Worship-Theo.

This is a Theology of Worship that I have been developing over the past 16 years of my being involved in the ministry. I never felt it necessary to write these things out until recently with all the changes to music in the church. It is important to understand who we worship, how to worship, where to worship and why to worship. In this the most important of these matters today seems to be understanding what worship is. In hopes to answer these questions, I have done research to find these answers and place them here on my website for those with the interest in understanding the fundamentals of worship to God. Please feel free to use the information as you may in sermons or in training your worship team. Freely we receive and freely we give.

Constants of Worship ~ Worship in the Old Testament ~ Worship in New Testament
The Early Church ~ Medieval Period ~ The Reformation
Post-Reformation Period ~ The 20th Century ~ The Christian Year

"Man was made to worship God. God gave to man a harp and said 'Here above all the creatures I have made and created I have given you the largest harp. I put more strings on your instrument and I have given you a wider range than I have given to any other creature. You can worship me in a manner that no other creature can.' And when he sinned man took that instrument and threw it down in the mud and there it has lain for centuries, rusty, broken, unstrung; and man, instead of playing a harp like the angels and seeking to worship God in all of his activities, is egocentered and turns in on himself and sulks, and swears, and laughs and sings, but it is all without joy and without worship."

Worship often understood as enjoying God, and yet the word “worship” comes from the Anglo-Saxon, “worth-ship,” meaning to attribute worth, ascribe worth, to pay homage, to reverence or venerate. The seventeenth century Puritan document, the Westminster Catechism defined “the chief end” [purpose] of humanity as being “to glorify God and to enjoy Him forever.” And St. John of the Cross once asked a penitent, “Wherein does your prayer consist?” She answered, “In considering the beauty of God, and in rejoicing that He has such beauty.” Yet Christian worship has a deeper meaning than this, in that it reflects not only “ontologically,” upon the “being” of God, but it also recounts the saving acts of God.

Christians everywhere partake in some form of worship, yet can we truly say that it is worship? Some worship is pleasing to God, and some worship is really more of a emotional boost to the individual and only seems to be worship. There is much pragmatism in the church today, which would reduce worship to entertainment or aesthetic qualities alone, without asking prior questions about the theology of worship. Behind every act of worship there are theological presuppositions for good or ill and much of what many evangelicals call worship is in essence evangelism, rather than true worship. The church has been caught up in the notion that the "worship music" should appeal to the people so as to draw them in. In so doing, they have sacrificed the true meaning of worship for that of a rock concert or festival that does not please God nor give Him the honor deserved.

There is nothing wrong with the sheer experience of contemplating God’s beauty, nor is there anything wrong with evangelism. But the focus of the Sunday morning service, even though it includes both of these things, is really missing the mark. The Sunday gathering of believers has a narrative element. On the first day of the week, we gather to retell the story of our “exodus from Egypt.” We recount and celebrate the incarnation, life, death, resurrection, and ascension of Our Lord Jesus Christ. These are the theological and historical underpinnings of worship. What we do in worship, the acts we perform, whether formal or informal, are the sacred behaviors the Church has developed in response to these mighty acts of God in Christ.

A major focus of the church today is the "Worship Controversy", what is the right method of worship? Should we have hymns or choruses or both? Should we be contemporary, traditional, or blended? This type of questioning is secondary to the real nature of worship. Whatever style is chosen, we are still left with the need to identify those unchanging constant elements that constitute truly Christian worship. What are the theological constants underlying the Church’s worship, whatever style is adopted?

Worship can only take place as a result of God’s divine self-disclosure. We love God because God first loved us. The initiative is always with God. Jean-Pierre de Caussade in Abandonment to Divine Providence, warns us against human-centered worship. “We ourselves must not try to produce spiritual pleasures and experiences, nor try to intensify those we may have. Such natural efforts are in direct opposition and quite contrary to the inspirations of the Holy Spirit. It is the bridegroom’s voice which should awaken the soul.”

Andrew Blackwood, in The Fine Art of Public Worship defines worship as humanity’s response to God’s revelation of himself, and states that this response includes

1. A feeling of awe and wonder in the Presence of the Holy God.
2. Confession of sins, personal and social [corporate].
3. The experience of God’s cleansing and redeeming grace.
4. Dedication of the heart and life to God for service in the world.

Isaiah 6:1-8 provides something of a biblical paradigm of worship, with its call and response pattern. God initiates, and humanity responds, leading to further self-revelation from God, and the harnessing of the will in obedient service.

Worship, then, is a divine-human encounter, which on the divine side issues from grace, and on the human side responds with thanksgiving. The history of worship has been the history of divine self-revelation. It is God who sets the parameters of worship and not we ourselves. Karl Barth’s powerful critique of Protestant liberalism was based on the rejection of its anthropological starting point. Liberals began with human religious experience and then extrapolated their theology from that starting point. When they speak of God, Barth claimed, they are really only speaking of humanity in a very loud voice! If our worship is to avoid this error, we must worship from the starting point of God’s own revelation in Christ.

Martin Luther said that the Bible was a harp upon which was played over and over again the same little song – Jesus Christ. Worship is the Church’s song of Christ. Worship that centers only on the Father is not Christian worship but simply Theistic (or even Deistic). Worship that centers only on the Holy Spirit is not Christian worship, but fanaticism. Worship must focus on Jesus Christ, His incarnation, His life, His death, His resurrection, His ascension, His presence in heaven, His presence in our midst, and His coming again. Of course, this is not to deny that Christian worship is Trinitarian, but we know God in Trinity through God the Son. Jesus did not say, “If you have seen the Father you have seen me,” but rather, “If you have seen me you have seen the Father.” We know the Father because he sent his Son. The Holy Spirit comes to speak, not of himself, but of Christ. We are brought into saving relationship to God through Christ. It is Christ who baptizes with the Holy Spirit. We are the Body of Christ. The Church is to be found wherever the risen Christ is present in the midst of the worshipping community.

Worship is a community act; it is ecclesial, that is an activity of the entire family of God. Just as the Passover in Judaism is a family meal recounting deliverance from Egypt, so the Sunday observances is a family gathering recounting the saving deliverance that God, in Christ, has wrought in us. Most of our confusion over worship stems from our confusion over the nature of the Church. Why do we “go to” church? To hear a great sermon, enjoy good music, make new friends, or eat coffee and donuts? We may do all of those things in church and enjoy them, but are these the reasons we go? We could do any of these things at any number of other civic or social clubs or societies. We go to church to be the church, that is to say, as a community, worship God, in Jesus Christ, and through the Holy Spirit.

The Church doesn’t exist for any other purpose than to Worship. Evangelism and social justice are activities that are extensions of the gathering of believers. They are the overflow of the fellowship, and are in fact themselves an expression of worship beyond the gathered meeting time. We often hear it said that today that the Church is the only organization that exists not primarily for the benefit of its members, but for those on the outside. This sounds right at first, but on closer examination, is not quite the truth. The Church exists neither for its own benefit, nor for the benefit of the unevangelized, at least not primarily. Even John Wesley’s dictum, “You have nothing to do but save souls,” is understood wrongly if taken to mean that the Church is nothing more than one great big soul winning machine. Wesley was not addressing the Church as such at all, but his chosen band of itinerant evangelists, all (or most) of whom were already members of the Church of England and expected to engage, along with other Methodists, in the Church’s weekly liturgy. To take advice addressed to a society of evangelists and make of it the reason for the Church’s whole existence, runs the danger of making worship merely a means to an end. Both evangelism and working for social justice and social reform, are outcomes of the liturgy. If they do not spring from a worshipping lifestyle, they may become no more than a species of works-righteousness or workaholism.

So, now we begin to adequately define worship: Christian worship is human response to God’s self-revelation, expressed in celebration of, and thanksgiving for, God’s saving activity in Jesus Christ. From this definition, there is the important matter of of the order, content, and etiquette of worship. However, unless we have this kind of foundation, our worship, though orderly in its own way, and even aesthetically pleasing, and culturally accessible, will nonetheless be something less than Christian worship.

As far as we know music has always been connected with the religious life of humanity. At first the use of music in worship seems to have been “ecstatic” and spontaneous in nature, rather than structured or notated. Later it developed form, with accompanying rules and patterns. We know that in ancient Egypt, small cymbals and more complex instruments such as harps of twelve or thirteen strings were used. The Greeks used music in their worship of the gods, and believed that music had a moral, spiritual, and emotional influence over humans. Plutarch, for example said, “The right molding of ingenuous manners and civil conduct lies in the a well-grounded musical education.”

Music was listed as one of the seven “liberal arts” in the ancient Greek world, along with arithmetic and geometry. It was considered not only something aesthetic but something philosophical and “scientific.” It was under Greek influence that notation and the ordering of a musical system first took place.

Though the Hebrews recognized the impact of music on the emotions, such as when David’s playing lifted the depression of Saul, their primary concern was to utilize music in the worship of Yahweh. “For the Hebrews, the arts obtained significance only as they could be used to adorn the courts of Jehovah or could be employed in the ascription of praise to Him.”

The first mention of music in the Bible is found in Genesis 4:21 where Jubal is said to be the “father of all those who handle the harp [or lyre] and pipe.” There are about thirteen instruments mentioned in the Bible which can be classified into stringed instruments, wind instruments, and percussion instruments.

1. String – kinnor (lyre) and nephel (harp, psaltery (KJV). A ten stringed instrument.

2. Wind – shophar (a ram’s horn), halil ( a double-reed, oboe-like instrument), hazozerah (a metal trumpet), and ugabh (vertical flute).

3. Percussion – toph (tambourine, or hand drum), zelzelim (cymbals), and mena an im (sistrum or rattle).

The first reference to music in worship is found in Exodus 15:1, 20-21 where Moses and Miriam offer thanksgiving to God for the deliverance from Egypt. We note that this was both instrumental and vocal, and included both women and men. Virtually the same narrative found here is delivered again in several Psalms – for example Ps. 78:12-13, 136:10-15.

The words “music,” “musicians,” “musical instruments,” “song,” “singers,” and “singing” appear in the Bible 575 times, in 44 of the 66 books. The whole of the Book of Psalms (150 chapters) is made up entirely of songs, originally used with musical settings. “The psalms were sung in regular sequence following the morning and evening sacrifices on specified days of the week and were accompanied by instruments which occasionally may have interrupted the singing with an interlude, possibly indicated by the word ‘Selah.’”

Erik Routley identifies two worship traditions in the OT: one spontaneous and ecstatic, the other formal and professional. The prophet Samuel is told that he will encounter a “band of prophets” at Gibeah-elohim, who will be playing harp, tambourine, flute, and lyre in “a prophetic frenzy. Then the spirit of the Lord will possess you, and you will be in a prophetic frenzy along with them and be turned into a different person.”

During the period of the judges, music was associated with the ministry of prophets. Much of the material we find in our prophetic books is in poetic style, divided into verses or stanzas, indicating that they may have been originally chanted or sung.

Music was often seen as accompanying a state of religious ecstasy or transport, under which the prophet exercised his gift. For example, on one occasion, Elisha called for a musician and then while the musician played, “the power of the Lord came upon him” and he foretold the impending judgment of God.

The music used in the worship of the tabernacle in the wilderness, its settlement under David, and later the Temple under Solomon is an example of Routley’s second type – formal liturgical music. Here we see a very elaborate development of the musical life of Israel. Remember, David was himself a musician and a composer, and his influence on the Tabernacle worship is pronounced. The Levites, an entire priestly tribe, were given the responsibility of providing musical training for the leadership of these services. Under David, the first large-scale choir and orchestra were organized for use in the Tabernacle worship.

The priest-musicians gave all their time to musical service. They were chosen on the basis of talent, and were provided with thorough training, including a five-year musical apprenticeship before admission to the band. Asaph, Heman, and Jeduthun seemed to be responsible for the Jewish choir as composers and conductors.

Under Solomon the musical grandeur of the nation increased even more. The Jewish historian Josephus records that in the first temple “there were 20,000 trumpets and 200,000 robed singers and instrumentalists, arrayed in white linen gowns, taking part in the service.”

II Chronicles 5:13-14 gives a description of the worship of the Temple, including a large group of singers and instrumentalists clothed in white robes. The worship of this period appealed to all five senses, including visual symbols such as priestly vestments, and candles, smells such as incense and burning animal flesh, tastes such as the shared offerings, and of course, the auditory appeal of music.

After the return from captivity in Babylon, temple worship was restored in the Second Temple. Though the Second Temple was not quite as magnificent as the First, music still played a large part in the services offered there. The Jewish Talmud describes the psalm singing of the Second Temple. At a given sign from the cymbals, twelve Levites stood on the broad staircase leading from the congregation to the court of the priests and played on nine lyres, two harps and one cymbal. As this happened the priests poured out the wine offering. Young Levitical boys added their voices to the treble part. The pauses, or divisions, or “selahs” of the Psalm were indicated by the blast of trumpets to the left and right of the cymbal players.

According to Hustad, “the words of ancient scripture were not to be spoken without melody; to do so was considered to be a minor sacrilege.” The chanting was accompanied by musical instruments, which provided embellishments of the vocal melody. The Psalms often are often constructed in parallel patterns, giving rise to the suggestion that they were originally, sung antiphonally, divided into a “versical” and a “response.” The music was mostly sacerdotal and professional, rather than congregational, though the people would join in traditional responses such as “Amen,” and “Alleluia.”

The most significant religious innovation among the Hebrews after the Babylonian exile, which has continued to this day, is the synagogue. This was developed to maintain a sense of religious identity in the Diaspora, far from the Temple and the homeland. Whether this development took place during the Babylonian captivity, or during the Second Temple period, in lands other than Israel, is disputed.

Because the animal sacrifices could not be offered beyond the Temple, the emphasis on verbal and musical worship was the offering of the “sacrifice of prayer and praise.”
The pattern of synagogue worship, with its reading and teaching of scripture, prayers, and the singing of psalms and canticles, formed the basis of early Christian worship (with the addition, of course, of the Lord's Supper/Communion). Synagogue music was probably led, as it is today, by a cantor - a soloist, probably trained in the Levitical temple service – and included congregational participation, such as responses. Synagogue worship was formal, rather than ecstatic, used a set lectionary of texts, and was based on the liturgical cycle of seasons – the annual cycle of fasts and festivals. Much of this was carried over into Christian worship in its earliest period.

What did all of this sound like? Well, quite unlike anything we hear sung in our churches today. In fact, the music sung and played in the OT would in all likelihood sound quite foreign to our ears and culturally distant, to the point of being jarring to the ears. Some Jewish cantors would claim that the chants heard in the synagogues of today are substantially unchanged since biblical times, because of the strength of oral tradition that has passed it on. Some musicologists believe that Eastern Orthodox chants have preserved much of the original sounds of the OT since the early Christians were keen to preserve the Hebrew music that accompanied the text in synagogue usage.

Eric Werner points out that the consensus among the leading authorities is that the early Hebrew chants were based on four-note chords and melodic patterns, much like Gregorian chants with their narrow range, not exceeding a fourth or fifth. The French musician and scholar Suzanne Haik Vantoura, believes that her research demonstrates that the notations above and below Jewish letters, usually understood as accent marks for chanting, are in fact a system of musical notation. Based on this she has transcribed and recorded several hours of music from the Bible.

According to A. S. Herbert, the connection between the sacrifices, and the musical chanting that accompanied it, did not perform a merely aesthetic function, but was though to effect real religious power. “They are not merely pious reflections, but effective words through which Israel’s ‘soul’ was conveyed to God, and His energy in judgment and renewal was released into Israel’s soul and through that into the world of nature and man.”

Worship, in the New Testament, is “eschatological event,” i.e. it is the celebration of of a new order through which the old cultus is done away. No longer are there holy “places” and “things” but now, all of Creation is made holy through the offering up of the body of Christ once, for all. This new world is announced in the kerugmatik proclamation of Christ’s death, resurrection, and ascension

Worship must edify the congregation. Gifts are to be tested by this criteria and regulated accordingly (14:26). Worship must be intelligible (14:27f), if it is to build community. The charismata are both a sign of the end and a link with the past (13:8) Spiritual gifts, without love are worthless (ch. 13). Worship is to have ordered form (ch. 11). Appropriate attire for worship is based on a principle of culturally determined decorum (11:2-16). Behavior at the Lord’s Supper is based on the principle of orderly and reverent recognition of Christ’s presence in the body (11:17-34).

Proskeuneo – “to fall down before, to prostrate, like a dog licks the hand of its master.” This is to be offered to God alone (Matt 4:10; Luke 4:8). It is offered to Christ in Hebrews 1:6. It is to be offered “in spirit and in truth” (John 4:21-24). It is a heavenly activity (Rev. 4:10).

Sebomai – “to revere, to adore.” This may be offered in vain (Matthew 15:9) and contrary to God’s law (Acts 18:13).

Latreuo – “to minister, to serve.” This involves the consecration of the whole person (Romans 12:1). It should be “by [or “in”] the Spirit” (Philippians 3:3).

Worship is “drawing near to God” and worship that is acceptable is characterized by reverence and awe (Hebrews 10:1). [The word “worship” doesn’t appear here in the Greek but is implied].

1. Worship must centre on the person and work of Christ.
2. The sacraments are eschatological in nature, declaring the end of the old cultus.
3. Worship may be either “formal” or “informal” so long as it is orderly.
4. Worship is a “whole-of-life orientation toward God.”
5. Congregational worship aims at the use of spiritual gifts for the purpose of edification (1 Corinthians).
6. Worship must focus on the finished work of Christ as the basis of the Christian’s pilgrimage (Hebrews).

The NT story opens with the song of angels – “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace among those whom he favors!” (Luke 2:14). Christians have much to sing about and the joy of salvation has always found expression in music and song. The chief source of NT and Early Church music was the Psalms. Certain New Testament texts, known as “canticles” were also adopted early and used in the liturgy.

a. The Magnificat (Mary’s Song) – Luke 1:46-55, “My soul doth magnify the Lord...”

b. The Benedictus (Zecharia’s Song) – Luke 1:68-79, “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel...”

c. The Gloria in Excelsis (the Angels’ Song) – Luke 2:14, “Glory to God in the Highest...”

d. The Nunc Dimittis (Simeon’s Song) – Luke 2:29, “Now lettest thy servant depart in peace…”

Psalms are clearly the Jewish Psalter. Hymns are probably new songs which expressed the Christology of the early church. Fragments of early Christian hymns may include 1 Timothy 3:16; 2 Timothy 2:11-13; Ephesians 5:14; Philippians 2:6-11. “Spiritual songs” may have been spontaneous songs as an extension of the “alleluia” at the end of a chant, or something more like the singing in a charismatic services today, whether glossalalic or non-glossalalic. St. Augustine spoke about the practice of “Jubilation.” “It is a certain sound of joy without words…it is the expression of a mind poured forth in joy…A person rejoicing in exultation, after certain words which cannot be…understood, bursts forth into sounds of exultation without words so that it seems he…filled with excessive joy cannot express in words the subject of that joy.”

The NT is unfortunately silent about musical instruments. We know that instrumental music was phased out of Jewish synagogue worship during the Second Temple period, because of its association with both pagan worship and the worship of heretical Jewish sects. By the time of Christ, only stringed instruments were used in Temple worship. After the destruction of the Second Temple in AD 70, all instrumental music ceased. There is neither prescription nor prohibition in the NT.

It as an expression of joy in James 5:15. Paul expresses a concern that singing be both spiritual and intellectual –in 1 Cor. 14:15. Songs are a teaching device according to Col. 3:16 (though altered punctuation can change the meaning of this verse entirely.) Praise songs may be seen simply as an act of worship to God in Hebrews 13:15. Singing must be an expression of the heart, according to Eph 5:19b and Col. 3:16b.

In the Australian Wesleyan editorial on Singing in the Australian Church (Issue 4 1999 Volume 11 No. 4, pp.23-25), the author of the article makes a number of assertions which I believe are open to question. The two central ideas of the article are 1)That congregational singing is a cultural construct and thus not a biblically mandated aspect of worship and 2) That public singing is not a part of Australian culture. The conclusion drawn from these premises is that we should consider minimizing the amount of congregational singing in our services, since the average Australian would find such activity either meaningless or uncomfortable.

Though the editor makes the first assertion, he then proceeds to cite a number of biblical references which do indeed seem to mandate congregational singing. The Psalms are full of exhortations for the people of God to sing. These are addressed, in the most part, as imperatives intended for the third person plural. In fact, the Book of Psalms was the song book of ancient Israel, as the author of the article points out. It is a liturgical document – a songbook. Of what use is a songbook if it is not be sung from? The author states that “There are numerous accounts [in the Old Testament] of songs that were sung by the Israelites. Many were sung either by individuals or by a small group of people. There are only a few references that speak of all Israel singing.” If there are only a few references (and I am not so sure they are as “few” as all that) then that is enough. How many commands must there be in order for a command to constitute a mandated behavior?

The author refers to Paul’s command to the Colossians that they should “sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, with gratitude in your hearts to God (Col. 3:16).” This exhortation is actually repeated in almost identical words to the Ephesian church, only here the congregational nature of the singing is made more evident. They are to sing such songs “among yourselves (Eph. 5:19).” If this is not congregational singing, I would like to know what is. Most New Testament scholars are in agreement that certain passages in the New Testament are in fact fragments of early hymns, providing a fascinating insight into the liturgy of the earliest Christians. These passages include the so-called “kenosis” passage of Philippians 2:1-10, and the great creedal confessional songs of 1 Timothy 2:5, 1 Timothy 3:16, and 2 Timothy 2:11-13. It is for this reason that most modern translations set these kinds of passages off in “poetic” indentation – to make their literary type clear. One of the earliest secular witnesses, (Pliny), to what Christians did when they came together says that Christians gathered early on the morning of the first day of the week, “to sing songs to Christ as to a god.” Thank God they still do it today!

Nothing could be more destructive to the nature of true worship than the proposal suggested in the article that “churches need to sing to the congregation, but allow the individual in the congregation to sing along if they want to – more like the rock concert form.” Worship is the work of the people. It is to be participatory if it is to achieve its desired end of glorifying God and building up the body of Christ. Two historical examples of the destructive tendency of a “spectator” approach to worship come to mind at this point. One is the Medieval Mass during which the priest performed a rite before the congregation, while they sat as mute spectators. Another is drawn from nineteenth century Protestantism, most especially in America, where paid choirs were often hired to sing to the congregation as they sat down and passively observed. One of the great aspects of worship renewal in more contemporary times, among both Protestants and Catholics, has been the insistence on a participatory form of worship in which, not just the clergy, but all the people of God have their role to play. There will always be those who can’t sing or won’t sing in our worship services. We need not interfere with these people or make them feel badly. Just because they feel they “can’t sing” (and most people who feel that way actually don’t sing too badly) doesn’t mean that they do not participate in and enjoy congregational singing at some level.

Now to the second assertion – that group singing is foreign to the Australian culture. One might well ask, “So what?” So is praying, reading the Bible, paying tithes, taking bread and wine in remembrance of Christ's death and immersing people in water. Does that mean we should quit doing such things? These are at least as “alien,” and some are more so, to the average Australian, than group singing. We do “the average Australian” (whatever that means in a nation as culturally diverse as Australia) a great disservice when we assume that he or she knows nothing about religious activity or what is likely to happen in a church service. They may not understand the precise meaning of the acts they observe in a typical church on a Sunday morning (nor would many Christians for that matter), but they are not so stupid as all that. I would say that the “average Australian” who is not a Christian would enter a worship service knowing that there would be some things they would not understand, and some religious behaviors with which they were not going to be as familiar as a regular worshipper. They would expect this and probably bring with them a natural curiosity, and may even find the “strangeness” appealing and worth investigating. If a visitor receives a loving welcome from a community of transformed individuals expressing the love of Christ, the “style” of worship will not be a problem to them. If they do not, then no amount of “seeker sensitivity” is going to make them feel welcome.

It is more than a little strange that this editorial should appear in a Wesleyan publication! Hymns, music, and song are vital aspects of our tradition and a priceless heritage given to us to share with the rest of the church and with all the world. With all due respect to the editor, whom I respect as a colleague in the ministry, and love as a brother in Christ, I fear he has overstated his case here and overlooked some vital truths about worship.

In the first century church there were two Lord’s Day meetings. The earliest Christians were Jews, and continued for a time to worship on the Sabbath (Saturday) and then to gather again on the first day of the week (Sunday) to celebrate the resurrection of Christ from the dead. The morning service (pre-dawn or at dawn) was made up of a simple service of scripture reading, exhortation by the leading presbyter (elder), prayers and singing, and was equivalent in many ways to the well established patterns of the Jewish synagogue. Then a second service was held, in the evening, the agape (love feast), which was a Eucharistic service.

The Roman governor, Pliny, in writing to the emperor Trajan, to seek advice on how he should treat those who had been arrested on the charge of being Christian, gave a brief description of the way Christians worshipped at this time. It is an important early, secular, reference to Christian worship.

They declared that the sum of their guilt or error had amounted only to this, that on an appointed day they had been accustomed to meet before daybreak, and to recite a hymn antiphonally to Christ, as to a god, and to bind themselves by an oath [sacramentum], not for the commission of any crime but to abstain from theft, robbery, adultery and breach of faith, and not to deny a deposit when it was claimed. After the conclusion of this ceremony it was their custom to depart and meet again to take food; but it was ordinary and harmless food, and they had ceased this practice after my edict in which, in accordance with your orders, I had forbidden secret societies. I thought it the more necessary, therefore, to find out what truth there was in this by applying torture to two maidservants, who were called deaconesses. But I found nothing but a depraved and arrogant superstition, and I therefore postponed my examination and had recourse to you for consultation.

By the second century the “love feast” had been dropped, and the Eucharist had been brought into the morning service. Justin Martyr (c. 100-165) in his First Apology gives a fascinating description of the worship of this period. The fact that Christians met in secret gave rise to much suspicion. What was a “love feast”? Was it some kind of sexual orgy? What does it mean to say that they eat the flesh and drink the blood of their founder? Are they cannibals? Christians kept quiet for the most part, but Justin was the first to come right out into the open with the pagans and describe exactly what it was that Christians did behind closed doors. He describes baptism and how the newly baptized are brought to their first communion. Bread, and wine mixed with water are brought to the presbyter, who offers thanks for them to the Trinity. After this prayer, the congregation responds with “Amen.” The deacons then distribute the bread and wine to those assembled, and also to those who are absent.

This food we call Eucharist, of which no one is allowed to partake except one who believes that the things we teach are true, and has received the washing for forgiveness of sins and for rebirth, and who lives as Christ handed down to us. For we do not receive these things as common bread or common drink; but as Jesus Christ our Savior being incarnate by God’s word took flesh and blood for our salvation, so also we have been taught that the food consecrated by the word of prayer which comes from him, from which our flesh and blood are nourished by transformation, is the flesh and blood of that Incarnate Jesus.

He then speaks of the Gospels as the “memoirs” of the Apostles and recounts Jesus’ words of institution, given in the Last Supper as recounted by Paul in 1 Corinthians 11:23-25 (“Do this for my memorial, this is my body…this is my blood”). After these services, the Christians are said to “constantly remind each other of these things.

And on the day called Sunday there is a meeting in one place of those who live in cities or the country, and the memoirs of the apostles [i.e. the Gospels] or the writings of the prophets [i.e. the Old Testament] are read as long as time permits. When the reader has finished, the president [presbyter] in a discourse urges…the imitation of these noble things. Then we all stand up together and offer prayers. [Here a description of the Eucharistic service, similar to that already given is repeated.] Those who prosper, and who so wish, contribute, each one as much as he chooses to. What is collected is deposited with the president, and he takes care of orphans and widows, and those who are in want on account of sickness or any other cause…

One is struck in this description by the great similarity between the early church’s worship practices and those that have continued until today.

1. Contrary to the claims of some Adventist groups that the early Christian did not meet on Sunday until Constantine decreed Sunday a day of worship in the fourth century, Justin makes it clear in this early second century source, that Sunday, not the Jewish Saturday Sabbath was the Christian day of worship. “We all hold this common gathering on Sunday,” he writes, “since it is the first day, on which God transforming darkness and matter made the universe, and Jesus Christ rose from the dead on the same day. For they crucified him on the day before Saturday, and on the day after Saturday, he appeared to his apostles and disciples and taught them theses things which I have passed on to you for your consideration.”

3. The presbyter [president or pastor] then gives a sermon, “ a discourse urging the imitation of these noble things.”

4. Prayers are offered, interestingly, from a standing position, the stance of the resurrection. This is still the practice in many churches today and in Evangelical Protestant churches, where Orthodoxy has been widespread, indicating a continuation of the practice from earliest times.

6. A free will offering is taken, and proportional giving {from “those who prosper”) is accepted, and distributed to those in need.

One final ancient source on the worship of the early church is The Didache. [“The Teaching”] This anonymous source was not discovered until 1873 but is believed by most scholars either to be the oldest surviving piece of Christian literature outside of the New Testament, or at very least to date as early as the mid-second century. It discusses baptismal practices, insisting that baptism should be “in the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit.” Baptism should be by immersion in running water, if possible, otherwise by immersion in ordinary (standing) water. If immersion is not possible, sprinkling water on the head three times in the Triune Name is acceptable. Fasting should precede baptism.

Sadly, a note of anti-Judaism (if not anti-Semitism) is apparent in the insistence that since the “hypocrites” (i.e. Jews) fasted on Mondays and Thursdays, Christians should fast instead on Wednesdays and Fridays.

The praying of the Lord’s Prayer three times a day is urged upon believers. A sample of a Eucharistic prayer is given, and the insistence that only the baptized should partake. This is a formal, written, prayer, but it is interesting to note also that “charismatists [the Greek reads “prophets”] should be free to give thanks as they please.” This indicates that there was a place both for formal liturgical prayers, and for spontaneous extemporary prayers. These were not considered, as they sometimes are today, to be mutually exclusive forms of prayer

Regulations for the use of the spiritual gifts of traveling missionaries or evangelists [Greek: “apostles”] and “charismatists” [Greek: “prophets”] are then given, designed to weed out impostors and charlatans. “If any charismatist, speaking in a trance, says ‘Give me money (or anything else)’, do not listen to him. On the other hand, if he bids you give it to someone else who is in need, nobody should criticize him.” How would today’s televangelist survive if this rule were enforced today?

Tithing is urged as the method of giving, and the day of worship is said to be “the Lord’s Day” and to include the celebration of the Eucharist, preceded by confession of sins and reconciliation between offended parties. “Overseers” [Greek: episkopoi] and “assistants” [Greek: diakanoi or “deacons”] are to be chosen from among the congregation, on the basis of character qualities, and are to be held in high regard. Finally, “In your prayers, your almsgiving, and everything you do, be guided by what you read in the Gospel of our Lord.”

By the third century, we see the development of the Episcopal system of a “three-fold order” of bishops, priests, and deacons. The presbyters (“priests”) began to be seen as serving less of a prophetic function, and more as stewards of the “mysteries” [sacraments] of God. Baptism was usually performed at Easter, after a lengthy period of preparation, including fasting. Catechumens were increasingly separated from the baptized worshippers, congregating in the porch of the nave.

During the periodic times of fierce persecution, Christians in Rome met in underground burial chambers (catacombs), where they also interred their dead. These were made up of miles of passages, 20 – 50 feet below ground. After Constantine’s Edict of Milan in 313, guaranteeing freedom of worship for Christians, worship became legal and congregations larger. The “basilica” model was adopted for churches. A basilica was “a rectangular hall with a semi-circular niche or ‘apse’ opening off one of the shorter sides. Inside it was divided by two, and sometimes four, rows of columns into a wider central space and two or four parallel long narrow spaces…various forms of basilica were commonly built to accommodate crowds attending a law court, market or any kind of assembly.”

The liturgy still included much extemporary prayer and exhortation by the local bishop, but worship patterns became increasingly more fixed. The “Words of Institution” at the Lord’s Supper have a more or less fixed shape, but with important regional variations. The “Holy, Holy, Holy” of Isaiah 6 is widely incorporated into the Eucharist. Trinitarian doxologies appear at the end of prayers.

Early creeds develop, arising out of the vows made at Baptism. The Creed we now know as The Apostles Creed originally began as a simple expression of praise before the Lordship of Jesus Christ. By the second century, creeds were being used as a symbol or rule of faith for believers. Justin Martyr insists on the candidate for baptism professing to believe and live by the truth. Irenaeus speaks of “the canon of truth which everyone received at his baptism. Creeds were also used in connection with the rite of baptism. In both Hippolytus and Tertullian we find descriptions of a three-fold dipping corresponding to a three-fold interrogation oriented around the three persons of the Trinity. The candidate replies Credo (“I believe”) after each question is put. In the fourth and fifth centuries this threefold interrogation began to be elaborated into a rudimentary creed. The Nicene Creed was based on these earlier baptismal confessions, “amplified with Christological and pneumatological specificities to establish orthodoxies (true worship) against the false worship of the Arians...As such the Nicene Creed became a mark of catholic and orthodox identity, but it was also deeply evangelical because it summarized the gospel story of Jesus.”

The celebration of Christmas Day was adopted around 350 AD, but was originally part of the much longer season of Epiphany. Sunday was declared a holiday by Constantine, in 321 AD, but, as noted earlier, it had been the Christians’ day of worship since the earliest times. Sunday became increasingly more of a festival day. Practices such as the burning of incense, the carrying of candles as a mark of honor, and the curtaining off of the altar, are thought by some to be pagan and secular imports into the liturgy. However, it should also be noted that such practices are also grounded in Old Testament precedents.

Easter was extended into week-long festival (Holy Week), including Palm Sunday (commemorating Jesus’ entry to Jerusalem on a donkey), Maundy Thursday (commemorating the Last Supper and the institution of the Lord’s Supper, and Good Friday (commemorating the death of Christ). Lent was established as a long forty-day period (excluding Sundays) of fasting and self-denial in preparation for Easter.

Where the earliest liturgies were in Greek, now we read of Latin, Syriac, Coptic, and other language variants. Eventually Latin will replace Greek almost exclusively (at least in the West). Regional differences led to some degree of discontinuity. For example, footwashing was practiced in Milan, but not in Rome. Powerful churches such as Rome attempted to enforce liturgical conformity but there was strong regional resistance.

Preaching was very popular in the fourth century, and some of the great preachers, such as John Chrysostom in the East and Amrose in the West, would be cheered (and sometimes booed!) by their congregations. On one occasion, Chrysostom (whose name means “golden mouth”) rebuked the congregation for applauding his performance as a preacher. He did it so eloquently that they responded by cheering him!

The Arian Controversy and the great Councils that arose in response to it, contributed to the liturgy of the church in the following ways:

1. A greater use of creeds in worship, and in particular the addition of the Creed to the Eucharist, whereas formerly its place had been more or less confined to the baptismal rite.

2. Revision of the Gloria Patri [“Glory to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit…”] so as to ensure a proper stress on the coequality of each Person of the Holy Trinity.

3. A tendency to overstress the Divine Majesty of Christ, and his role as Judge, at the expense of his Humanity, and his role as Redeemer, with a corresponding drop in the numbers attending the Eucharist, for fear of offending the Royal Host.

4. Establishment, through a link with the Lunar cycle, of the forty days of Lent with its ensuing pattern of darkness and light, Holy Week and Easter Week, fasting and feasting.

5. Development of the festivals of Christmas and Epiphany, with a stress on the Incarnation of Christ.

6. Greater devotion to Mary as Theotokos [The “God-Bearer’] and the four great Marian feasts of the Assumption, the Nativity, the Annunciation, and the Purification, each set in a profoundly Christological setting.

These centuries see an increased distance between the Western Catholic and Eastern Orthodox wings of the Church. The East was generally more fixed in its liturgy, yet at the same time, allowed great regional diversity. No two Eucharistic services were identical, but there were certain more or less fixed elements, such as the Preface, and the Words of Institution. An increased number of festivals and saint’s days were added to the Church Calendar, such that it became very cluttered. A certain morbid interest in relics continued to develop. The division between clergy and laity was accentuated. The use of images and statues was on the rise. Additional sacraments were added – marriage, penance, ordination, confirmation, extreme unction – to Baptism and Eucharist. The Eucharist became increasingly to be viewed, almost exclusively, in terms of sacrifice, rather than in its memorial aspects. Sacerdotalism rapidly developed. This was the idea that the sacraments were only effective by virtue of the priestly office. No priest meant no Mass, and therefore no worship and no available grace. The veneration of Mary and of the saints meant that where prayers were once offered through them, now they began to be offered to them, such that they begin to be seen as functioning in a kind of mediatorial way. The people had given up the Roman style of dress, but the priests retained it, thus increasing through dress, the distance between clergy and laity.

Music in the Early Church

We have seen how the Younger Pliny of Bithynia wrote to the Emperor Trajan in 112 AD and described the coming together of Christians before daylight to sing hymns to Christ “as unto a god.” So we know that sung music was part of the church’s worship at that time.

“The music of the earliest Christian churches was entirely vocal, with little regard for instruments of any kind. In fact, the early church fathers, such as Clement of Alexandria, St. Chrysostom, St. Ambrose, [and] St. Augustine, strongly denounced the use of instruments with sacred singing.” To this day there is no instrumental use in Orthodox churches. Clement of Alexandria in particular rejected any music associated with erotic dances. The melodies used should avoid certain intervals and be solemn and austere. All dancing was forbidden, and Chrysostom brought his considerable homiletical ability to bear in opposing it.

Synagogue chants and antiphonal (responsive) chants were adopted early. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan, born in Treves, France c. 340 AD, did much to encourage congregational singing and is associated with the “Ambrosian Chant” which was a forerunner to the better known Gregorian Chant. He was concerned especially with combating Arianism through protest hymns.

Some did oppose music all together, but for the most part it was encouraged. Augustine records how moving he found the Psalm chants in use in Milan, but was concerned that he might be guilty of the grave fault of finding the music more important to him than the words.

Christ is risen: the world below is in ruins.
Christ is risen: the spirits of evil are fallen.
Christ is risen: the angels of God are rejoicing.
Christ is risen: the tombs are void of their dead.
Christ indeed has arisen from the dead, the first of the sleepers.
Glory and power are his forever. Amen.

May none of God’s wonderful works keep silence, night and morning.
Bright stars, high mountains, the depths of the seas, sources of rushing rivers:
May all these break into song as we sing to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.
May all the angels in the heavens reply: Amen! Amen! Amen!
Power, praise, honour, eternal glory to God, the only giver of grace.
Amen! Amen! Amen!

Bridle-bit of untamed colts,
Wing of birds that do not go astray,
Sure Tiller of ships,
Shepherd of the King’s lambs!
Gather your children who live in simplicity.
Let them sing in holiness.
Let them celebrate with sincerity,
With a mouth that knows no evil,
The Christ who guides his children!
O King of the saints,
O sovereign Word of the Most High Father,
Prince of wisdom,
Support of toiling men,
Eternal joy of the human family,
O Jesus, Saviour

The medieval period tends to be viewed according to two extremes. Either it is a great golden age when the Church was at the peak of its glory, strength and majesty, or it is a time of superstition, decline, false doctrine and idolatry. Neither view is accurate, for like any period it has its high and low moments.

As Christianity spread, on the back of the Roman Empire, into pagan lands, it could not successfully resist the influence of paganism. Pagan practices connected to Spring festivals, for example, entered into the Christian observation of Easter. But are these examples of the Church being “polluted” by pagan elements, or are they signs of the Church’s triumph over paganism, taking pagan symbols and investing them with Christian significance, thus triumphing over them? Debate continues over this important question. It is my opinion that to bring idols into the camp of God only weakens the people of God.

One of the greatest “worship wars” to shake the Medieval Church was the Iconoclastic Controversy in the eight century. Leo III (717-740) outlawed the use of icons in 725. He wanted to purify the church from what he saw as “superstition” and he also had a political motive. He wanted a united empire and icons were offensive to Jews and Moslems alike, as well as to “gnostic sects, such as the Manichaens and the Paulicians, who idealised the “spirituality” of religion. The Hellenistic Christian sect of “Origenism” stressed “the intellectual and spiritual world of pure spirit…The image [it was believed] stands in the way of, rather than being a ladder to, that world.”

Both monks and ordinary people revolted against this ban. Leo sent out troops to enforce his decree. Meanwhile, back in Rome, a Synod was called in 731, under Pope Gregory III, which asserted the validity of images and excommunicated all opponents of icons. Leo’s successor, his son Constantine V, pursued his father’s policy even more vigorously. At a Synod in Constantinople in 754, images were again condemned because they “draw down the spirit of man from the lofty adoration of God to the low and material adoration of the creature.” In this controversy, the papacy tore itself away from Eastern emperors and the already-existing gap between East and West was significantly widened.

The greatest theologian of the age, John of Damascus, contributed significantly to the debate over icons, speaking persuasively in their defense. His Fountain of Knowledge is a complete systematic theology of eighth century Eastern Orthodoxy.

Constantine VI, whose mother was a “patron of pictures,” called a General Council in Nicaea in 787. This is considered by Orthodox Christians to be the last recognized ecumenical council. It asserted that icons “should be given due salutation and honorable reverence, not indeed that true worship which pertains alone to the divine nature…For the honor which is paid to the image passes on to that which the image represents, and he who shows reverence to the image shows reverence to the subject represented in it.” “Hence there triumphed the principle that the divine is not remote from the material world; but as in the Incarnation, the latter can be the medium of access to God.” This is the position of many orthodox churches as well as the Catholic church today, that the images are worthy and pass on to worship ultimately the Creator. This is a false teaching and should be treated as such.

The Church continued to intensify its collection and veneration of relics, the adoration of images, pilgrimages to holy sites, and developed more and more fanciful legends of the miracles of the saints. There was in all this a defective, and yet a real, piety. Fisher gives a fascinating study of contrasts as he describes the medieval period in the following excerpt.

One is struck by the strong contrasts that present themselves in every province of mediaeval life, and lend to it a picturesque character. By the side of the brilliant attire of the prince and of the bishop, we see the coarse frock of the monk and the rags of the peasant. In the vicinity of the mighty cathedral, whose spires rise above the tallest trees of the forest, are the mean dwellings of the mechanic and the peasant’s miserable hovel. Associated with mail-clad nights, whose trade is war and whose delight is in combat, are the men whose sacred vocation forbids the use of force altogether. Through lands overspread with deeds of violence, the lonely wayfarer with the staff and badge of a pilgrim passes unarmed and in safety. In sight of castles, about whose walls fierce battles rage, are the church and the monastery, within the precincts of which quiet reigns, and all violence is branded as sacrilege. There is a like contrast when we look at the inmost spirit and temper of different classes. On the one had there is flagrant wickedness, the very thought of which excites horror. On the other hand we meet with examples of sanctity that command, in the most enlightened days, the deepest reverence of all who value Christian excellence. The middle ages are commonly designated the “ages of faith.” Doubt as to the reality of things divine was an infrequent intruder. When it came, it was repelled as a messenger of Satan. A sense of the nearness of the supernatural world and of its beings, good and evil, that belonged to it, possessed all minds. A thin veil divided the realms unseen from the visible world, and that veil might at any moment part for the free ingress of invisible agents. Every thought on divine things, every aspiration, every fear, was bodied forth in symbols. Prayer and praise, religious ceremonies, sacred festivals and pageants, formed an atmosphere in which the entire community lived and breathed.

Much speculation existed regarding the precise hierarchy of angels. The air swarmed with spirits both divine and malignant. Demons assumed grotesque forms in church architecture and in art. In popular mythology, the devil developed horns, a tail, and cloven feet. Belief in the efficacy of magic spells was widespread.

In the 12th century the Gothic style of tall rising spires and arches, supported by “flying buttresses” to distribute the weight to enable much higher structures, replaced the older basilica style. Left and right wings were added to the basilica pattern to provide more room, and, perhaps inadvertently to form the shape of a cross. Cathedral construction could be the work of several generations, providing employment for the entire town. “The people of all classes combined in a common enthusiasm of sincere devotion, everyone giving or doing what he could to carry upwards the walls and towers, and tom perfect with elaborate art every part of God’s earthly dwelling.”

Some of the theological debates of the period seem a little ludicrous, such as the “grave and heated” debate over whether or not the elements of the Mass were assimilated by the digestive organ, and the now proverbial, “how many angels can dance on the head of a pin.” In fact they were often quite profound discussions of the nature of reality.

The precise number of the sacraments was never fully decided upon until the Council of Florence, in 1439, fixed them at seven in number. Augustine, in the fifth century, had referred to up to 30 things as a “sacrament”! Peter Lombard listed the sacraments as seven in number in his Sentences, a medieval textbook for theological students, still; recommended for use during the Reformation period (16th Century). Sacraments were seen, not only as signs, but as vehicles of grace. The doctrine of “transubstantiation,” based on the Aristotelian distinction between “substance” and “accidence,” replaced the earlier Augustinian view. The elements of the Eucharist were said to be “changed” during the Mass, such that the accidents” (bread and wine) remained the same, but the “essence” was transformed into the body and blood of Christ. In cathedral services, a bell would tinkle to announce the “miracle” of transformation for the benefit of those in the more remote parts of the building. Children were banned from participation in the Mass, lest the elements be spilled. Eventually the cup was withheld from the laity for the same reason. Thomas Aquiinas developed the doctrine of “concomitance,” which stated that the bread was “accompanied by” the blood, as well as by the body, of Christ. Transubstantiation was declared an official dogma, by Pope Innocent III, in 1215.

The major fault of medieval worship is that the Mass virtually eclipsed the didactic elements of worship. Preaching and teaching were given a subsidiary, almost non-existent, role in the liturgy. Some objected to this trend. The Dominican, Humbert de Romanis, said that Christ celebrated the Mass only once (referring to the institution of the Lord’s Supper), but spent his life preaching. Interestingly, the great philosophical theologian, Thomas Aquinas, though he wrote in Latin, preached to the people in the “vulgar” tongue – Italian. This was also a flowering age of religious verse, much of which was turned into hymnody. Among the medieval hymns that have survived in use today, some of the most commonly found are those of Bernard of Clairveaux, such as Jesu the Joy of Loving Hearts, Jesus, the Very Thought of You, and O Sacred Head Once Wounded.

An often forgotten element of medieval worship is the use of religious drama. The old pagan dramas had been stamped out, and been replaced by Mystery Plays (which focused on Jesus’ life and passion) and Miracle Plays (which focused on the exploits of the apostles). These were at first composed and performed by the clergy, the church building serving as the performance space. Sadly, such plays were excluded from the church, in 1210, by Pope Innocent III. Drama was then taken over by the secular performance artists, who began to satirize the church and its clergy. Eventually, in England, this art form would develop into the Elizabethan dramatic art of Shakespeare. A lesson to be drawn here is that that which is forced out of the church or boycotted by the church (for example, television and cinema in our own time) is often taken over by secular and demonic forces and used against the church and its message.

The whole period may be characterized by depths of depravity and at the same time, heights of sanctity. Our own age is often marked by the former, whilst the latter is conspicuously absent. Given that most Protestants tend to have a very negative view of the medieval period (and doubtless there is much to be concerned about), for the sake of balance I include here a very positive description provided by the nineteenth century Anglican priest, John Henry Newman, who later converted to Catholicism and became a Cardinal. Admittedly it is a rather idealized portrait, as are Protestant portraits of the Reformation period, but one does sense the appeal of a “Christian Europe” such as is described here.

The fair form of Christianity rose up and grew and expanded like a beautiful pageant, from north to south; it was majestic, it was solemn, it was bright, it was beautiful and pleasant, it was soothing to the griefs, it was indulgent to the hopes of man; it was at once a teaching and a worship; it had a dogma, a mystery, a ritual of its own; it had a hierarchical form. A brotherhood of holy pastors, with mitre and crosier, and uplifted hand, walked forth and blessed and ruled a joyful people. The crucifix headed the procession, and simple monks were there with hearts in prayer, and sweet chants resounded, and the holy Latin tongue was heard, and boys came forth in white, swinging censers, and the fragrant cloud arose, and mass was sung, and the saints were invoked; and day after day, and in the still night, and over the woody hills and in the quiet plains, as constantly as sun, and moon and stars go forth in heaven, so regular and solemn was the stately march of blessed services of earth, high festival, and gorgeous procession, and soothing dirge, and passing bell, and the familiar evening call to prayer; till he who recollected the old pagan time would think it all unreal that he beheld and heard, and would conclude he did but see a vision, so marvelously was heaven let down upon earth, so triumphantly were chased away the fiends of darkness to their prison below.

•The Low Mass (Missa Lecta) was spoken.
•The Sung Mass (Missa Cantata) became the main Sunday mass in a parish church.
•The High Mass or Festival Mass (Missa Solemnis) was also sung, often with a choir.

While the Roman Mass limited singing to the clergy, a much greater congregational participation was evident in the German Church of the Middle Ages. Many melodies of popular origin were sung during penitential processions and pilgrimages. The Scandinavian regions were evangelized primarily by the German Church, and also gave rise to some wonderful sung music.

•Kyrie
•Gloria in excelsis Deo
•Credo
•Sanctus et Benedictus
•Agnus Dei
•These five have been put to music by great masters such as Palestrina, Bach, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, and Stravinsky.

The Eastern Liturgy remained non-instrumental up to the present day. Basic organs began to appear in the West in the eighth century. By the twelfth century their use in the Mass was common. At first, the organ was used to set the pitch for unaccompanied chants and choral parts. It then developed a repertoire of its own, playing responses to portions of the sung Mass, and finally became a solo instrument in its own right.

Monastic prayer centered around seven times of prayer each day, known as the “hours.” The Psalms and Canticles played a large part in these times of worship.

–Matins/Lauds (before dawn)
–Prime (6 am)
–Terce (9am)
–Sext (noon)
–None (3pm)
–Vespers (6pm)
–Compline (before bed)

St. Francis of Assisi (1182-1226) wrote many vernacular hymns of praise called laude, influenced by the style of the French troubadours. Later these developed into more complex songs using folk song tunes and dance melodies. German Geisslerieder were sung by 14th century flagellants. Leisen were crusading or pilgrim songs, sung in processional litanies. The visionary mystic, Hildegard of Bingen (1098-1197) used extended melody lines based on plainchant, and incorporating “ecstatic melismata” (jubilation). Hildegard’s music is the earliest recognizable body of composed music by an identifiable author.

Exposure to the Middle Eastern Islamic culture, as a result of the Crusades, is reflected in the musical styles of the medieval period. Giovanni da Palestrina (c. 1525-1594) was a great Italian composer whose polyphonic music is some of the most complex ever written. The Missa Papae Marcelli is one of his most famous masses. Composed in 1567 it was “described as a totally new style.” William Byrd (1543-1623), writing during the Reformation (late medieval) period, wrote music for the Catholic Mass as well as for the reformed Anglican rite.

Only what is expressly condemned in scripture should be excluded from worship.
(Luther’s position)

Only what is expressly commended in scripture should be included in worship.
(Calvin’s position)

Luther defined the Church as that company of people wherein the Word of God is rightly preached and the sacraments rightly administered. Worship, therefore, was essentially a matter of Word and Table in the centre of the Baptized community.

He was critical of the worship practices of his time. “There is today in the churches, a great ringing of bells, blowing of trumpets, singing, shouting, and intoning, yet I fear precious little worship of God… To think to worship God with many words and a great noise is to count Him either deaf or ignorant, and to suppose we must waken or instruct Him. Such an opinion of God tends to His shame and dishonor rather than to His worship.” The devil would fear a “pig-sty” where prayer was truly offered more than all the “high and beautiful churches, towers and bells in existence, if such prayer be not in them.”

At first, Luther simply used a shortened version of the Roman Mass. In his first liturgy, Formula missae et communionis (1523), hymns, scripture readings, and sermon are to be in German, Latin was retained for the rest. His later German Mass, the Deutscher messe (1526), was more radical. The whole of the service is in the vernacular (German), though the Greek of the Kyrie eleison is retained. Both of Luther’s masses were used in Lutheran churches. The more formal Formula missae tended to be used in cathedral and collegiate settings, and the Deutsche messe in smaller towns and villages.

According to Luther, the worship of God is two-fold. It has both outward and inward components. It arises out of the experience of God’s grace. Variations in the liturgy are quite acceptable. Each one should be convinced in his or her own mind and give liberty to others. After all, it is not external rites that commend us to God but faith and love.

Even if different people make use of different rites, let no one either judge or despise the other; but let each one abound in his own opinion, and let them understand and know even if they do differently; and let each one’s rite be agreeable to the other, lest diverse opinions and sects yield diverse uses, just as happened in the Roman Church. For external rites, even if we are not able to do without them, - just as we cannot do without food and drink, - nevertheless, do not commend us to God, just as food and drink does not commend us to God. Wherefore, let this word of Paul govern here: The kingdom of God is not food and drink, but righteousness, peace, and joy in the Holy Spirit. Thus no rite is the Kingdom of God, but faith within you, etc.

Luther was keen to eliminate the overcrowding of the Christian calendar with saints days. Instead of such days being used for devout exercises they tended to be used in “loafing, gluttony, and drunkenness, gambling and other evil deeds; and then the mass and the sermon are listened to without edification, the prayer is spoken without faith…It is all so formal and superficial!”

Ceremonies are likened by Luther to the models and plans of builders. They are important, but they are not the actual building. If a builder spent all of his life admiring his plans and drawings and models, and never got around to building anything, would we not think him crazy? Yet some approach worship in this manner.

Luther does not see himself as abolishing the whole of the medieval cultus and starting from scratch. He is not a liturgical “restorationist” or iconoclast, but one who sees himself as standing within the catholic liturgical tradition. Unlike the English Puritans, it is not his wish to “demolish idols” and begin again, but to purify that order of worship, which is currently in use.

It is not now, nor has it ever been, in our mind to abolish entirely the whole formal cultus of God, but to cleanse that which is in use, which has been vitiated by most abominable additions, and to point out a pious use. For this cannot be denied, that masses and the communion of bread and wine are a rite divinely instituted by Christ, which was observed, first under Christ Himself, then under the apostles, most simply, and piously without any additions. But so many human inventions have been added to it in due course of time, that nothing of the mass and communion has come down to our age except the name.
Philip Melanchthon

According to Luther, Melanchthon was the “greatest theologian who ever lived,” and his Loci Communes [“Common Places”] of 1555, was second in importance only to the Bible. According to Melanchthon, God wants his Church “to be known as the place where his word is preached, and he wants public, honorable gatherings with preaching, invocation, thanksgiving and the sacraments…[These] are extremely important for planting and maintaining true knowledge and invocation of God.”

Melanchthon was also chiefly responsible for The Augsburg Confession, the first formal statement of the Lutheran confessional tradition. The following Articles deal directly with the Church and its worship.

That we may obtain this faith, the Ministry of Teaching the Gospel and administering the Sacraments was instituted. For through the Word and Sacraments, as through instruments, the Holy Ghost is given, who works faith; where and when it pleases God, in them that hear the Gospel, to wit, that God, not for our own merits, but for Christ's sake, justifies those who believe that they are received into grace for Christ's sake.

They condemn the Anabaptists and others who think that the Holy Ghost comes to men without the external Word, through their own preparations and works.

Article VII: Of the Church

Also they teach that one holy Church is to continue forever. The Church is the congregation of saints, in which the Gospel is rightly taught and the Sacraments are rightly administered.

And to the true unity of the Church it is enough to agree concerning the doctrine of the Gospel and the administration of the Sacraments. Nor is it necessary that human traditions, that is, rites or ceremonies, instituted by men, should be everywhere alike. As Paul says: One faith, one Baptism, one God and Father of all, etc. Eph. 4, 5. 6.

Of Usages in the Church they teach that those ought to be observed which may be observed without sin, and which are profitable unto tranquility and good order in the Church, as particular holy-days, festivals, and the like.

Nevertheless, concerning such things men are admonished that consciences are not to be burdened, as though such observance was necessary to salvation.

They are admonished also that human traditions instituted to propitiate God, to merit grace, and to make satisfaction for sins, are opposed to the Gospel and the doctrine of faith. Wherefore vows and traditions concerning meats and days, etc., instituted to merit grace and to make satisfaction for sins, are useless and contrary to the Gospel.

Of the Worship of Saints they teach that the memory of saints may be set before us, that we may follow their faith and good works, according to our calling, as the Emperor may follow the example of David in making war to drive away the Turk from his country; For both are kings. But the Scripture teaches not the invocation of saints or to ask help of saints, since it sets before us the one Christ as the Mediator, Propitiation, High Priest, and Intercessor. He is to be prayed to, and has promised that He will hear our prayer; and this worship He approves above all, to wit, that in all afflictions He be called upon, 1 John 2, 1: If any man sin, we have an Advocate
with the Father, etc.

This is about the Sum of our Doctrine, in which, as can be seen, there is nothing that varies from the Scriptures, or from the Church Catholic, or from the Church of Rome as known from its writers. This being the case, they judge harshly who insist that our teachers be regarded as heretics. There is, however, disagreement on certain Abuses, which have crept into the Church without rightful authority. And even in these, if there were some difference, there should be proper lenity on the part of bishops to bear with us by reason of the Confession which we have now reviewed; because even the Canons are not so severe as to demand the same rites everywhere, neither, at any time, have the rites of all churches been the same; although, among us, in large part, the ancient rites are diligently observed. For it is a false and malicious charge that all the ceremonies, all the things instituted of old, are abolished in our churches. But it has been a common complaint that some abuses were connected with the ordinary rites. These, inasmuch as they could not be approved with a good conscience, have been to some extent corrected.

John Calvin was born in France in 1509 and died in 1564. While studying at University in Paris in 1533 he encountered the teachings of Luther and experienced a sudden conversion. He broke with Roman Catholicism, and began to formulate his theology. The first edition of his Institutes of the Christian Religion was published in 1536, when he was only 27 years old.

He had decided to take up a life of scholarly retirement, but upon visiting Geneva, in Switzerland, the reformer Guillame [William] Farel, persuaded him, after much effort to stay and organize the reform there. In 1537 all of the townspeople were called upon to swear loyalty to a Protestant statement of faith. But popular support was lacking and Calvin and Farel were thrown out of town. Calvin went to Strasbourg, where he met Martin Bucer, who encouraged him and influenced him considerably. Calvin began to write commentaries, beginning with Romans, and became the pastor of a French speaking congregation of refugees there.

In 1541, the climate had changed and he was invited back to Geneva. He set about exercising a strict moral discipline in Geneva, which many of the townsfolk resented, especially coming from a French foreigner. His aim was to mature the church so he began to preach to the people on a daily basis.

When Calvin first preached at Geneva he seems not to have followed any set liturgy at all, and there was no music. After he was evicted from Geneva, he became the pastor of a group of French exiles in Strasbourg. He then borrowed from Martin Bucer’s German rite to create his French liturgy of 1540. This was simplified when he returned to Geneva becoming the widely used “Geneva rite.” This liturgy came into standard use among the Reformed churches on the Continent. He was convinced that some kind of order in worship must be prescribed, but insisted that nothing was to be allowed in public worship that could not be deduced from scripture. He eliminated Roman elements and all prayers to Mary and to the saints. The place of the sermon was exalted as the “sacrament of the Word.” Endorsing only the congregational singing of metrical versions of the Psalms, he favored music in the home and in school life, but feared that its use in church would distract worshippers from more “spiritual” worship. Influenced by Bucer’s liturgy he began to use metrical Psalms in French.

Pure religion, according to Calvin, was a uniting of faith and fear, hence the rather austere and reverential nature of Presbyterian and reformed worship. Fear mingled with faith produces “a voluntary reverence…[and] legitimate worship agreeable to the injunctions of the law…Men in general render to God a formal worship, but very few truly reverence him; while great ostentation in ceremonies is universally displayed, but sincerity of heart is rarely to be found.”
Huldrich (Ulrich) Zwingli

Zwingli was the leader of the Reformation in Zurich. His Commentary on True and False Religion (1528) was an early Reformed systematic theology. He disagreed very sharply with Luther over the Lord’s Supper, denying the Real Presence of Christ in the Supper, and taking a strictly memorialist view. He denounced the Mass in very strong terms and eliminated all Roman influences from the liturgy, though it is interesting to note that he retained the Ave Maria (Hail Mary) in his liturgy. Though an accomplished musician himself, his first German service eliminated music altogether. Psalms and scriptural canticles were to be spoken, not sung. Zwingli also banned congregational singing and the use of the organ.

Henry VIII, who is usually credited with beginning the Reformation in England, was no Protestant. He simply wanted an English Catholic Church without the Pope as Head. He wrote against Luther’s ideas and was given the title, by the Pope, of “Defender of the Faith,” before he had his final falling out with Rome.

Thomas Cranmer, the Archbishop of Canterbury, replaced the Latin Mass with the English Prayer Book with the approval and enforcement of Parliament. His 1549 Book of Common Prayer (BCP) underwent subsequent Puritan revisions in 1552. Its final edition of 1665 remains authoritative in the Anglican Communion.

The Thirty Nine Articles state the position of the Church of England on a number of matters pertinent to our study, and are well worth examining.

Article XIX: Of the Church
The visible Church of Christ is a congregation of faithful men, in the which the pure word of God is preached and the sacraments be duly ministered according to Christ's ordinance in all those things that of necessity are requisite to the same. As the Church of Jerusalem, Alexandria, and Antioch have erred: so also the Church of Rome hath erred, not only in their living and manner of ceremonies, but also in matters of faith.

Article XX: Of the Authority of the Church
The Church hath power to decree rites or ceremonies and authority in controversies of faith; and yet it is not lawful for the Church to ordain anything contrary to God's word written, neither may it so expound one place of Scripture, that it be repugnant to another. Wherefore, although the Church be a witness and a keeper of Holy Writ: yet, as it ought not to decree anything against the same, so besides the same ought it not to enforce anything to be believed for necessity of salvation.

Article XXII: Of Purgatory
The Romish doctrine concerning Purgatory, Pardons, worshipping and adoration as well of Images as of Relics, and also Invocation of Saint, is a fond thing vainly invented, and grounded upon no warranty of Scripture; but rather repugnant to the word of God.

Article XXIV: Of speaking in the Congregation in such a tongue as the people understandeth
It is a thing plainly repugnant to the word of God and the custom of the primitive Church, to have public prayer in the Church, or to minister the sacraments in a tongue not understanded of the people.

Article XXV: Of the Sacraments
Sacraments ordained of Christ be not only badges or tokens of Christian men's profession, but rather they be certain sure witnesses and effectual signs of grace and God's good will towards us, by the which He doth work invisibly in us, and doth not only quicken, but also strengthen and confirm, our faith in Him.
There are two Sacraments ordained of Christ our Lord in the Gospel, that is to say, Baptism and the Supper of the Lord.
Those five, commonly called Sacraments, that is to say, Confirmation, Penance, Orders, Matrimony, and Extreme Unction, are not to be counted for Sacraments of the Gospel, being such as have grown partly of the corrupt following of the Apostles, partly are states of life allowed in the Scriptures; but yet have not the like nature of Sacraments with Baptism and the Lord's Supper, for that they have not any visible sign or ceremony ordained of God.
The Sacraments were not ordained of Christ to be gazed upon or to be carried about, but that we should duly use them. And in such only as worthily receive the same, have they a wholesome effect or operation: but they that receive them unworthily, purchase to themselves damnation, as S. Paul saith.

Article XXVI: Of the unworthiness of the Ministers, which hinders not the effect of the Sacraments
Although in the visible Church the evil be ever mingled with the good, and sometime the evil have chief authority in the ministration of the word and sacraments; yet forasmuch as they do not the same in their own name, but in Christ's, and do minister by His commission and authority, we may use their ministry both in hearing the word of God and in the receiving of the sacraments. Neither is the effect of Christ's ordinance taken away by their wickedness, nor the grace of God's gifts diminished from such as by faith and rightly do receive the sacraments ministered unto them, which be effectual because of Christ's institution and promise, although they be ministered by evil men.
Nevertheless it appertaineth to the discipline of the Church that inquiry be made of evil ministers, and that they be accused by those that have knowledge of their offences; and finally, being found guilty by just judgement, be deposed.

Article XXVII: Of Baptism
Baptism is not only a sign of profession and mark of difference whereby Christian men are discerned from other that be not christened, but is also a sign of regeneration or new birth, whereby, as by an instrument, they that receive baptism rightly are grafted into the Church; the promises of the forgiveness of sin, and of our adoption to be the sons of God, by the Holy Ghost are visibly signed and sealed; faith is confirmed, and grace increased by virtue of prayer unto God. The baptism of young children is in any wise to be retained in the Church as most agreeable with the institution of Christ.

Article XXVIII: Of the Lord's Supper
The Supper of the Lord is not only a sign of the love that Christians ought to have among themselves, one to another, but rather it is a sacrament of our redemption by Christ's death: insomuch that to such as rightly, worthily, and with faith receive the same, the bread which we break is a partaking of the body of Christ, and likewise the cup of blessing is a partaking of the blood of Christ.
Transubstantiation (or the change of the substance of bread and wine) in the Supper of the Lord, cannot be proved by Holy Writ, but is repugnant to the plain words of Scripture, overthroweth the nature of a Sacrament, and hath given occasion to many superstitions.
The body of Christ is given, taken, and eaten in the Supper, only after an heavenly and spiritual manner. And the mean whereby the body of Christ is received and eaten in the Supper is faith
The Sacrament of the Lord's Supper was not by Christ's ordinance reserved, carried about, lifted up, or worshipped.

Article XXIX: Of the wicked which do not eat the body of Christ, in the use of the Lord's Supper
The wicked and such as be void of a lively faith, although they do carnally and visibly press with their teeth (as S. Augustine saith) the sacrament of the body and blood of Christ, yet in no wise are they partakers of Christ, but rather to their condemnation do eat and drink the sign or sacrament of so great a thing.

Article XXX: Of Both Kinds
The Cup of the Lord is not to be denied to the lay people; for both parts of the Lord's sacrament, by Christ's ordinance and commandment, ought to be ministered to all Christian men alike.

Article XXXI: Of the one oblation of Christ finished upon the Cross
The offering of Christ once made is the perfect redemption, propitiation, and satisfaction for all the sins of the whole world, both original and actual, and there is none other satisfaction for sin but that alone. Wherefore the sacrifices of Masses, in the which it was commonly said that the priests did offer Christ for the quick and the dead to have remission of pain or guilt, were blasphemous fables and dangerous deceits.

It is not necessary that traditions and ceremonies be in all places one or utterly alike; for at all times they have been diverse, and may be changed according to the diversity of countries, times, and men's manners, so that nothing be ordained against God's word.
Whosoever through his private judgment willingly and purposely doth openly break the traditions and ceremonies of the Church which be not repugnant to the word of God, and be ordained and approved by common authority, ought to be rebuked openly that other may fear to do the like, as he that offendeth against common order of the Church, and hurteth the authority of the magistrate, and woundeth the conscience of the weak brethren.
Every particular or national Church hath authority to ordain, change, and abolish ceremonies or rites of the Church ordained only by man's authority, so that all things be done to edifying.

As the Reformation was proceeding in Zurich, under Zwingli, some felt it wasn’t going far enough. Conrad Grebel, Felix Manz, and other associates of Zwingli wanted to do away with tithes, usury, and military service. They wanted a totally self-governing church, free of all ties to and interference from the civil government. On January 21st, 1555, Zwingli, more moderate, forbade them from spreading their views. That night the radicals met and baptized each other. The name “anabaptists” (meaning “to baptize again”) would later be given to them by their detractors.

These “radical Reformers,” wanted to restore New Testament Christianity as they understood it. They are sometimes referred to as the “left wing” of the Reformation, or the “third” Reformation.” Discipleship was their key word, and their mahor principles included congregationalism, believer’s baptism, separation of church and state (no Christian could serve as a magistrate), and pacifism. The Schleitheim Confession of 1527 formularized their faith. Michael Satler, the leading figure, was burned at the stake four months later.

Luther and Calvin both strongly opposed them, and when an extreme group set up a “utopia” in Munster (1534-35), took up arms, practiced polygamy, and claimed bizarre revelations, Catholic and Lutheran forces combined to butcher them, cruelly torturing their leaders to death.

Despite persecution, the Anabaptists grew rapidly, especially among the lower classes. Having no official state sanction, they had to rely on outright evangelism. Mature leadership came to the fore in the person of Menno Simons (1496-1561), a converted priest. In the Ordnung [Discipline] of 1527, insights into the simple principles by which they conducted their worship may be found.

FIRST ARTICLE
And beginning: when the brethren are together they shall sincerely ask God for grace that He might reveal His divine will and help to note it (Ps.86,118) and when the brethren part they shall thank God and pray for all the brethren and sisters of the entire brotherhood (I Thess.1 and 5;II Thess.1 and 2; II Cor.1;Col.1,3,4).

SECOND ARTICLE
In the second place: we shall sincerely and in a Christian spirit admonish one another in the Lord to remain constant (Heb.10:1;Acts 14,15,18; Col.2). To meet often, at least four or five times, and if possible...even at midweek [prayer meetings?] (I Cor.11,14; Acts 1,2,9.11.20; Heb.10; II Cor.6; Matt.18).

SEVENTH ARTICLE
In the seventh place: in the meeting one is to speak and the others listen and judge what is spoken, and not two or three stand together (I Cor.14). No one shall curse or swear (Matt.5; Rom.3; James 5) nor shall idle gossip be carried on, so that the meek may be spared (I Cor.15; Eph.5; Col.3; II Tim.2; Psalm 118).

When brethren and sisters are together, being one body and one bread in the Lord and of one mind, then they shall keep the Lord's Supper as a memorial of the Lord's death (Matt.26; Mark 14; Luke 22; I Cor.11), whereby each one shall be admonished to become conformed to the Lord in the obedience of the Father (Phil.2,3; I Pet.2,4; Rom.8; I John 2--Obedience: Rom.2; Phil.2; II Cor.2,10; II Thess.1; I Pet.1).

Martin Luther (1483-1546) was himself a musician who “loved the great music and the Latin text which graced the mass.” In 1530 he began to outline a treatise on music, which was never actually completed. Quoting Augustine he said, “For music is a gift…of God, not a gift of men…Therefore, accustom yourself to see in music your Creator and to praise him through it.” “I am not of the opinion that all arts are to be cast down and destroyed on account of the Gospel, as some fanatics protest; on the other hand I would gladly see all arts, especially music, in the service of Him who has given and created them.” According to Luther, preachers should not be ordained without skills in music. “Music is a noble gift of God, next to theology. I would not change my little knowledge of music for a great deal.”

Some musicologists, such as Victor Gebauer, believe Luther understood music to be “the language of God” and that the “power of music, used for good purpose, could produce the same effect as the Word of the Gospel.” In Luther’s liturgy, historic Latin hymns were replaced by German metrical versions set to secular musical styles.

Luther was indifferent to, and at times hostile, to the use of organs in church. Beyond setting the tone for the unaccompanied singing he did not favor its use. This suspicion of the organ was also common among Roman Catholics of the time. Luther himself wrote many excellent hymns which have been retained in the use of most Protestant churches. His hymns had three purposes:

1. Theological – to demonstrate believer-priesthood.
2. Liturgical – to retain orthodox elements of the Roman Mass.
3. Pedagogical – to teach Lutheran doctrine.

He chose tunes from earlier worship modes (eg the leisen of the medieval pilgrims), or borrowed secular tunes. He borrowed the tune from the love song Wach auf, wach auf, du schone (“Wake up, wake up, you beauty”) for Nun freut euch, Lieben Christen g’mein (“Dear Christians, one and all, rejoice.”) Lutherans after Luther’s time did the same. For example the song Innsbruck, ich muss dich lassen (“Innsbruck, I now must leave you) became O welt, ich muss dich lassen (O world, I now must leave you). Two of his best known hymns are paraphrases of Psalms. A Mighty Fortress is Our God (Psalm 46), and Out of the Depths I Cry to You (Psalm 130).

Calvin endorsed only the congregational singing of metrical versions of the Psalms.
He favored music in the home and in school life, but feared that its use in church would distract worshippers from more “spiritual” worship. With the help of the French court poet Clement Marot, and Calvin’s colleague Theodore Beza, all 150 Psalms were set to metre in the Genevan Psalter of 1562. These were to be sung, in French, by the congregation with no musical accompaniment.

The music editor of this work was Louis Bourgeois (c. 1510-1561) who adapted tunes from French and German secular songs and bits of Gregorian chant, as well as composing some of his own music in similar styles. These were very different from other church music of the time. Their dance rhythms led some to mock them as “Geneva jigs.”

John Merbecke (c. 1510-1585) set certain songs in the BCP to syllabic chants based on original melodies of his own, and some adapted from Gregorian chants. These earlier settings were later abandoned as the Church of England came under increasingly Calvinistic influences.

Myles Coverdale had made an English translation of German and Latin hymns in 1543 which he called Goostly psalmes and spirituall songs. These were for use in private chapels and homes, rather than in the Sunday liturgy. But again, this approach was frowned upon as the Church came more and more under the influence of Calvin’s thought with its preference for metrical psalms only.

At the end of the reign of Henry VIII, Thomas Sternhold produced a small book of 19 metrical Psalms entitled Groom of the Royal Wardrobe (c.1547). His purpose was to provide for the young King Edward VI and his royal court a more spiritual substitute for the “trivial, secular court ballads.”

Most of the early English Psalms were in “ballad metre” (8.6.8.6) later called “Common Metre,” so they may also have been sung to popular ballad tunes. In 1549 a larger Psalter appeared with 36 psalms by Sterhold and a further eight by his collaborator John Hopkins.

When Queen Mary ascended the throne, the country reverted to the Roman ritual and many Protestants, known as “the Marian exiles,” fled to the Continent. When they returned under Elizabeth I they brought with them a renewed interest in the Psalms. Based on Sternhold and Hopkins’ earlier work, and influenced by Calvin’s French psalter, the entire 150 Psalms soon appeared in English (in 1562) and this “Sternhold and Hopkins” collection would dominate English worship music for the next 200 years.

The English church followed Luther, rather than Calvin, however, when it came to the use of choirs. The choir both led the congregation and sang alone, especially in the cathedrals and royal chapels. Tudor composers who had earlier written Latin Masses, such as William Byrd, now began to compose music for the BCP service.

“Let me read to you a couple of letters that ministers have actually received when they tried to change hymn styles and bring in new music:

1. “What's wrong with the inspiring hymns with which we grew up: when I go to church, it is to worship God, not to be distracted with learning a new song. Last Sunday's was particularly unnerving. While the text was good, the tune was unsingable and the new harmonies were quite discordant.”

2. “I am no music scholar, but I feel I know appropriate church music when I hear it. Last Sunday’s new hymn, if you call it that, sounded like a sentimental love ballad one might expect to hear crooned in a saloon. If you persist in exposing us to rubbish like this in God's house, don't be surprised if many of the faithful look for a new place to worship. The hymns we grew up with are all we need.”

Those letters weren't actually written to ministers in our Presbytery. The first was written in 1890 and was complaining about “What a friend we have in Jesus.” The second letter, dated 1865, was criticizing the use of “Just as I am.” The church we have always known, the way we have done things, worshipped and functioned, was itself responsible for changing the way previous generations had always done church. The Christian church has always been changing. We are fooling ourselves if we think we are the first generation to ever face change.”

When we talk about the "modern period" we aren’t referring to the 1990s or even to the twentieth century, but to that whole period from Post-Reformation days, through the Enlightenment, and into the mid-twentieth century (from the 1600s to the 1900s). We have a lot of ground to cover in surveying this period.

The German Pietist movement of the seventeenth century, sought to simplify religion, and tended to reject music as art. This brought them into conflict with the great German Lutheran composer Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750). Yet Bach is himself influenced by the Pietists. For example, his cantata texts reflect Pietist theology. Well known Pietist hymn writers include Johann Freylinghausen (1670-1739), Nicolaus von Zinzendorf (1700-1760), Johann Franck (1618-1677), and Edwrad Neumeister (1671-1756). Bach used some of my Neumeister’s cantata texts.

One of the frequently recurring themes of Pietist hymnody is the relationship between Christ (the Groom) and the Church (his Bride). Wesley would later take exception to some of the highly intimate language in these hymns, with their almost “erotic” overtones. English translations were often sanitized versions. Modern German translations have also made significant changes. For example, Franck’s Jesu, meine Freude (“Jesus, Priceless Treasure”), modelled on H. Alberti’s love song, “Flora my joy” originally read “Jesus, my Zucker (Sugar).” This was changed to Jesus my Freude (Joy).” Charles Wesley’s Jesus, Lover of My Soul, reflects this Pietist influence. His brother, John said that it was so personal that it should not be sung in public worship. In spite of this, it has become one of the most widely sung of Charles’ hymns.

In what sense are the Scriptures authoritative for establishing worship practices? The Church of England generally followed Luther’s “permissive” rule. The Puritan party within the Church of England, however, followed Calvin’s “restrictive” rule. Both parties agreed on the authority of Scripture, but they differed on how to apply the Scripture to worship.

Calvin had said that the English Prayer Book contained multas tolerabiles ineptias (“many tolerable [i.e. bearable] pieces of foolishness.”] The Puritans agreed, and specifically wanted to remove such things as the surplice (the white cotton garment worn by the priest), wedding rings, using the sign of the cross in baptism, and kneeling at Holy Communion. All ceremonies, they argued, must have direct biblical warrant or they are wrong. John Owen represents the Puritan position well when he states, “God’s worship hath no accidentals…all that is in it and belonging to it, and the manner of it, is false worship, if it have not a divine institution in particular.”

This position was contrary to the Anglican Article XXXIV, “Of the Traditions of the Church” which we looked at in Lecture 6. “It is not necessary that traditions and ceremonies be in all places one or utterly alike; for at all times they have been diverse, and may be changed according to the diversity of countries, times, and men’s manners, so that nothing be ordained against God’s word…every particular or national Church hath authority to ordain, change, and abolish ceremonies or rites of the Church ordained only by man’s authority, so that [i.e. “so long as”] all things be done to edifying.”

The Puritans often used some rather remarkable proof-texts to defend their own unique practices. Numbers 28:9 they took as proof that there should be two Sunday services. 2 Timothy 1:13 made the use of a catechism obligatory. Romans 8:26 proved set liturgies to be unlawful. Acts 1:15 proved that the minister should remain standing in one place during the service, and 1 Corinthians 14:31 was used to justify the Puritan practice of area-wide “prophesyings” (preaching fests that were carried out outside the Anglican parochial system). If you take the time to look up these verses you will see that they do not in fact prove the points being made. At best they are suggestive of such practices. This only goes to prove that the phrase, “It’s biblical,” often means little more than, “That’s the way I see it.” (!)

In seventeenth century England there were three possibilities for regulating worship. Either one used the set liturgy of the Anglican Book of Common Prayer, or the Presbyterian manual of general guidance, The Westminster Directory, or individual ministers and congregations would be left to their own devices to develop patterns of their own (Independents, Quakers, Baptists). The only clearly sanctioned pattern, legally speaking, was The Book of Common Prayer, and Anglican ministers could be thrown out of their parishes if they did not use it, (as were John Wesley’s grandfather and great grandfather). To pursue strict conformity to the point of applying legal penalties such as imprisonment and even death for breach of that conformity seems futile. Yet some discipline seems necessary. How can the church ensure that the extremes of the “Toronto Blessing” manifestations are kept out of their liturgy? And what of extreme liberal liturgical texts which strike at the heart of the received faith of Christians? How should these be kept out of our worship practices? So, whilst legal penalties may seem extreme, an “anything goes” policy creates its own set of problems.

The Puritans defined worship as “doxology,” that is, rendering glory to God. All true piety was a form of worship. It took place in the three spheres of the local church (public), the family circle (domestic) and in the prayer closet (private). The Puritans believed that every home should be a little “church,” with the Father, as head of the house, as the minister. Twice daily, families were to hear the Word read, and join in prayer. Interestingly, public worship was considered the most exalted type, because it was closest to that worship which is offered in heaven. Simplicity was designed as the safeguard of inwardness and the Scriptures were the safeguard of truth. Puritans are sometimes criticized for their rather somber and austere approach to worship, but to them such worship was a thing of beauty. Elements of Puritan worship included:

1. Praise (metrical versions of the Psalms only)
2. Prayer (confession, adoration, intercession)
3. Preaching (“the supreme test of a person’s ministry; the most solemn and exalted action.”)
4. Sacraments (or “Ordinances”)
5. Catechizing (learning doctrine by rote forms of question and answer)
6. Church discipline.

The Puritans believed in preparing the heart for worship. One Puritan wrote, “If thou wouldst…leave thy heart with God on Saturday night, thou shouldst find it with him in the Lord’s Day morning.” Some have argued that we do not need new liturgies, new hymns, new tunes, or new styles of worship, so much as we need more “heart-work” to prepare for those we already have. Without this, we will only suffer from more of what C. S. Lewis called “the liturgical fidgets.”

For Quakers (founded as “The Religious Society of Friends” by George Fox, 1624-1691), worship is not so much a practice we cultivate as a response to the consciousness of God’s Presence. Fox’s own experience became a kind of model for Quaker consciousness. He felt, he said, “an infinite ocean of light and love flowing over the ocean of darkness and death.” Congregational worship was marked by silence. Out of silence would arise vocal expressions, which edified the Body. Sacraments were dispensed with, though the truths conveyed by the sacraments were affirmed.

The transition in English church music from Psalm singing to hymn singing was pioneered by the work of Isaac Watts (1674-1748). “Isaac Watts was the eldest of nine children of a minister, also named Isaac Watts…The younger Watts is considered the ‘father of English hymnody.’ As a youth, he criticized the language of the psalms that were sung in church. The elder Watts encouraged him to write his own if he though he could do better. Isaac Watts is credited with writing over 600 hymns. He was educated at the Free School, Southampton, where he studied Greek, Latin, French and Hebrew from the Reverend John Pinhorne, rector of All Saints. In 1690 he entered the Nonconformist Academy of Thomas Rowe at Stoke Newington, near London (dissenters were not permitted to attend universities by the Church of England). After leaving the Academy at the age of 20, he spent two years at his father's home where he wrote a majority of the Hymns and Spiritual Songs (published 1707-9). In 1696 he became tutor for six years of the family of Sir John Hartopp at Stoke Newington. In 1699 he became assistant to Dr. Isaac Chauncey at Mark Lane Independent Chapel, London. He undertook serious study (so serious that it permanently damaged his health) and was ordained and succeeded Dr. Chauncey as minister in 1702. The congregation grew rapidly under Watts’ leadership and was forced to move twice and call an assistant minister. He suffered a serious illness in 1712 and stayed at Theobalds, near Cheshunt, Hertfordshire, with the Sir Thomas Abney family. Watts was sick for four years, but he remained with the Abney family the rest of his life. He was tutor to the Abney children and chaplain to the household. In 1739 he suffered a serious stroke which left him paralyzed. Watts died on November 25, 1748, and was buried in Bunhill Fields.”

As noted earlier, metrical versions of the Psalms were the preferred form in English church music after the Reformation. However, from the end of the seventeenth century (1600s), hymns began to appear in appendixes to Psalters, intended for private and home use. The Baptist minister Benjamin Keach was the first to introduce a hymn of “human composure” for use in a service of Holy Communion, in 1690.

Watts first began to write “free, Christianized psalms.” These were an attempt to give the OT Psalms a Christological orientation and make them relevant to the Gospel age. His next move, the writing of original hymn texts, earned him the title of the “father of English hymnody.” English hymns were sung in Presbyterian, Congregational, and Baptist churches for a full 100 years before they found their way into Anglican usage.

“Watts has been said to combine most successfully the expression of objective worship with that of subjective devotional experience...best illustrated in his well-known hymn, When I Survey the Wondrous Cross. ”

Methodist worship began as a kind of modified Anglicanism. “I believe there is no worship in the world,” wrote John Wesley, “either in ancient or modern language, which breathes more of a solid, Scriptural, rational piety than the Common Prayer of the Church of England, and though the main of it was compiled more than 200 years ago, yet is the language of it not only pure but strong and elegant in the highest degree.”

When the Methodist Episcopal Church was formed in America in 1784, Wesley abridged the Anglican Book of Common Prayer into The Sunday Service of the Methodists in North America. Most of the holy days (“so-called”) were omitted. Frequent communion (weekly) was urged, and communion was seen as a “converting” as well as a “confirming” ordinance. Wesley’s approach to the Table differed from the Puritan (and modern Wesleyan) approach, in that he did not require that a person receiving Communion had experienced the new birth. “True penitents” could come to the Table seeking either prevenient, justifying, or sanctifying grace. Children as young as 9 were to be admitted, and the usual practice was to receive from a kneeling position in groups gathered at the altar rail.

“Mr. Wesley’s Abridgment” of the Book of Common Prayer was a greatly shortened form, and included altered services for special occasions. God-parents were omitted from the Office of Baptism, and the word “priest” was replaced with “minister.” The word “regenerate” was omitted from the phrase, “this child is regenerate and grafted into the Body of Christ’s Church.” The sign of the cross over the baptized was omitted by Wesley, but added at a later date.

There was mention of the Rite of Confirmation. This was a practice that was not widely used, even in the Anglicanism of Wesley’s day. There is no mention of a ring in the “Solemnization of Matrimony.” This may show a Puritan influence, with its rejection of the “wearing of gold and precious stones.” A service of “Communion for the Sick” is included, as are services for the Burial of the Dead (interestingly, Wesley rejected the idea of “consecrated ground” for burial), and for Ordination. “Select Psalms” were included, and many of the “imprecatory” Psalms (those which called God’s wrath down on the heads of our enemies) were rejected as being “not fit for the lips of a Christian congregation.” The Thirty-Nine Articles of the Church of England were reduced to Twenty-Four.

Wesley’s Abridgement was not well received among American Methodists. One of the early Methodist bishops is known to have said, “Our preachers prefer to pray with their eyes shut,” expressing a decided preference for extemporary over written prayers.

Wesley expected Methodists in England to fully participate in the services of the Church of England, and forbade Methodists from holding their meetings during “church hours,” in order to enable this participation. Such involvement was then to be supplemented by meetings in small groups (classes and bands) and by the preaching services of the Methodists. The Puritan concept of family worship was retained among the Methodists. Preachers were to fast Wednesdays and Fridays until 4pm, and quarterly fast days were to be held among the Methodists. The practice of Wednesday and Friday fasts was in imitation of the early church period when fasting vigils were held on Wednesdays to commemorate the day upon which Judas struck a deal with the Sanhedrin to betray Jesus, and Fridays in memory of the crucifixion. “Love-Feasts” were regularly held, particularly as a means of reconciliation between offended parties. In the Love Feast, bread and water were shared between brothers or sisters (special two handled cups were manufactured for the purpose). Watch-Night services were held on New Years Eve. These often included the Covenant Service, in which believers renewed their covenant with God. This was another practice borrowed from English Puritanism and became a regular part of the Methodist calendar of services.

Subsequently, most Methodists in America developed in a more revivalistic fashion, which included less sacramental observance, more extemporary prayer, and a focus on preaching, often to the neglect of other aspects of worship. There were however, Methodists who still used Wesley’s Sunday Service and valued the more formal dignity of the earlier Anglican roots. In England, “Church” Methodists (more oriented toward Anglican worship) and “Chapel” Methodists (more oriented toward Dissenting worship) represented these two trajectories, and both patterns continue to be represented in all Methodist bodies today.

The Methodist standards of doctrine were officially, John Wesley’s Standard Sermons and Explanatory Notes Upon the New Testament. To these must be added, even if de facto, the Hymns of Charles Wesley. Hymns for the Use of the People Called Methodists (1780) was ranked by some along with the Book of Common Prayer and the Canon of the Mass as one of the greatest liturgical resources ever written.

“It is large enough to contain all the important truths of our most holy religion, whether speculative or practical; yea, to illustrate them all and to prove them both by Scripture and reason; and this is done in a regular order. These hymns are not carelessly jumbled together, but carefully ranged under proper heads, according to the experience of real Christians. So that this book is, in effect, a little body of experimental and practical divinity…In what other publication of the kind do you have so distinct and full an account of Scriptural Christianity? Such a declaration of the heights and depths of religion, speculative and practical? So strong cautions against the most plausible errors?…and so clear directions for making your calling and election sure; for perfecting holiness in the fear of God?”

John Lawson (A Thousand Tongues) makes a distinction between the “Scripture Hymns” of Wesley and Watts, and the “Christian sentiment” hymns of the 19th Century. In Wesley's hymns we see theology as art and devotion.

“Religious doctrine is perhaps better approached and understood as art than as science; as penitent devotion than as desiccated dogma. If theology is discourse about God, it may be claimed that adoration is as important for its construction as reason. Charles Wesley was an adoring penitent, penitent as he adored, adoring as he was thankful…His method of expressing his discoveries about God was no less valuable because it was the artist’s method and not the philosopher’s or scientist’s.”

Altogether Charles wrote some 6,500 hymns. His brother John edited these and was also responsible for the translation of a number of German pietist hymns, such as Jesus, Thy Blood and Righteousness. Poetically, the Wesleys helped liberate church music from the confines of the two-line metres – common, long, and short – that had become established patterns in both Anglican psalmody and Watt’s hymnody. Their musical sources were “the newer psalm tunes, opera melodies, and secular folk songs of German origin.”

“There's a myth circulating among Methodists in the United States. Many believe the denomination's founders, John and Charles Wesley, based their hymns on tavern tunes that were popular in 18th century England. The idea is that the brothers wrote new lyrics to the tunes, in an effort to spread Christianity's message to people who spent their Sundays in taverns, rather than at church.

“But Methodist scholar, Dean McIntyre, who studies sacred music says this story simply isn't true, and he thinks it’s important for church leaders to understand that.
While he's adamant in his assertion that the Wesley brothers did not base their hymns on tavern tunes, he says he never intended to expose the idea as a myth. In fact, he says as a child, he rather enjoyed the notion that some of the hymns he was singing were based on lewd and crude melodies sung by sailors more than 200 years ago. ‘This was an idea that I had grown up with,’ he said. ‘I had heard this in a Sunday school class, or in worship in a sermon, or in a summer camp, or a music camp, or any of those things that I would have attended. I don’t know where I heard it first, but I grew up with it. And my experience has been that for my entire life, that that’s the case probably with most United Methodists today.’

“Mr. McIntyre says as the music director for the Church’s National Board of Discipleship, he has encountered hundreds of Methodists who believe their hymns were once tavern tunes. He says the idea is a seductive one, because it appeals to Americans’ sense of equality and gives the Methodist faith an almost democratic spirit. ‘We would like to think of John and Charles Wesley as people who would have such an evangelistic zeal, that they would go out into the taverns, and that in their desire to bring the sinner into the church, and into the faith, that they even would take the music of their sinful lifestyle, so that they could feel comfortable in the church when they sang sacred words to the secular music,’ said Dean McIntyre. ‘Now, we want to believe that of the Wesleys. The truth is, it didn’t happen. They didn’t do it.’

“Dean McIntyre should know. He has spent years combing through the personal papers of the Wesley brothers, and nowhere, he says, has he found any mention of the practice of turning drinking songs into hymns. He insists if the Wesleys had been in the habit of doing this, they would have written about it. He notes the two brothers were meticulous about explaining how, when, where, and why their hymns should be sung. But they never expressed their approval of secular music in worship services.
Yet, Mr. McIntyre says the myth that they did is being used to justify the use of rock and rap music in present-day Methodist worship. ‘How much of rock culture are you going to put into the worship of your congregation in its hymnal? How far can you go with “acid” rock, for instance? Does that have a place in the worship of God through music in the Church? Many say it does. Many say it doesn’t. Of course, the fact that it does or doesn’t is another issue. My point is we should never point to John Wesley as a person to approve of that practice,’ he said.

“Dean McIntyre says the notion that the Wesleys based their songs on tavern tunes probably came about as a result of some confusion over the meaning of the musical term ‘bar form.’ A ‘bar’ can, of course, be a synonym in American English for the word ‘tavern.’ But it’s also a term that’s used to describe a particular type of melody, that follows what Dean McIntyre calls an ‘AAB’ pattern. ‘The classic blues are in bar form,’ he said. ‘You think of “I’m going to Kansas City, Kansas City, here I come.” Well, that’s the first A form. And then it repeats, “I’m going to Kansas City, Kansas City, here I come.” That's the second A. And then you get, “They've got some crazy little women there and I'm going to get me one.” That's the B. So we have AAB. It's a bar form.’

“But Mr. McIntyre says there was one instance in 1746, when historians believe Charles Wesley did, in fact, re-write the lyrics of a popular drinking song. ‘You know, the Wesleys would go out into the town square and preach, because they were denied use of the Anglican pulpit in England,’ said Dean McIntyre. ‘And so one day, Charles is out preaching in a town square. And as had happened, a group of sailors came and stood along the edges of the crowd that Charles had attracted and was preaching to, and began to interrupt his preaching. And they began to sing a song. The tune was Nancy Dawson, which was a British folk song, and went to a number of texts. But the words they were singing to this tune were sexual in nature, and included things like drinking. It would have been a tavern song. And so Charles interrupted his sermon, pointed to the sailors out on the edge of the crowd and addressed them specifically, and invited them to return to the evening service. And he would have a song that they really should sing. So that broke up the event, and the sailors went their way, and Charles went back to his apartment, that afternoon, and he penned the words of a hymn, the first line of which is “Listed into the cause of sin, why should a good be evil?” He wrote these words to the tune of Nancy Dawson.

“The other lyrics to the song say, ‘Music alas too long has been, pressed to obey the devil. Drunken or lewd or light the lay, fell to the soul's undoing. Widen the truth with flowers alay, down to eternal ruin.’ Today, the tune is also a popular nursery rhyme, entitled Here We Go 'Round the Mulberry Bush. Dean McIntyre says the fact that Charles Wesley modified a tavern tune once, doesn’t mean the founders of Methodism made a habit out of it. But he doesn’t expect Methodists are going to give up their myth easily. The fact is, they like believing it, and Mr. McIntyre says that wouldn’t be such a bad thing, if the myth hadn’t gotten caught up in a very important debate about the use of secular music in the Church. He, himself, doesn't have a solid opinion on the issue. But he’s sure of one thing - John and Charles Wesley would not have approved.”

Calvinistic Methodists in Wales drew their theology from George Whitefield rather than from John Wesley. “Wales is the home of one of the great singing traditions of Western culture…The Welsh people sing in four parts, not in unison, and develop good voices simply by imitating their elders in that society.”

Leaders of the Evangelical Awakening in Wales included Howel Harris (1714-1773) and Daniel Rowland (c. 1711-1790). Both of these wrote hymns. William Williams (1717-1791) however, is usually considered the greatest of the Welsh hymn writers. His most famous hymn to English speaking peoples is probably Guide Me O Thou Great Jehovah.

Summary of the Period 1517-1800

A. Pre-Reformation – the musical arts existed “for the glory of God.”

D. Great Awakening – Wesley and Watts wrote hymns to call people to repentance, faith, and holiness.

E. “Since the Reformation the aim of glorifying God in church art has (to some extent and varying greatly from situation to situation) given way to the idea of benefiting human kind.”

American Revivalism and Gospel Songs
Early colonists were Spanish Catholics, who settled areas such as Saint Augustine, Florida (the oldest city in the US), the Caribbean islands, and Mexico. Music schools and cathedral choirs were established and American composers wrote masses in the style of Palestrina, Victoria, and di Lasso.

A handful of Huguenots (French Protestants) established a colony in Georgia, bringing the metrical Psalms of Calvin with them. French psalm tunes were taught to the Indians of the area (Seminoles?) Further north, the Eastern seaboard colonists were primarily of British extraction. They brought with them the Sternhold and Hopkins Psalter, and the Ainsworth Psalter, produced in 1612 by English dissidents in exile in Amsterdam.

The Bay Psalm Book (1640) was the first major publishing enterprise of the colonies. It was a revision of Psalm texts. These were “lined out” by a deacon or presenter for the benefit of congregations who were illiterate or who had no books of their own. A very limited range of tunes was available, as the tunes tended to be passed on by oral tradition rather than be written down.

In the early 18th century (1700s) organs and choirs began to appear in rear balconies of larger churches. A cello or woodwind instrument might also be employed to assist the singing. Some churches established “singing schools” often led by talented musical amateurs. By the late 18th century “tune books” began to be published, containing British folk tunes. Some early American songwriters, such as William Billings (1746-1800), began to write original tunes. “Because these frontier musicians had little or no training in European art traditions, their works exhibit a rough-hewn quality that still sounds both archaic and creative!”

The hymns of Wesley and Watts were being sung by the Presbyterians and Congregationalists of New England. Watts’ The Psalms of David Imitated in the Language of the New Testament (1729) was published by Benjamin Franklin. John Wesley, while a missionary in Georgia, published a Collection of Psalms and Hymns (1737) in Charleston, SC, said to be the first hymn book published in America. George Whitefield’s use of hymns, especially those of Isaac Watts, in his well attended open-air meetings helped to break down resistance to hymns.

Baptist churches in the Southern colonies developed two worship traditions, the more formal represented by Charleston First Baptist (SC), and the more revivalistic by the Sandy Creek, NC congregation. The First Baptist Church of Charleston, South Carolina, was the first Baptist church founded in the south (c.1695). In the eighteenth century it had retained a formal, stately (though evangelical) style of worship. Its members were known as “Regular” (i.e. Calvinistic”) Baptists.

The Sandy Creek, North Carolina group were “Separate” (i.e. Arminian) Baptists, led by the charismatic Shubal Stearns. Much more revivalistic in style, “ardor, not order” characterized their approach. “Faith was feeling and every Sunday was a camp meeting. The praise of God was not vertical but horizontal. Unlike the city slickers at Charleston, they did not praise God by praising God; they praised God by reaching women and men. They had a mourner’s bench and they expected public groaning not polite amens.”

In Charleston, the Regular Baptists sang psalms, Isaac Watts, and Baptist hymn writers in the same mold. In Sandy Creek, the Separate Baptists sang the lively folk hymns of the American frontier.

Revivalist worship in the nineteenth century followed an evangelistic model, whereby the church became a tent, rather than a temple. The pattern used by the YMCA in the 1850s came into wide use in the churches. A song service was followed by a brief prayer, announcements, choir or solo musical item, offering, solo, sermon, invitation (often lengthy and accompanied by hymns) and dismissal. Increasingly older hymns of the Wesley and Watts era were replaced by the newer “gospel songs.” Psalms were all too often completely ignored.

American music collections such as Kentucky Harmony (1816), Southern Harmony (1835) and The Sacred Harp (1844) contained songs that are now often referred to as “Early American folk melodies, “white spirituals,” “Appalachian folk tunes,” or “old Baptist music.” These are further examples of the sacred-secular borrowing already noted in earlier periods.

A more urban phase of revivals was initiated under the ministry of Charles Finney in the first half of the nineteenth century (principally in the period 1824-1850). At this time the foundations of the Moody / Sankey and Graham / Shea combining of a preacher with a musician was established. Thomas Hastings (1784-1872) was a leading music teacher and conductor who, in association with Finney, compiled the first hymn books to be used specifically for use in his revivals. Some of these hymns could be quite confronting.

“Shape note” singing was a popular device for those who were not musically literate. Lowell Mason (1792-1872) however advocated the use of standard musical notation, and developed music education in public schools. Men like Mason and William B. Bradbury (1816-1868) travelled and studied in Europe and composed a great deal of music for churches, as well as editing many hymnals and choir books.

The rise and growth of Sunday Schools led to the composition of children’s songs in the camp meeting style, “with catchy, easily remembered melody, simple harmony and rhythm and an inevitable refrain.” The “Gospel Song” soon followed, first launched by the YMCA in the 1860s. Authors such as P. P. Bliss wrote in a similar style to the famous American songwriter Stephen Foster. Fanny Crosby had been a successful secular song writer before she took pen to paper to compose her well known Gospel songs, such as Blessed Assurance.

The Gospel Song has been defined as “A sacred folk song, free in form, emotional in character, devout in attitude, evangelistic in purpose and spirit. The hymns are more or less subjective in their matter and develop a single thought, rather than a line of thought. That thought usually finds its supreme expression in the chorus or refrain which binds the stanzas together in a very close unity, just as it does in lyrical poetry where it is occasionally used.”

Gospel song writers were by no means unlettered rustics. They were often sophisticated urbane professionals. Phoebe Palmer Knapp, who wrote the music for Blessed Assurance, was married to the President of the Metropolitan Life Insurance Company. Fanny Crosby’s associate Howard Doane was a wealthy industrialist and civic leader. Robert Lowry was professor of literature at Bucknell University. Charles Converse, who wrote the music for What a Friend We Have in Jesus, studied in Europe where he met the composers Schumann and Liszt. Fanny Crosby was a close associate of five American presidents as well as other important civic leaders. The music these people composed often made them a great deal of money. This American development was soon exported overseas and gave rise to similar efforts in other countries such as among Swedish Lutherans.

It has sometimes been argued that hymns are more objective and God-centered and gospel songs more subjective and “human-centered.” Yet many gospel songs are very objective and God-centered and many hymns are very subjective and focused on Christian experience (Charles Wesley’s for example).

Dwight L. Moody (1837-1899) and Ira D. Sankey (1840-1908) were the first “team-act” between evangelist and song leader. Their hugely successful campaign in Great Britain brought them on to the world stage. Moody once said, “I believe that music is one of the most powerful agents for good or evil.” A magazine of the period The Nation, described the music of the Moody/Sankey crusades as follows: “Determine the pleasure that you get from a circus quick-step, a Negro-minstrel sentimental ballad, a college chorus, and a hymn all in one, and you have some gauge of the variety and contrast that may be perceived in one of these songs.”

There are many strengths in these Gospel songs. They spoke of the saving love of God in Christ. They were couched in contemporary language. They were ballads, narratives of human experience, which spoke to all who had shared a similar experience. They were emotionally infectious. Their rhythmic patterns gave opportunity for such physical expressions as marching, clapping, and foot tapping.

Where most of the hymn writers of the 17th and 18th centuries were considered to present doctrine in their hymns, nineteenth century hymn writers, influenced by the spirit of the Romantic Age, were more interested in improving the artistic and literary quality of their hymns.

Often this Romantic spirit, with its design for eliciting religious emotion included “little effective communication of the sacred text. Romanticism in art emphasized the passionate, the fanciful, the imaginative.”

Important hymn writers of this period include Reginald Heber, 1783-1826 (Holy, Holy, Holy); John Keble, 1792-1866 (Sun of My Soul); Henry Francis Lyte, 1793-1847 (Abide With Me); Sir John Bowring, 1792-1872 (In the Cross of Christ I Glory); Sir Robert Grant, 1779-1838 (O Worship the King); and Charlotte Elliot, 1789-1871 (Just As I Am).

On July 14, 1833 a new religious movement in England was launched when John Keble preached a sermon at Oxford entitled National Apostasy. The Oxford (or “Tractarian”) Movement was concerned that the English Church was being held captive by its connection to the Parliament of the day. It sought to affirm the catholicity and apostolicity of the Church of England as a church founded by Christ. Evangelicals (Low Church Anglicans) strongly rejected this movement as “popish.”

Many of its leaders (such as John Henry Newman, who eventually became a cardinal) later converted to Roman Catholicism, but most stayed in the Church of England to form its “Anglo-Catholic: or “High Church” party. It returned much of pre-Reformation worship styles to the Reformed churches of Britain – reviving the ancient Greek and Latin hymns, in English translations, and Gregorian chant.

Its stress on dignified worship also influenced other Protestant in the Free Church tradition. Boys’ choirs were established; liturgical vestments began to be worn by the clergy; Ritual became more elaborate, with the use of anthems, processionals, and recessionals. Hymns produced by this movement include John Henry Newman, 1801-1890 (Lead, Kindly Light); Edward Caswell, 1814-1878 (When Morning Gilds the Skies); and John Mason Neale, 1818-1866 (The Day of Resurrection). Other Oxford Movement leaders (apart from John Henry Newman) to “defect” to Catholicism and become prominent leaders included William Faber, 1814-1863 (Faith of Our Fathers, Living Still); and Matthew Bridges, 1800-1863 (Crown Him With Many Crowns). The hymn book that was partly the product of this movement was Hymns Ancient and Modern (1861) which dominated Anglican hymn singing for over a hundred years). A good example of an Anglo-Catholic parish in Melbourne today is St. Peter's Church in Eastern Hill.

High Church Hymn Writers of the Victorian Era resisted the drift toward both secularism and Roman Catholicism. “They were primarily concerned with preserving the integrity of the liturgy, creeds, sacraments and practices of the Anglican Church.” Cecil Francis Alexander, 1818-1895 (There is a Green Hill Far Away).
Christopher Wordsworth, 1807-1885 (O Day of Rest and Gladness). Sabine Baring-Gould, 1834-1924 (Onward Christian Soldiers). Samuel John Stone, 1839-1900 (The Church’s One Foundation). Dorothy Frances Gurney, 1858-1932 (O Perfect Love, All Human Thoughts Transcending).

Evangelical or Low Church Hymn Writers of the Victorian Era “were Anglicans who remained in the Anglican Church but who were generally more concerned with the spiritual and social welfare of individuals rather than in merely maintaining the integrity and practices of the church.” George Croly, 1780-1860 (Spirit of God, Descend Upon My Heart). Emily Elizabeth Steele Elliot, 1836-1897 (Thou Didst Leave Thy Throne and Thy Kingly Crown). Arabella Katherine Hankey, 1834-1889 (I Love to Tell the Story). Frances Ridley Havergal, 1836-1878 (Take My Life and Let it Be).

Broad Church Hymn Writers of the Victorian Era “represented the liberal and modern faction in the Anglican Church. They supported the traditions and practices of the established church but attempted to reconcile the church with higher criticism and scientific and philosophical findings and developments.” Alfred Lord Tennyson, 1809-1892 (Strong Son of God, Immortal Love). William Walsham How, 1823-1897 (O Word of God Incarnate). John Erneste Bode, 1816-1874 (O Jesus I Have Promised). Edwin Hatch, 1835-1889 (Breathe On Me, Breathe of God).

Dissenting Church Hymn Writers of the Victorian Era “represented those who had broken from the established state churches in England and Scotland. The greatest number of these independent writers were of Scotch Presbyterian background.” Horatius Bonar, 1808-1889 (I Heard the Voice of Jesus Say). Eizabeth Douglas Clephane, 1830-1869 (Beneath the Cross of Jesus). George Matheson, 1842-1906 (O Love that Will Not Let Me Go). Sarah Flower Adams, 1805-1848 (Nearer, My God, to Thee). Thomas Toke Lynch, 1818-1871 (Gracious Spirit Dwell with Me).

A great spirit of optimism was prevalent at the beginning of the twentieth century. This would be the “Christian Century,” and an important mainline periodical took that as its title. The invention of radio and television greatly affected worship as the church began increasingly to adjust its modes of communication to fit a new media-savvy culture. The organ began to be replaced by the piano (and later the keyboard). Charles Alexander was the musical off-sider to Reuben Torrey (successor to D. L. Moody). The more percussive sound of the piano seemed better suited to the lively gospel songs of the early twentieth century.

The early twentieth century church music scene was dominated by the influence of D. B. Towner at Moody Bible Institute. Towner and his protégés took a biblical-theological approach to the content of their songs. This changed a little with the popularity of converted major league baseball player Billy Sunday, whose musical offsider was song leader-soloist-trombonist Homer Rodeheaver. They brought a more “entertainment” based approach to evangelism. Sunday’s physical antics and boisterous preaching was matched by Rodeheaver’s invitation for railway workers to sing “I’ve been working on the railroad,” and college crowds were invited to sing their school songs. All this was designed to put the crowds on side with the evangelists and their message, but it did mean that the earlier biblical-theological approach was diluted.

The memory of the Titanic was still in everyone’s minds when they sang songs such as “I was sinking deep in sin, far from the peaceful shore [but] love lifted me…” Testimony based songs were popular. “What a wonderful change in my life has been wrought since Jesus came into my heart…” A hymn from the 1920s reflected memories of trench warfare.

Over the top for Jesus, bravely we will go,
Over the top for Jesus, routing every foe;
Never delaying when we hear the bugle blow,
We’ll fight for the right with all our might
As over the top we go.

Radio “contributed to the passive character of recreation in our culture, and undoubtedly encouraged spectatorism in church life.” Merrill Dunlop (b. 1905) wrote gospel songs inspired by jazz rhythms and harmonies. He used the “rhumba” for hymns to be sung in a Latin American mission context. Moody Bible Institute began gospel broadcasting in 1926 using hymns written in a “sanctified broadway style.”

After the Second World War, Youth for Christ rallies became popular in America. The chorus section of earlier gospel songs was often sung divorced from the stanzas, resulting in the musical form we now know as the “chorus.” Youth For Christ was the first ever approach to evangelism as marketed to a particular age niche. The most popular of these post-war Youth for Christ evangelists was a young Billy Graham, and his bass-baritone sidekick George Beverly Shea.

The Oxford Movement of the nineteenth century had something of a parallel in the 20th century with the Liturgical Renewal Movement. Many leading church music authorities began to call the church back to a more “objective” style of music. They preferred Gregorian chant and “high art” musical forms to more “popular” approaches. But popular music remained the mainstream evangelical approach. The Billy Graham Crusades have utilized the popular musical styles of each decade to complement the preaching of Dr. Graham. (D. C. Talk have performed at recent Graham crusades.) Bill and Gloria Gaither have been hugely popular as they have taken the latest secular “pop” and “country” songs and composed religious replies.

Eugene L. Brand has said that the liturgical movement has been diverted from its “preoccupation with history (what is proper?) to a more pastoral concern (what is relevant?).”

Contributing influences on worship in the second half of the twentieth century are listed by Hustad as follows:

2. McLuhanism: “the medium is the message.” Less stress on words, more on visual images.

5. Aesthetic relativism: loss of “authority” in high art, and the triumph of “pop art” including kitsch.

6. The triumph of ecumenism. Declining denominational loyalty and loss of interest in doctrinal questions.

The first reaction of evangelicals to the new music of the 1960s was “horror and rejection! They had just started moving uphill toward better hymns and choral music, when they met the competition coming downhill, strumming guitars and singing folk music!” But this soon gave way to a full-blown appropriation of contemporary music forms. The “folk rock” phenomenon of the mid-sixties meant that everybody was keen to express their vision of the world, set to a simple musical accompaniment. Self-appointed prophets abounded.

By the 1980s Christian contemporary music was outselling its secular counterpart in the United States, meaning they could have phenomenal success without ever breaking out of a Christian constituency. To country, pop, and rock forms of Gospel music has been added rap, ska, r & b, metal, grunge, “alternative” etc. There is even Christian punk and Christian “death metal” (!)

1. This is an age of individualism and narcissism. There are no “experts” in art and culture. What I like is what is best.

3. This is an age of electronics, computers, television, and the internet. This has produced a more emotive/intuitive culture dependent on visual images more than words and rationality.

4. This is world in which simpler musical forms are preferred to more complex forms. Rock music is a product, in part, of a culture of protest and rebellion. Culture is determined by reaction and demand, rather than by trans-generational mentoring, and the passing on of cultural forms. There is a corresponding decline in musical education at all levels.

5. This is an age of spiritual hunger, with a stress on experiential encounter with the divine, whether in new age transcendentalism or charismatic worship.

The Charismatic movement has introduced a fresh approach to the use of “contemporary music” in worship services. Pentecostals and charismatics have argued that typical Protestant worship is too Western-cognitive-rational in its emphasis. Charismatic worship has been identified as more “Eastern-intuitive-emotional.” Unlike the Western liturgical tradition, Eastern approaches are said to be less penitential, and more celebratory, and this too is reflected in charismatic approaches. This characterization is open to challenge however. For one thing, Eastern orthodox worship is very “wordy” with its lengthy spoken and sung liturgy. And confession and absolution is included in Eastern liturgies, but is often absent from a typical charismatic worship service.

Charismatic worship has an almost unvarying pattern of music, preaching, and prayer ministry. Music plays a very large part in this liturgy.

The earliest charismatic “choruses” were actually pioneered down under, in New Zealand, before impacting the church on a global scale. David and Dale Garratt released a 45rpm record in 1968 out of which emerged the popular Scripture in Song and Songs of the Kingdom series. Australasia has continued to be at the forefront of worship music, with the very widely used Hillsong material from the Hills Christian Church in Sydney.

The practice of repeating a simple chorus over and over in a kind of Christian “mantra” provides “a more emotional substitute for ‘theologically loaded’ traditional hymns.” This fresh approach had much to commend it, especially in moving away from earlier “sentimentalized” gospel songs, overly subjective in nature, to the singing of biblical texts and objective songs of praise, often drawn from the psalms. But sadly many churches have dispensed with more theologically adequate “content” songs in favor of “praise” songs that are valid expressions of adoration, but do not teach much of anything at all.

The biblical basis for charismatic worship practices is drawn primarily from the Old Testament, and in particular on David’s Tabernacle, with its emphasis on singing, dancing, and instrumental music in the presence of the Ark of the Covenant, the symbol of God’s living presence. Charismatics typically define “worship” more narrowly than other believers. For most Christians, “worship” is all that takes place in the gathering of believers. For many Pentecostals and charismatics, thanksgiving, praise, and worship are separate and consecutive movements. Preparation for worship begins in the “outer court” where thanksgiving is expressed. The gatherers then move to the “holy place” where praise is offered. Finally worship is reached where the focus is no longer on what God has done, but on adoring God for who he is. This often leads to a time of glossalalic expression (praising God in “tongues” or “singing in the Spirit,”) prophecy etc.

According to Hardy and Ford, praise and worship is a better approach to sanctification than traditional Christian disciplines. This desire to transcend discipline and the means of grace in a more direct, “unmediated” manner is a typical expression of Christian mysticism. This should give us pause, however, as it gave Wesley pause in his controversy with the Quietists. If God has chosen to mediate his grace to us through constituted means, is a transcendence of this a good thing?

Paul Waitman Hoon gives a powerful theological critique of the concept that “pure” worship is attributing praise to God on the basis of his worth, (who he is) quite separate from his actions (what he has done). “It is precisely the recital of, and engagement with, a particular history bound up with a particular Jew, in a particular land, at a particular time, that is the basis of Christian worship.”

Indeed, Geoffrey Wainwright reminds us that creeds are also praise. “The motive of purpose of…confession is both doxology and witness. The act of confession is part of a more ample movement, a broader sweep which takes its origin in God and comes to completion in God, having drawn humanity to salvation during its course.”

Though stressing transcendence, charismatic worship lacks a true sense of mystery, penitence, humility, and awe, as it can have the appearance of manipulating God through “techniques.”

There is too little stress on the rational content of our faith in charismatic worship. “In [Hustad’s] judgement, 30 minutes of singing songs in one musical style, with much repetition of a few words of ‘pure praise,’ is an excessive invitation to emotional manipulation.”

The connection between music and the creation of ecstatic states has problematic origins in a pre-Christian view of the world.

The idea that charismatic renewal music is a fulfillment of Joel 2:28 and Acts 2:17 has exegetical fallacy written all over it.

Related to the above is the idea that charismatic renewal songs are “new wine” and classic hymns are “old wine.” This leads to a significant cultural loss of the church’s tradition. “When we sing the hymns of Ambrose and Luther and Wesley, we give witness to the perpetuity of God’s covenant as well as the continuity of the Spirit’s presence.”

Worship is impoverished when its music lacks melodic and harmonic, theologically valid texts, and musical artistry.

Are those who promote seeker style worship services really only applying a method for evangelism or are they “recommending a new standard for worship based on the statistically determined preferences of a certain age group”?

Include NT elements in every worship service (scripture, preaching, prayer, acts of dedication, and musical expressions related to all these in a full service of Word and Table.)

Express joy; let visitors sense the power of Christ in us. “Unbelievers come to church, not primarily to investigate the claims of Christ, but to investigate the Christ in us.”

Guard important symbols, such as the cross, and do not replace them with secular ones.

Sing a variety of songs from a wide range of musical styles, as the early church did.

Ensure that worship is incarnational. We become more fully human as we become more fully like Christ.

The Christian Year is “an arrangement by which special days and seasons of the year are set aside for the commemoration of particular aspects of the Christian faith.” It gradually developed in the early church, and followed the pattern set by the Jewish church, with its ordered round of high festivals and solemn days of remembrance, such as the Passover, the day of Atonement, the Day of Pentecost, and so on. Some of these were taken over by the Christian Church for its own use. According to Frank Colquhoun, its purpose is “to celebrate progressively the great acts of God in the redemption of the world by our Lord Jesus Christ, and to stress the corresponding duties incumbent upon the Church in response to what God has done.”

The two focal points of the divine plan of salvation are Incarnation and Atonement. The Church Year follows this arrangement with the first part of the year based on the two great festivals of Christmas and Easter, each with a corresponding period of preparation – Advent preparing for Christmas, and Lent preparing for Easter. Pentecost concludes this first half of the year with a stress on the reception of the Pentecostal gift of the Spirit. The second half of the year (the season after Pentecost or ordinary time) is concerned with applying and living out the salvation we have celebrated in the first half.

Easter was the first annual festival to be kept by the Church, linking up as it did with the Jewish Passover. Closely associated with this was the feast of Pentecost forty nine days later. “In the minds of the early believers, with their Jewish background, these annual festivals could not fail to recall the mighty acts which God had wrought for their salvation in the cross, the empty tomb, and the coming of the Comforter.”

The Christian Year begins on the first Sunday of Advent, which is the fourth Sunday before Christmas Day, or the Sunday closest to November 31st. This season bears witness to the “coming” of Christ, both in his humiliation at Bethlehem and in his final glory at the Last Day. It is, therefore, a time of preparation. In fact, it speaks of Christ’s coming in a threefold sense 1) the coming of Christ in the flesh, 2) the coming of Christ in Word and Spirit now, 3) the coming of Christ in glory at the end of the age. The color for Advent is violet.

Why the use of colors? It is not certain whether they were chosen arbitrarily or with some specific symbol in mind. Consciously or unconsciously certain colors are indicative of certain moods and feelings. White is clean and pure, green speaks of growth and of spring. Black is darkness, suffering, death. Red is for blood etc. In any case, their use in our churches today may serve as one more way of appealing to the postmodern world with its emphasis on the senses.

Christmas, the celebration of Christ’s birth, did not come into general use until the fourth century, when it replaced an earlier festival of the birth of the sun. In the wake of the Christological definitions at Nicaea and elsewhere, the stress on the Incarnation of God in the flesh gave rise to its isolation from the earlier season of Epiphany, celebrated by the Eastern Church, during which Christ’s birth was celebrated on January 6th. The Western practice of observing December 25th gradually dominated and the Nativity was separated from the season of Epiphany.

One symbol for Christmas is the IHS – the English transliteration of the first three Greek letters in the name of Jesus. Another appropriate symbol is the Chi Rho (cr) the first two Greek letters in the word “Christ” superimposed upon each other. The symbol of the Lamb of God (Agnus Dei) reminds us of John the Baptist as the forerunner of the Messiah. These are the words he used in announcing the coming of Christ. Others symbols include the shepherd’s staff, the manger, a candle, the star of Bethlehem, angels, etc all relating to the story of the Nativity.

The color for Christmas is white and its theme is rejoicing for the gift of God’s Son.

With the exception of Easter, this is the oldest festival of the Christian year, but usually the most neglected. The thirteenth day after Christmas Day (Jan 6th) is the Feast of the Epiphany – “The manifestation of Christ to the Gentiles.” The word “epiphany” means ‘to show forth.’ It is linked with the story of the Magi in Matthew 2:1-12, and emphasizes the world wide reach of the Christian revelation.

Before the popularity of Christmas Day it was the day on which the church celebrated the birth of Christ. Later it came to be linked instead to Christ’s baptism in which He is revealed to the world through his earthly ministry. This was the stress Martin Luther preferred for Epiphany.

The color for Christmas, white, is continued, but sometimes replaced by green in the last four days to symbolize the new life and hope that Christ brings into the world. It is an appropriate time for a missionary emphasis. Symbols include the star of Bethlehem that guided the magi, an orb representing the world and mounted by a cross, the baptismal shell with water dripping from it.

Opens on Ash Wednesday and covers the forty-six days before Easter Day. These forty days are a season of fasting and penitence in preparation for the great Easter festival. It developed from the period of fasting undertaken by the catechumens in the early church before they were baptized at Easter. Sundays however are never days of penitence, but always a “mini-Easter.” They are not included in Lent and so it is technically a forty-day rather than a forty-six day period. No fasting takes place on Sunday not even in the Sundays in Lent. It is related biblically to the forty days of fasting by Moses, and by Christ, to Elijah’s forty day fast, and to the forty years spent in the wilderness under Moses. Its name probably comes from the German word Lenz and the Anglo-Saxon word Lenchthen, meaning “Spring,” a time when the days begin to lengthen.

Like Advent, its color is also violet which speaks of both the royalty of Christ, and his passion. Its message is “Repent of your neglect of and indifference to the things of God. Live close to him so that your faith is renewed.”

Now we move day by day into the events of the last week of Our Lord’s earthly life. Holy Week is an older season than Lent itself, Lent being an extension of it. Palm Sunday is the last Sunday before Easter and ushers us into Holy Week. On it we remember the entry of the Lord into Jerusalem on that great final week. Its symbol is the palm branch.

Maundy Thursday commemorates the Last Supper and the institution of the Lord’s Supper. Its name is derived from the Latin mandatum meaning “command” because it was in this night that the lord “mandated” the commemoration of his death in the Eucharist. Grapes and wheat are a common symbol for this day.

Good Friday marks the day of Christ’s suffering and death on the cross (Passion). Its name probably comes’ from “God’s Friday,” just as Good-bye originally meant “God be with ye.” A stripping of the altar “seals the tomb” until Sunday. The cross is the primary symbol of Good Friday, often with the INRI lettering – These represent the Latin inscription Iesus Nazarenus Rex Iudaeorum – “Jesus of Nazareth, King of the Jews.” Other symbols include the crown of thorns, and the lamb of God.

On Holy Saturday, a prayer vigil is often held until Easter morning when we celebrate his resurrection victory.

The color for Holy Week is red, speaking of Christ’s blood, except for Good Friday when it is replaced by black. The cross is the major symbol throughout this week.

Celebrated, at least in the West, as a movable feast, it occurs the first Sunday after the full moon falling upon or after March 21st, which is the first day of Spring. (In the Eastern churches it is still held according to the Jewish calendar, corresponding with the Feast of the Passover.) It can occur, therefore, anywhere between March 22nd and April 25th.

Originally called Pascha, a word derived from the Hebrew for Passover, some scholars believe that the word “Easter” comes from the Anglo-Saxon spring goddess, Eostre, whose festival coincided with the Spring equinox. Other reject this on the basis that the British Church at the time when this goddess was prevalent, was particularly keen to distance itself from any pagan influences, and would never have borrowed such a usage. The issue is inconclusive either way. Easter, or course, celebrates Christ’s glorious resurrection from the dead. We may think of every Sunday as a “Mini-Easter,” or of every Easter as a “Great Sunday.” Its color is white. Symbols include the crown of Christ, the egg, and the butterfly, all of which speak of new life.

Then follows the forty days of the Easter season, the time spent by the Risen Lord revealing himself to his disciples and to others before ascending to be with his Father. (Acts 1:3) This concludes with Ascension Day, the fortieth day after Easter Sunday, always a Thursday. It commemorates the Lord’s exaltation to the right hand of God and testifies to his kingship. The symbol for Ascension is the crown of Christ. The color for the Easter Season continues as white.

Ten days after Ascension comes the day of Pentecost (or Whitsunday) with a stress on the ministry of the Holy Spirit in the Church. This ends the first half of the Christian Year. It is associated with the giving of the Law through Moses on Mt. Sinai, the “founding” as it were of the Jewish Church,” and the founding of the Christian Church on the Day of Pentecost. Its symbols are the dove and the flame. Red is the color and the central idea is a life of holiness and empowerment for service and witness.

Bears witness to the Christian doctrine of God as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and ushers in the season variously known as Trinity Season, the Season after Pentecost, or simply Ordinary Time. Here we are concerned with the practical outworkings of the Christian life. Its color is green which speaks of growth and renewal

The first half of the year answers the question, “What do Christians believe>” and the second half, “What ought a Christian to do?” It is an aid in holding together in proper proportion a celebration of the great facts and events upon which the Christian life is based. The essential principle of the Christian year, and of liturgy broadly, is not the use of set forms, but the setting forth of the saving acts of God. It places emphasis, as the New Testament itself does, on what God has done – the saving acts of God in Christ, those “once for all” events by which our salvation is accomplished, rather than upon current events, ecclesiastical trends, individual experience, or the preacher’s pet peeves. In centering upon what GOD has done it underscores the futility of our own efforts and announces for us a year of grace. Its comprehensive nature ensures that no aspect of the Christian faith and life is untouched and so it meets our whole spiritual need.

The Christian Year can serve as an antidote to the heresies and “isms” that often afflict the Church when she forgets the core content of her proclamation, when the story is forgotten. It is a practical way that the pastor can ensure a balanced all-inclusive teaching program that will feed the mind, the heart, and the senses, with the Grand Story of redemption. It helps us to “sanctify” time. We may choose to mark time the way the world does (Anzac Day, Mother’s Day, Grand Final day, Melbourne Cup Day etc.) or we may choose to mark time the way the Church does, with the Christian Year. Denominational days help us mark time in other ways – World Missions, Kingsley College, Home Missions, etc. As mush as possible these should flow with, rather than interrupt the Church Year.

A mention of Holy Week brought from one colleague the response, “Every week is holy to me brother.” Why then do we have Spiritual Emphasis Week”? Is not every week meant to be a week of spiritual emphasis? Or “Missions Awareness Week.” Are we not to be aware of Missions every week?

The Christian Year also has eschatological significance. It helps us live “between the times.” It involves a rite of separation from ordinary time, old time, which speaks of our old status and nature, and into sacred time – what it means to be a Christian, who I am in Christ. It then involves a rite of reincorporation into an ordinary time that it no longer “old time” but is now “renewed time.” I am reminded of my renewed status as a child of God, as the recipient of God’s saving and sanctifying grace, and it sends me back out into ordinary time as one who is in the world of old time but not of it. Rather I am a citizen of the eschaton. The kingdom has come, is in me, and is coming. It reminds us that a sanctuary is not something that takes place in space, but in time.

The Christian Year serves as an effective bridge between the Christian churches, helping us to affirm our unity by following together the same annual pattern of celebration. When asked via an email message for suggestions for changes to our Wesleyan “40 Days of Prayer and Fasting” program I responded – “Why not call it Lent and celebrate it before Easter, with the rest of the church?” Instead we used it to lead up to our District Conferences. Thus our parochial denominational program was deemed of more significance than the faith and practice of the historic church and the theological rationale behind the ordering of the Christian Year.

Like most liturgical resources, the Christian Year is a good servant but a poor master. It should not be considered a noose around our necks or a heavy burden to drag around with us. It is designed to enhance our discipling ministry. As such it is a time honored, tested, and proven tool, which we neglect to our own loss.

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http://www.glenobrien.com/OccasionalPapers.html