Douglas Wilson on “feeling worshipful”- and its remedy
by Greg Linscott
From Future Men, p. 100
Music has been one of the chief culprits in the feminization of the church. Many of the ‘traditional’ hymns of the nineteenth century are romantic, flowery, and feminine. (I come, after all, to the garden alone, while the dew is still on the roses.) But the recent rejection of such hymns in favor of contemporary worship music has been a step further away from a biblical masculinity. The current emphasis on “feeling worshipful” is frankly masturbatory, which in men produces a cowardly and effeminate result.
The fact that the church has largely abandoned the singing of psalms means that the church has abandoned a songbook that is thoroughly masculine in its lyrics. The writer of most of the psalms was a warrior, and he knew how to fight the Lord’s enemies in song. With regard to the music of our psalms and hymns, we must return to a world of vigorous singing, vibrant anthems, more songs where the tenor carries the melody, open fifths, and glory. Our problem is not that such songs do not exist; our problem is that we have forgotten them. And in forgetting them, we are forgetting our boys. Men need to model such singing for their sons.
Greg Linscott 
That is an interesting perspective.
It is more than an interesting perspective; it is gospel. Pure and simple gospel.
For all the hoo-haw and self-conscious ink-spilling that goes on among fundamentalists regarding music, the fact that no one takes ideas such as Wilson’s seriously tells us all we need to know about current critics of worship. If one can ignore such an example of what the LORD is pleased to hear during his worship (i.e. the Psalter), then nothing he says can command any credibility.
Wilson is correct, and what’s more: obviously correct. Irrefutably correct.
That we should need to have this pointed out to us demonstrates the nature of our problem.
I had not thought of the connection of gender with the songs of contemporary American evangelicalism. This (indeed) shows what a sorry state we are (I am) in.
BQ, thank you for your strong words!
I have been looking for a definition of this, not only with the music but amongst the musicians. When I was in college I had a voice professor that would comment about muscians that were masturbatory in their delivery. As a professional musician who was recently saved I was surprised to see it with such prevelancy in the church. I pray for a return to this masculine style of singing and psalmody in the church.
I have long thought that contemporary worship music is feminizing to the Church. Several years ago I had the opportunity to observe the congregational singing of two large evangelical churches in the Chicago area, and the conclusions that I drew from that experience are the basis for my thoughts here.
I lived in the city of Chicago for 4 years and during that time I attended a large non-denominational church: average Sunday morning attendance: 1500. The church used a hymnal, but more and more, over those 4 years, I saw the worship services change from mostly hymns, with one or two praise choruses, to mostly praise choruses, with one or two hymns. For the hymns, the accompaniment was piano (grand) and organ (pipe), with extremely competent musicians. For the praise choruses, however, the organist played a small electronic keyboard on a stand next to the organ. (I always felt sorry for him. A master organist consigned to play a little 3-octave electronic keyboard.)
In June 1998, toward the end of my time in Chicago, I attended a church music seminar, held at a large church in the western suburbs. That church was about the same size as my own, and it, too, had a grand piano and pipe organ. The seminar was excellent, and I’m so glad I was able to go. The choir of that church sang several times during the conference, and they were very good. I also met the church’s music minister, and was so impressed with his philosophy of church music, as well as with other aspects of this church’s music, that I decided to visit this church the next Sunday morning.
That Sunday, as I looked through the bulletin during the prelude, I saw that we would be singing only hymns, as the music minister had told me—hymns that would be considered “great, historic hymns of the church.” Watts and Wesley were well represented.
As we sang the first notes of the first hymn, I was astonished at what I heard. There was a *huge* difference in the quality of the singing between this congregation and my own, back in the city. This congregation had a depth and strength to its singing that my own did not. It was obvious that the *men* were really singing–and many were singing tenor or bass. The difference between the two congregations was so stark that I stopped singing and just listened in wonderment for the remainder of the hymn. The other hymns that morning were sung in the same way.
The next Sunday, back in my church in the city, the singing of the choruses and the hymns was “thin” — melody only, and few men could be heard.
Over the next few days I thought a lot about that experience, and why the singing was so different. The only answer I could come up with was that praise choruses are feminizing to men and once a church “crosses the line,” so to speak, from primarily hymn-singing to primarily chorus-singing, *all* the singing of that congregation changes, and is feminized–either
a) qualitatively–where the men become effeminate in their singing, or
b) quantitatively–where the men are so repelled by the music that they do not participate—or they don’t come to church at all.
The following factors contribute to that process.
1. Most praise songs are subjective and emotionally oriented: what *I* think; what *I* feel; what *I* want to do. Such content is more appealing to women than to men.
2. Because usually just the words (not the music) are visible on the screen or in the bulletin, 4-part harmony–with the men singing their parts– is nearly impossible.
3. Many praise choruses are made popular by commercial Christian “artists.” Most male artists today sing in a style that is breathy and effeminate, and if such popular Christian music is what churchgoers listen to. . . .
I recently listened to an on-line clip of a male singer who has for years been considered conservative and “middle of the road.” Well, sad to say, he, too, has adopted the breathy style. How I miss singers such as Frank Boggs, Bill Pierce, and Hale and Wilder! And groups such as the “16 Singing Men,” and the “Melody Four Quartet”!
4. Many men have never been encouraged to really *sing.* In most churches today, congregational singing has become less and less important, with the “performers” (aka the worship team) doing the singing, and the congregation mostly listening passively.
5. Hymns that have challenging men’s parts, where the men are really encouraged to sing, are pretty much a thing of the past. Alas! These hymns would include:
* All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name (second tune–“Diadem”)
* The Spacious Firmament
* Joy to the World
* Wonderful Grace of Jesus
These hymns, I think, would fit Doug Wilson’s description of “vigorous singing” and “vibrant anthems.” Other hymns that lend themselves to vigorous singing would include “O Worship the King,” “A Mighty Fortress is Our God,” “Praise to the Lord, the Almighty,” “Crown Him with Many Crowns,” “Soldiers of Christ, Arise,” “Rejoice, the Lord is King,” and many more.
(When was the last time you sang any of these hymns, all the verses, with a song leader who inspired you to sing to the Lord with all your heart? When was the last time you sang a hymn, where the leader had just the men sing one of the verses?)
Because many churches have noticed that the men tend not to participate in contemporary worship, they have implemented elements of popular culture and entertainment in order to attract the men. A very sad situation indeed.
Any thoughts on how this came to be, and how to change it?
Dissidens and others,
If the “it” you wish to change is the reluctance of men to sing during worship, you will need to set before all the men the spectacle of some ordinary men doing the thing you wish all men to do, and the ordinary men must do it with gusto, obvious impact, and regularly.
ORDINARY men: this is key. If you set forth the men with opera-chorus quality voices, you will only reenforce an ordinary man’s penchant for withdrawal before obviously greater talent and expertise. No man likes to look inept, and some weak-voiced weenie trying to sing alongside a booming, vibrant bass or a soaring on-key tenor … well, he’s not going to do it.
Ordinary MEN: the point here is plurality. Let a single man see a sizeable group of men doing something that’s just swell, and he’ll want to join in. For men, safety is found in numbers. And, within numbers, a man who feels safe will grow (in this case, grow in skill in singing).
Gusto: at the beginning (i.e. for several years, perhaps) the singing should be ONLY the kind that ordinary men will admire as masculine. No plaintive counter-tenor solos during the offertory. Please.
Let the hymns be the robust, sinewy, masculine things that do not embarrass a man to sing. Take a razor blade to the hymnals and carefully slice away all the maudlin, treacley crap redolent of grandmother’s lilac-scented lingerie drawer. No “In the Garden,” and nothing by Fanny Crosby. Nada. Nichts. Zilch.
Also eliminate those crooning, navel-gazing, repetitive, mind-numbing mixolydin modern choruses. No Jesus is my Boyfriend songs. They’re bad enough for women. They’re religious poison for men.
Give the men something manly to sing, and only something manly to sing. The women will still sing it, and the men will begin to sing it, if they have some seed-crystal of manly singers to join. You may need to get rid of your hymnal and replace them with something from the Forties, or earlier.
Maybe much, much earlier, as in the Psalter. Here’s a thought which everyone will probably grow tired of me championing: Teach the men to sing the naked Psalm texts to Anglican chants. It’s easy. I’ve taught ten-year olds to do it in ten minutes. I’ve seen 50 men learn to do it on the spot by copying only five men who were doing this with confidence (again, an easy thing, since this form of singing is really simple).
Let the men sing these and only the men. No women. The Psalter is chock full of blood, sweat, fire and brimstone, mountain-leveling, earth-shattering glory to God. Let the men sing this and only the men. If men are supposed to lead in worship (and, they are!) then give them something major to do and make it prominent, obvious, and routine. Make a generous space in the worship service where every man can think “Yeah, this is where I wade in and make my contribution with the other men!”
Obvious impact and Regularly: men singing, even men only singing, should not be an occasional thing. It will have the impact of a water fall if it has the constancy of a waterfall. Every service should thunder with the sound of male voices. Every Sunday the walls of the sanctuary should vibrate with the blood-charged resonance of the glory of God (cf. 1 Cor. 11:7) singing His praises.
There’s more, but this would be a good start.
Greg, I’m thinking on this. There is much with which I agree. However, it seems like the Psalms include much that is less than “robust” regarding a man’s relationship with God. Sure, many of them exult in God as a great Victor. But others describe God as a gracious Healer, Forgiver and Shepherd. David expresses longing, need for comfort and encouragement, etc. I’m not suggesting anything “masturbatory” (whatever that is intended to mean). But I am suggesting that a brokenness over God’s grace, my sin, Christ’s sacrifice, etc. is more than appropriate. To see a “man’s man” weeping quietly as we sing “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded” doesn’t hint of femininity, IMO. Mercy, the idea that such an expression of appropriate emotion is indicative of being less than masculine is repulsive to me.
As for a pre-occupation with “me” in worship, again, I agree to a point. However, the power of Watts’ tremendous hymn “How Sweet and Awesome is the Place” is his amazement that *he* (or *I* as I sing it) should be included in the great Gospel feast…despite myself. I don’t think the references to personal involvement in redemption in such a song are at all self-centered.
Just some thoughts. Thanks for the post.
Chris and Greg,
Emotion during worship is another of those things about which Jesus would say: he who seeks to keep it will lose it, while he who loses it for My sake will keep it to everlasting life. Seek emotion and you’ll lose worship. Forget emotion for the sake of worshiping the one worthy of worship, and you’ll find emotion aplenty.
Also, terms here are misleading because they’re not well defined. What emotion are we talking about? Is gratitude an emotion? Joy, I suppose, would qualify as an emotion. Relief?
How about fear? Real, bowel-churning, heart-stopping fear. Every wonder about that Psalmic admonition to “rejoice with trembling?” When was the last time you experienced that? Or saw someone else in the throws of something like that?
Tears? Chris, why cannot someone weep with joy? or with fear? or with anger? On that point, where is the place for indignation in worship? There’s indignation aplenty in the Psalms, by which we are warranted in supposing it’s a legitimate emotion during worship, right?
When emotions — of any sort you can name — flood the psyche to the point of drowning it, the body releases the “pressure” or “overflow” in the form of tears. Tears are a sign that the soul is burdened by emotion the soul is too weak to endure while maintaining composure. When one no longer weeps at what used to make him weep, it is for two reasons only: (1) his soul has become calloused and so no longer feels the emotion that formerly provoked weeping, or (2) his soul has grown stronger and is now able to shoulder a weight of emotion (any emotion) without needing to weep.
Finally, Wilson’s characterizing much of evangelical worship as masturbatory shocks, but that Wilson’s words shock us while what he points to does not shock us is telling. His term is accurate — it signifies a manipulation with the sole aim of achieving a desireable state of consciousness. This is why worship leaders, whose job it is to generate the “worshipful feeling”, are fundamentally masturbatory in their ministrations. They are insulted to have their “ministry” so characterized. Instead, they ought to feel shame, exactly the same shame that revivalists should feel, who resorted to the same techniques to move people down the aisles.
Bill, we may be speaking past each other. I’m all for vibrant, joyful, robust worship. One need not shed tears, and as you suggest, one may indeed shed in tears of joy. And yes, our worship should always be characterized by fear and reverence (Heb. 12:28-29). In other words, I’m not talking about a fuzzy-fest that has more in common with Hallmark commercials than Scripture.
I do wonder, however, if what you suggested in your 12/28 post approaches the type of emotion-targeting which is being criticized here and at MTC. I’m not attacking at all–just honestly thinking. We shouldn’t manipulate worshiper’s emotions, and the modern tendency to do so is clearly wrong. But I wonder if your solution could result in the same error in the opposite direction? Are you seeking a particular emotional response with your emphasis on male-dominated singing and choice of particularly robust hymns?
Thanks for the interaction.
Hi, Pr. Chris,
Thanks for the elaboration. It’s good to hear that we are, perhaps, talking past one another.
Your question as to whether I am seeking a particular emotional response is legitimate. I hope I am not seeking it merely because it is an emotional response. I pretty much always *expect* some emotional response to any worship that is worthy of the name. Often, it should be emotions of joy, gratitude, adoration, etc. Often, because we are sinners, a truly proper emotional response will be grief, sorrow, dismay, and similar emotions that properly attend the godly sorrow the Scripture speaks to. Even then, without commiting the very error I deplore, I would attempt to guide a genuinely penitent sinner toward grace, and I would hope he’d experience godly gratitude.
All that said, I’d come back to this: It’s idolatry to aim at the emotion itself, rather than what would rightly generate the emotion — namely some divine truth, cogently preached or taught, received by faith.
As to the male-dominated singing of particularly robust hymns, I’d contend for that for two reasons:
(1) Biblical Precedent and Pattern: the worship of the Bible is robustly masculine by divine fiat and by reference to its actualization in the liturgy of the Old Covenant and its hymnbook. It is also forthrightly liturgical in its execution, patterned on the worship in heaven (which we can still observe in the era of the New Covenant, via John’s visions in the Apocalypse).
What you will nowhere see in the Bible (unless its to oblique references to pagan worship) is anything like mini-skirted mavens with phallic mikes crooning Jesus is my Boyfriend songs to men who are supposed to sing along with them. Blech!!
In view of the overriding currents I have just mentioned, a very high profile to men at worship is almost mandatory as an antidote to the current poison coursing through the sanctuaries in America every Sunday. I do not speak to your congregation, Pr. Chris, for I have never seen it. But even if your congregation worships far more soberly and sanely than most, I’m sure you still know whereof I speak.
As to the potential for what I’m advocating to generate emotion, I guarantee that it has great potential for that. I attended a clericus in Houston last month, attended by about 100 Anglican priests. In our worship, we sang the Te Deum, composed by Ambrose 16 centuries ago. We sang the Psalms right out of the Psalter to Anglican Chants, in four-part harmony. If you want shivers that will make your moustache curl, that’ll do it.
My point is simply this: to make my moustache curling the end of the matter turns the whole enterprise upside down. It’s like being in love with love, rather than being in love with God. Both will “feel” the same, at least for a while. But sooner or later, one of those will rot.
Thanks for the response, Bill. Based on your last paragraph, you may appreciate this post. D.A. Carson has the same frustrations.
I’m gathering from your comment that you are an Anglican priest? Let’s not take this thread off course, but I’d be interested in your doctrinal positions. I’ll poke around your blog. If you’d care to email me with a link to a doctrinal statement or something, I’m interested.
Chris,
Fr. Bill is aka the prolific “Brother Quotidian,” affectionately shortened to “BQ.”
Chris,
What I will now say in general terms about Anglican doctrine will keep us on point here (viz. the topic of worship).
The English Reformation yeilded a “big tent” Protestantism that was genuinely Protestant, especially in the soteriological areas. Cranmer can be shown to adhere to all five Solas *as they were understood in that original Reformation context*, though probably not as they eventually evolved, particularly in the Truly Reformed and Anabaptist streams. The English Reformation settled into something far closer, in practical terms, to Lutheranism than it ever did to Continental Calvinism. It was most certainly opposed to the Anabaptists.
On the continent, among the Calvinists and the Anabaptists, the Reformation often amounted to amputation when it came to public and private worship and piety. “We don’t do this or that, because that’s what Catholics do,” was he de facto principle of reformation. Thus, the use of the organ in worship was repudiated among Continental Protestants for a couple of centuries at least. So also liturgy itself, with its ceremonial and material adornments. Repudiating these became a principle of reform which continued to operate long after Christian worship in some of these communities had ceased to resemble anything within light years of the Medieval Roman mass. The extremity of such a program is found in the Quaker meeting, where all sit on chairs in silence, speaking only rarely in turn.
In the English Reformation, communal and private worship was left (in principle) pretty much as it had been for the previous 1500 years. Cranmer’s alteration of the Sarum mass did two things: (1) it vastly simplified the overall liturgy, pruning away much that was repetitive (e.g. the Lord’s Prayer on some feast days would be recited seven times during the service!), and (2) it recast much of the language of the prayers to capture the soteriological reformation that makes the Reformation … well, a reformation. All you need do to see how thoroughly Protestant are Cranmer’s revisions is to compare the prayer of consecration in the Sarum mass and in the first Prayer Book (1549).
In the area of worship [see! we’re still on point] much of the rest of catholic (note the small “c”) worship remained untouched, deemed (as it was in Lutheranism) to be entirely Biblical and wholesome. Thus, were retained vestments, all the “pious behaviors” such as the sign of the cross, kneeling for prayer, bowing before the alter, as well as “adornments” such as candles, vesting the alter, crosses and crucifixes, tabernacles, sanctuary lamps, and so forth.
The English Reformation had its own “worship wars,” climaxing in the conflict between the Puritans (who were really Scotch Presbyterians at heart) and everyone else, whom the Puritans accused of being crypto-Papists. Today, that same charge is frequently leveled by the sons of the Anabaptists and the grandsons of the Calvinist Scholastics against people like me who retain the patterns of Western catholic worship (along with the Lutherans).
I came to faith among the Southern Baptists, received serious spiritual formation among old-style Bible Church fundamentalists, graduated from DTS in ’78 with a major in Hebrew, and ministered in evirons very similar to yours, Chris, for about ten years. The one Big Thing missing in all this is still found in the worship of the English Reformation.
The quote from Carson you provided in another blog is accurate in judging evangelical (and fundamentalist) worship to be broken. It is both broken and corrupted, though with very different toxins than what corrupted worship in the late Middle Ages. If that era of the Church wallowed in a left-hand ditch, modern evangelicalism and fundamentalism wallows in the right-hand ditch. Journeying to the New Jerusalem goes ever so much more efficiently by keeping to the road between them.
I’m sending references to your question about doctrine via email.
Fr. B, aka BQ
Ironically enough, the much maligned (and often justifiably so) Mark Driscoll has commented on trying to get men to sing love songs to Jesus. He puts it in a way that I can’t recall closely enough to repeat it here (and I am not sure I would be comfortable repeating his language here anyway). But it is essentially the same point.
In an additional bit of irony (to me, at least), the use of “masturbatory” seems to be cut from the same cloth of language that Driscoll is frequently (and often rightly) lambasted for using.
I think there is a great lack of true masculinity in our churches.
But I need to get back to drinking my knitting here, so someone else will have to solve this problem.
Drinking my knitting???? What in the world does that mean? Perhaps I have had too much to drink …
My apologies
I wondered which definition of “masturbatory” was intended, Larry. Either way, it seems to me to be unnecessarily graphic, and you’re right, others who are less conservative are frequently criticized for such language.
FWIW, Merriam-Webster defines “masturbatory” as:
I, for one, don’t see it any different than others who have quoted performers saying “rock music is sex” or similar statements. “Self-gratifying” may sound more polite, but it really doesn’t capture the truly perverse and abhorrent nature of the “feeling worshipful” emphasis.
Now… for a good draught of yarn! 😀
Not to get off topic, or to interrupt my stein of yarn, but I think “capturing the truly perverse and abhorrent nature” of things is a reason to use more graphic language, particularly in some contexts. Which is why some of what Driscoll says doesn’t bother me much. I think he is worse than he used to be, but I think there is a certain way of putting things that grabs attention and engages us in a way that “more polite” language would not. Having said that, I would never use masturbatory in the pulpit or in writing … or did I just do that?
Larry,
I certainly would not do so very often. I don’t think Wilson does, either. It’s certainly not his shtick, as it seems to have become with Driscoll.
But… Wilson is better known for things like paedocommunion and poking fun as Dispensationalists…
So- anyone recommend some good vintage spun fibers?
Wilson has the very great virtue of speaking plainly and pointedly to whatever he is addressing. I far, far prefer that in a brother with whom I have differences of conviction. It avoids misunderstanding, excess spillage of ink, wasted bandwidth, windiness in pulpits and a host of similar tedious things.
I have watched the folks in Moscow for several years now and I am fascinated (and, mostly encouraged) by what I see. On the matter of worship, the appear (from my perspective) to be groping their way very slowly and very deliberately back toward the classic shape and dynamics of catholic (note the small “c”) Western worship. And, they get a LOT of flack from many quarters (from this one too?) for “going Roman” on everyone.
I’m going to assume that in fundamentalist Baptist circles they would meet the same criticism on this score. Am I correct? I ask because I really want to know. I’m not spoiling for a quarrel.
Assuming that Western catholic worship is something to recover, there are bascially two ways to do it. The English Reformation is one solution: keep the shape and dynamics of the liturgy and adjust the express langauge the rites. Wilson and his confreres appear (I may be misapprehending, of course) to be sort of shopping for stuff within the worship mall of the high middle ages, stitching it together according to a pattern. It’s not all de novo, of course. I’m sure they keep Calvin in mind as they proceed. But, for many modern Presby types, Calvin was too, too Roman for their tastes, and Luther was postively unreformed (as were the Anglicans).
How does the worship enterprise in Moscow register on the radars within your communities? Curious minds really would like to know.
I don’t know enough of the complete specifics of Moscow to comment on them. I suspect that the way we are going would not be considered the “popular” way in Fundamental Baptist churches, though. In the last two years, we have incorporated some (not exclusive) psalter singing (with the lyrics projected on a screen- how’s that for playing two sides?), a “prayer of confession” in addition to the pastoral prayer, switched to an offering box and lost the plates, lost our auditorium flags, added corporate Scripture reading, and open with either the Gloria Patri or the Doxology.
In your corporate Scripture reading, do you read aloud, in unison? If so, how do you do it with all the different translations?
I remember reading the Scriptures aloud, congregationally, when I was growing up, but that was a long time ago, when everyone used the KJV. I really miss that aspect of corporate worship. (Reading a passage of Scripture printed in the bulletin or from the back of the hymnal just isn’t the same. I would much rather read from my Bible.)
We use the KJV as our standard text. There are some who bring other translations, so when we read in unision or responsively, I project the Scripture text on a screen with an LCD projector. I also use the projector to display lyrics for a few songs not in our hymnal, as well as the lyrics for instrumental songs that are played.
Pondering The Expression of Emotions
NOTE: This post is a continuation of conversation taking place at My Two Cents and here at Irrelevant.
Chris,
There is a world of difference between the imagery of “O Sacred Head” and say, “In The Garden.” What you call “b…
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