often exaggerated for effect. I hope that no one actually reading what was written would conclude that Aigner (or the gang of 238) thinking that demon worship is preferable (or equivalent) to singing one of these songs.