Have you noticed that at some of our camp meetings our people do not sing as wholeheartedly as they once did? This is an unfortunate fact that we need to face, for when a church begins to leave its singing to choirs and soloists it loses something vital. At our camp meetings the people often sing well the first week end, but from then on their interest lags.
There may be several reasons for this. We may have been trying to get them to sing too much. Why do we need a song service before every meeting? The services of singing may be too long and not properly planned. Too often in some quarters the attitude still exists that just about anyone can conduct a song service. This is not true in our day. In some places we may be singing the same old numbers over and over again. In other instances at an important service we have unwisely announced hymns that were entirely new. This is especially true some times in the church service, and it is a disappointment to the people, for they unconsciously feel they have failed in their part of the service if the organ and the choir have to sing the number practically alone. Time should be taken to
teach new songs to the congregation, perhaps between the Sabbath school and the church service, or at some other time. Or a new hymn might be chosen as the "hymn of the month" and used several times during any given month.
Sometimes at our camp meetings we have as many as six meetings or more a day, and we expect the people to sing enthusiastically at each service. Why? We don't have three, four, or five prayers at each service. The question of special music, also, can become a routine part of the program if we have it given by just about anyone at every service.
Surely we need to rethink this matter, plan most carefully for this part of the service, and strengthen its value by omitting it at times. Then, too, not every song service has to be "rousing" and "enthusiastic." Why not occasionally conduct a song service with more quiet hymns, just for variety? We have on occasion even told some camp meeting congregations that those who did not feel like it did not need to sing. This came as a surprise.
Some soon began to take part, but others received a real blessing by listening to the rest sing.
A song service must be more than a preliminary feature while the people are coming in or while the ministers are whispering last-minute instructions to one another. If we remember that "singing is as much an act of worship as is prayer," then we will regard the song service in a different light. To be always urging and trying to get the people to sing wears out the saints and surely must weary the angels. Why is it that a percentage of the congregation almost invariably starts walking out during the singing of the closing hymn at camp meetings and congresses? And we see this even in many of our church services. This should not be. May it not be that they have been urged to sing too much without the proper spirit of understanding, and it has become too common to them? They do not look upon singing as an act of worship, equal in solemnity to prayer. Such trends cannot be ignored.
This summer I attended the Carolina camp meeting. C. H. Lauda, the conference president, is to be commended for his organizational plans with reference to his camp meeting. He and his workers do not look upon the evening song service as a "preliminary" to be taken care of by some song leader who keeps the congregation singing for twenty minutes or half an hour, after which the workers, together with the evening speaker, come in rather ostentatiously to take their places and to let the people know that now it is time for the service to begin. In stead, Elder Lauda has his workers, together with the evening speaker, come in promptly at seven-thirty and take their places on the plat form for the song service. Then, together with the ministers on the platform, the people enjoy the period of song fellowship. This is proper and wise planning. At the close of the service they seldom have a closing song. Such a plan may not commend itself to some minds, and yet there is wisdom in it, as long as it does not become a hard-and-fast rule at our camp meetings. If our people do not look upon singing as a sacred act of worship, the closing song may actually cause them to forget the evening sermon, especially if it has not been chosen with care or if the speaker has made little effort to lead up to the closing hymn or song. Too often the congregation just goes through the motions of singing, as a religious routine, anxious to be on their way home.
Evangelistic Music That Is Different
Our evangelistic music has ever been an important factor in strengthening the hands of the evangelists. It has often attracted and held certain people in the early part of a campaign until they began to realize that they were get ting real help from the spoken message. Music has melted hearts and helped in securing decisions. And yet, with it all, there has been in every city a certain class of people who have not come to our meetings simply because they got the impression, from the way the music and the subject were advertised, that it was just an other "run-of-the-mill" evangelistic meeting.
Perhaps sometimes they have been justified in reaching such a conclusion. We can do much to convey the impression to serious-minded people that our evangelistic music is different. In our advertising, a good portrait showing the singing evangelist with a pleasant expression on his face, rather than an arm-waving picture, is a step in the right direction. Many of our singing evangelists are doing this. Then, too, reference might be made in the advertising to the "heart-warming appeals" of the soloist or choir, rather than playing up the idea that the music will be bright or cheery or enthusiastic. It can be all that, but these expressions convey the wrong impression and put us in a class with cheap evangelism.
To many, the term "singspiration" conveys the wrong impression. We are not condemning it, but we might well question its use among us. Why do we have to use this term to describe our services of music? It is a borrowed term, and to some it might sound somewhat flippant. It really has little appeal to the musically cultured mind. A term such as "hymn fellowship" or "song fellowship" or "hymns of all churches" or "hymns we all love" would recommend itself much more highly to thinking people. The word "singspiration" is associated with cheap revival ism. Should we not make every effort to keep as much of this out of our work as possible? A recent writer representing the Pocket Testament League of New York, writing about evangelism among our soldiers in Korea, had this to say:
"You don't need motion pictures, snappy choruses, or a brightly lighted auditorium to get our soldiers in Korea to a gospel meeting. To them the gospel is really news, good news. They crowd into stuffy huts, stand in windy fields, sit on cold hill sides, to listen to someone tell the old, old story of salvation." In a very definite sense the statement made by the writer of the article "Are We Still Using Model T Methods?" in the May MINISTRY holds true. Most of the people who come to evangelistic services today are thinking seriously, and therefore demand a different type of music. It might still be definitely and largely evangelistic music; and evangelistic gospel songs of the right kind will have their place until the end of time. The serious times in which we live, the serious thinking of people, and the elevated musical standard of today demand a better type of gospel song. This is emphasized in the fact that the great gospel song favorites of today are such songs as "I'd Rather Have Jesus," "The Love of God," "Great Is Thy Faithfulness," "My Father Watches Over Me." These numbers reveal a trend to elevated standards in gospel music.
The day when any cheap, catchy ditty can be expected to "go over" is fast disappearing. Even among the famed Stamps-Baxter followers of the Southland and among the "hill-billies" a gradual change is being felt. In certain areas the exciting, catchy tunes have for decades been a great vogue in the religious meetings. Singing conventions would not infrequently develop into hypnotic, frenzied orgies. But out of even such areas has come an occasional very fine gospel song with genuine appeal. In late years the children of these areas have been attending Government schools and developing a taste for better music. As a result there is a definite trend away from the "gospel" jazz numbers.
The evangelist who does not have a song leader and proper musical talent may well fol low the practice that some have used success fully. Have someone at a good organ quietly playing, or use some fine organ records on a good playback with the volume turned low, so that as the people come quietly into the place of meeting they are unconsciously being brought into the spirit of worship. A sign out side the door might read, "Preaching service begins at 8 o'clock. But come in and enjoy the quiet, relaxing organ music while you wait." This might attract passers-by, and in the minds of some would lift the whole service out of the class of cheap evangelism. As the people come in through the door, another tasteful sign might read, "Please take your place quietly during this period of musical meditation." This will discourage whispering and visiting, and of course our own people will need to be instructed in this matter, for too often they are the worst offenders.
Musical Standards
Our own college and academy music departments are doing much to elevate the musical standards and tastes of our young people. The song leader or youth leader who today tries to use some of the cheaper, trippy choruses may get a response from a certain segment of an Adventist congregation, but in the eyes of thinking young people he and his efforts will be only an amusement if not a distinct disappointment. We cannot emphasize too strongly the need for reform in the choruses that we are using in our ranks. Let us use choruses, but let us use only the best.
However, in this matter of reaching for higher musical standards, we must definitely guard against another trend that will limit the efficiency of some of our future workers. Among some there is a tendency to belittle any and all gospel songs. Some of these are young graduates who have been impressed with the need of elevating our standards of music. But too often they find that their efforts have put them completely out of touch with the common man. They are useless as song leaders, for they do not know how to conduct a real evangelistic song service, which will always have to be somewhat flexible and "folksy" in the right sense of the word. In their singing they often attempt music for which they are not prepared vocally, and which has no evangelistic appeal. Somewhere along the line someone who has had to do with the musical education of such persons has done them a great injustice. We are happy that this is the exception rather than the rule, but we need to guard constantly against extremes in either direction. Let us endeavor to fit our young people musically for service, and not for a parade of talent nor for a display of "superior" musical intelligence.
One who has not had a broad-minded preparation for the singing ministry and who has leaned largely toward oratorio and the classics may be inclined to choose a number like "If With All Your Hearts," from the oratorio Elijah, as an appeal song at the close of an evangelistic sermon. The words of this number are truly appealing "If with all your hearts ye truly seek Me, ye shall ever surely find Me" but the music, while it is wonderful, is too ornamental for an appeal song. It is "great" music so much so that the music outshines the words. Then, too, it requires a well-polished voice to do justice to the number. Also, it is difficult to sing a high A flat in such a number without drawing some attention away from the message to the voice. The voice has to shine more or less, to do justice to the number. Such numbers can well be used in evangelism to satisfy all classes, but should be used in the song service or in the sacred concert, and not as an appeal song at the close of an evangelistic sermon. A simple gospel song like "Nothing Between" far outshines it for that purpose.
The music of even the best of gospel songs is admittedly rather ordinary, though it should be interesting rather than dull or trite. But in this apparent weakness we actually find the soulsaving strength of the gospel song, for the words have an opportunity to be the predominant factor, -sending the message of conviction straight to the heart. On this point we need to keep in mind an important factor in choosing gospel songs. If the words are trite, as is altogether too frequently the case, and the music is admittedly inferior to great music, then we have a very weak number. Hence it is important that in choosing a gospel song, great emphasis be placed on finding a good poem, for the words will always be the dominating factor in gospel music. The music, of course, should not be cheap or trivial.
In my frequent contacts with a large number of musicians and voice teachers of many faiths in Canada, the United States, and England, I have invariably found that the best and most experienced musicians have been the most tolerant of genuine gospel music. Some have remarked about the "sincerity" of the gospel music used. I have also found among this group an occasional small mind that would not con descend to use even such an accepted number as "The Holy City." In our earnest endeavor to raise our musical standards let us ever guard against becoming musical snobs, lest the usefulness of our musical ministry to the cause of God become less than nil. The true musician is never a snob, no matter how educated musically he may be. He will never want to get out of touch with even the musically uneducated.
There is a middle-of-the-road course that will suit the area in which one is laboring, and each must endeavor to discover this for himself. That we have in a measure found this course and that our musical standards as a denomination are progressing is evidenced by some of the songs that have become denominational favorites among us as a people. Such numbers as "The Beautiful Hills," "A Song of Heaven and Home land," "What, Never Part Again?" and others of like nature can certainly be classed as excel lent gospel songs. They are by no means great by the standards of the musical world, but they are great gospel songs. No one can justly class them with cheap music.
Should we not all pray that the Lord may give us wisdom to discern the times and to find the right kind of music for this day and age? Let us look to Him who created the human voice, for guidance in this matter, for there are tremendous soul-saving possibilities with the right kind of music in modern evangelism.
