[Book Review] A History of Contemporary Praise and Worship: Understanding the Ideas That Reshaped the Protestant Church 

I recently read through the fantastic new volume by Lester Ruth and Lim Swee Hong A History of Contemporary Praise & Worship: Understanding the Ideas That Reshaped the Protestant Church 

This study offers a new gold standard in understanding the history of contemporary praise and worship music. It helps move the understanding beyond many of the limited narratives that focus too narrowly on the Jesus People’s influence and takes seriously many of the efforts and movements both within the Pentecostal/Charismatic churches as well as within the mainline.

It manages to communicate clear continuities in the development of worship without falling into the all-too-common error of reducing the history to a singular stream of influence.

I’ve been working on a project related to this for a few years now related to the Catholic Charismatic Renewal so I absolutely loved the book.

While you’re at it, I recommend picking up Flow, which is another recent publication from Ruth (as Editor and contributor). It’s a very practical guide to leading worship with contemporary worship components. Although focused on Methodists, I found a lot of value in it too.

Here’s a video of the authors discussing their research here: