Worship is not music. Music can be used to worship God. So join the church and sing and play instruments to God from a heart of joy in His abundant blessings, and pray to God out of a heart of faith in His gracious care of us; that is a form of corporate worship.

 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Scripture calls us to sing a new song to the Lord. It allows us to be creative in our expression of love for God. With new lyrics, changing instruments, and a joyful shout, we praise God. I also know it’s good to become familiar with these songs for the sake of singing them with the saints on a Sunday morning. So, thanks to Kaycee, we have a Spotify and YouTube playlist where you can listen to all the songs we are currently singing in our contemporary worship service. This is helpful to all of our people so that when we have an opportunity to gather together across all the services, we have familiarity with the songs!

At WBC, when we select songs, we think about the following components:

  • Are they biblically accurate? We sort this out amongst our worship leadership and pastors. We occasionally pull songs from the set that we don’t believe accurately convey scripture.
  • Are they geared for corporate praise? Not all songs are created to be sung corporately.
  • Are they vertical praise or horizontal challenge (i.e. praising God or encouraging/challenging the church family, and both of this have biblical support)
  • We don’t always rule out a song because of the backing church or writer simply because even in scripture God uses broken people to write the most amazing songs, like in the book of Daniel.

Important notes:

  • All worship songs are hymns. Hymns are simply songs for a religious deity. We call it “Contemporary Worship” but really, it’s simply “Recently Produced Hymns.” Ceasing to write new songs to the Lord is abnormal to the people of God and not in union with Psalm 33:1-3.
  • In all of our services we include hymns from past saints and hymns recently produced. We are beginning to incorporate Psalms as praise songs as well!
  • Rich theological songs have been written throughout history. Poorly written songs have been written throughout history. Some of the most theologically rich and biblically accurate songs I’ve heard have been written in the past few years, and yet some of my favorite music to praise God through are the hymns listed in our Baptist Hymnal.
  •  The early church sang psalms, the hymns of past saints, and “recently produced hymns.” This has always been the pattern of the temple, synagogue, and church.
  • The original songs of the church were Psalms, and they are redundant. The most commonly sung hymn was Psalm 116. Called “the great Hallel,” they would sing it during Passover meal and when gathered. The psalm repeats the same line 26 times! Repetition is a major feature of Biblical Hebrew, and the majority of praise in the Bible.