Contemporary Whippersnapper Church Music

I was really struck by Wade Berry’s words in a post yesterday on “worship and dissatisfaction with the modern church.” He wrote:

Churches need to remember that their job is not to preserve “the old hymns” and pass them along to the next generation – whether that next generation wants them or not. Their job is to provide people with an opportunity to connect with God. It is to challenge the intellect and awaken the emotions. It is to call for repentance, to offer transformation, to facilitate healing, and to empower faithful living. And, most of all, it is to lovingly offer God our heartfelt thanks for all that He has done for us.

I thought of his words this evening as we tried to sort out some technical issues that have plagued our attempts to offer the best music we can at my church (I play keyboards). But more than the above, I thought of this cartoon from the Ongoing Adventures of ASBO Jesus:

And this one from Sacred Sandwich (HT ξἐνος) also seems relevant:

We’re making progress on some of the technical issues that have been hurdles to getting the proper balance on the sound, but whether the music still seems “too loud” may have as much to do with the age of people in the congregation as anything we can do with the instruments, our voices, or the sound board.