Make a Joyful Noise!!!!!!!!!!!!

Singing is commanded in Scripture as a part of our worship, but it should be so much more than a duty-bound voicing of words. The Bible reveals many reasons why we should want to lift our voices in song.

We should sing of the strength and power of our God. We should sing of the victory that is possible through Him. We should sing songs of exaltation and songs of thanksgiving for our blessings, most especially the blessing of salvation. Our songs should pour forth from an overflow of the joy we have in the love of our Father.


While singing is to be "unto the Lord", it is also for our consecration and edification. As we sing, we draw nearer to God, as well as to one another. Understanding is to be a part of our singing, so let us be sure we are telling the truth when we sing words like, "Jesus Is All The World To Me."


Colossians 3:16 "Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, as you teach and admonish one another in all wisdom, and as you sing psalms, and hymns, and spiritual songs with thankfulness in your hearts to God."

Keeping Them Quiet in Church--Reprise

This is an edited version of a post I wrote for a now defunct blog site more than a year ago. I hope you enjoy it.

This blog grew out of my response to kamirusma's blog yesterday. She introduced the issue of church being boring. No doubt it is a real factor within the families of faith. I suppose all of us have had heavy eyelids in church, as well as almost any other place we sit still for more than a few minutes.

In my opinion it is inexcusable to make the message of Christ boring. In our day of instant gratification, I suppose that to some the traditions of faith can seem dull, especially if those leading worship and presenting the message are just going through the motions.


I belong to a fellowship that is conservative. We do things as close to the way they are outlined in the New Testament as we can. We are not high church, if that is a functional term for this community, but not charismatic either. We sing acapella, no gimmicks to hype up our services.


But we try to make the message and the worship assembly meaningful and practical, we want it to be part of your life everyday and in every place.


One of the things we do is give our teens opportunities to be a part of the services and to participate in ministry of the word. I think it is an important part of why there are few who sleep in our services.


We have our Sunday school study centered around one passage or topic for the whole family on any given week. That way the families can read and share with their kids in discussions of the subject before classes. The intent is that everyone be aware of the subject before they get to class so they do not feel left out. They will even be likely to contribute to the lesson.


We do some other organized activities to help the young ones know the basics of faith so they will develop a faith of their own. Hopefully, by their teen years so they have made their decisions for faith and are not as likely to be "forced to go to church".


Skouba has some good ideas in the comments of kamirusma's blog, & I encouraged her to post them on her site too. She points to the need for mom and dad to train the children to worship instead of programming them to need to be entertained.


Another item that helps is that the messages in our services are not long and drawn out, at least not on a regular basis. I had a friend and mentor tell me long ago, "No sermon is all bad if it is short enough."


I don't know if this helps the debate, but I hope so.

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