Shaping Modern Lutheran Worship sans Praise Band

As I mentioned at the end of my last post, we in the LCMS do have models that can show us what a contemporary, vibrant, fresh, music program can look like without compromising a shred of authentic Lutheran identity. Let me show you a program that I know a little about. That is Bethany Lutheran in Naperville, where Phillip Magness, my partner here at Liturgy Solutions, is Cantor.

First of all, I am very much aware that many if not most of our churches do not have the resources that Bethany has. But that does not mean that they do not have any resources. Be aware that when I speak of what Bethany does, we must understand this to mean, what Bethany thinks. What is the philosophy that lies behind their approach to music? If we can understand this, we can begin to implement it with success in parishes that have limited or few resources as well as those that have a wealth of resources. Here are some things that I think Bethany Lutheran has realized; that have led them to the place where they are as a vibrant, flagship example of authentic Lutheran worship.

1. Lutheran hymnody is exciting

This is really a theological matter. If a pastor is convinced that the Lutheran hymn heritage has something unique to offer Christians in the way of Gospel proclamation and catechesis, they will want to drink deeply from it. If they want to use it, they can find ways of making that happen without capitulating to the desires of naysayers who think other, less theologically astute songs are more “exciting.” There is nothing more exciting about one kind of music over another. One can cultivate an appreciation for all kinds of music, if one opens their minds and interests to doing so. As Christians, we should be open to cultivating appreciation for the Lutheran hymn corpus because of the great value it possesses and the great contribution it makes to Christian understanding theological knowledge and ultimately, spiritual growth.

In order to do this, pastors and musicians may need to streamline their hymn repertoire in their parishes to contain fewer songs sung more frequently. They will also want to introduce more complex hymns slowly, one at a time.

The unfortunate flip-side of this is that one of the reasons why pop-styled music is becoming more and more prominent in our churches is because pastors and their congregations really do not value the hymn heritage of our Lutheran church. They find the musical remoteness of some of the hymns off-putting and do not think it is worth the time to learn such hymns. We have addressed this matter on the blog before and will not go into details now, but this view is absolutely fatal to Lutheranism, because all the hymnody becomes music that does not discuss distinctively Lutheran theological issues, denying the people the comprehensive richness of our Lutheran theology. If this is missing from our music, one can bet that it is missing from the preaching too. That’s how it was in evangelicalism as I witnessed the erosion of strong doctrinal categories. That’s how it will be for Lutheranism too as we toy with the trend toward all things contemporary in our parishes.

2. Singing begets singing

If you want your congregation to sing, then sing. Adding instruments does not beget more singing. If anything, fewer instruments begets more singing, because the voices themselves must supply the musical sound that fills the room. When a congregation gets the fact that their voices are creating the pleasant the sound they are hearing, they’ll sing more and better. They accomplish this by just singing. Sing the hymns from LSB, the old chorales and the new tunes. Let me give a couple examples:

Let’s imagine two congregations. One is inclined to sing and loves their hymnody, the other is not inclined to sing and is uncomfortable with their hymnody. With the latter, the biggest mistake a congregation could make is to employ lots of instruments, especially if a PA system is involved. Why? Because it will not create more singers, but will create more spectators. People who are not inclined to sing, will not become so because you get more enthusiastic people to lead them, or more pop-friendly musicians to accompany them. They will neither become so, if you have an organist who improvises fancy introductions to hymns and re-harmonizes stanzas at will. The only way a congregation like this will sing is if they are responsible for producing the primary sound component in the service through opening their throats and singing. Simple accompaniments will be necessary to accomplish this, be they by a keyboard, guitar or organ, with the help of a solo vocalist or small group singing the hymns. But even more effective, would be simply a few people in the congregation who will just sing out, making the people around them feel more comfortable to do the same. I have often suspected that the trend we are witnessing to put up the rock band as the primary sound for worship has really not encouraged more enthusiastic singers, but rather, more enthusiastic spectators.

I have experienced this phenomenon where I currently work. I teach music in a Catholic high school where the student body is not inclined to sing. I was asked to try to change this by creating a “singing culture” of sorts at the school. Here is how I am proceeding. When I arrived there was a small group that led the singing. They were not very good and they were too small to fill the room with sound. When many of those students graduated, I started using my classes to lead the music for the liturgy. Now I was using 60 – 80 students at once, who could fill the room with their sound. This made them love what they were hearing and want to do it more and better. There were groups that ended up being disappointed when they were not chosen to participate in a particular liturgy, even though they had for the previous one. The point is this: As these students began to experience the sound that they as a community were making, they grew more enthusiastic about continuing to do it. As they learned the songs in class they began to enjoy them. That’s what will happen with our hymns. To learn them is to love them.

Bethany Lutheran understood two things: 1. Sing the Lord’s song to the fullest, including the hymnody of the historic church, and, 2. It is not more instruments that leads people to more singing. Rather, more singing leads to more singing.

3. The use of instruments

Following an understanding of these things, we can now talk about the former congregation from my example above that loves to sing and does so, vibrantly each week. With them, you can use whatever instrumental combination you want because they consider themselves, and their voices part of the music making process. They have developed a love for their hymnody and are engaged in the spiritual/liturgical conversation with one another; they know it and they like it. Any instrumental addition will be regarded as an enhancement to what they already provide with their own voices. It will not distract them from singing. It will not make enthusiastic spectators. It will be embellishment of the liturgical dialogue that is going on. The instruments can help illumine the text and are embraced as part of the celebration.

So, how should such instruments be used? This is where Bethany Lutheran excels. In my next post, I will discuss how the Bethany philosophy provides a much more interesting, creative, pathway to a fresh, contemporary sound and how the praise band is fast becoming hackneyed and trite. Employing a pop/rock-styled worship expression is not nearly as creative as employing a rich, liturgy and hymn based worship expression that is both modern and traditional. As to resources, those churches that can mount the praise band every Sunday are likely have the resources to do something along the lines of what Bethany has done to be modern, vibrant and yet authentically Lutheran in their worship life. The question is, are they willing?

How We're Changing

Part 3 in a series

The LCMS convention is long over, but some of the music demonstrated there reflected the influence of pop-culture influenced American Protestantism. This Protestantism is, to be sure, not Lutheran. They take their cues on worship from Nashville and Los Angeles recording studios and companies like Maranatha Music and Integrity. These entities exist to make a buck and in doing so, cater to the lowest common denominator when it comes to theology. Anything that would identify one theological position from another cannot possibly be produced by the major record labels. It would not sell. The song may not say anything objectionable, but that’s where the money is.

Yet, we Lutherans are now clamoring after this stuff as it if is novel and new. We’re 30 years too late and even some of the most vigorous evangelical proponents of the new efforts in worship back in the 70’s & 80's are now wondering if the affect they had desired actually worked. The Emergent Church has now formed as, believe it or not, a backlash to the mega-church, Willow Creek–styled, mass appeal techniques. Yet, despite these clues, the LCMS convention was advocating by its own showcases the very same approaches to worship that the evangelicals were using 25 years ago. Are we not just a bit slow on the uptake?

Here are some things that are happening in the LCMS now that the evangelicals did ever so long ago. It all looks really familiar to me because it is exactly what occurred when I was in the Evangelical church through the 80's and the 90's.

• Viewing doctrine as divisive and an impediment to missions
• Thinking that one can possess strong doctrinal positions, and change the musical styles to those influenced by the pop-culture (top 40 mostly).
• Disappearance of the chancel furniture except maybe on Communion Sundays
• Praise band leads almost all of the service, typically drums, guitar, keyboard, bass, lead singer.
• Hymns barely to non-existent
• Old=bad, new=good
• How-to, practical sermons for daily living rather than Christological, law/Gospel proclamations (may not be epidemic in the LCMS yet, but don’t worry, it’s coming)
• Disdain for the liturgy. We retain the things that might still qualify us as “Lutheran” but we really wish we could get rid of those too. The liturgy becomes a “style” seen as a necessary evil, rather than a “substance” that is life-giving through what it purveys. So it is altered to become "cooler," if not downplayed, or discarded altogether.
• Communion practiced less frequently or on days other than Sundays
• Service more like a concert with the band warming up for the main act -- the sermon!

I have noticed that we are shifting to a more and more amorphous brand of Christianity where doctrinal distinctions and precision is downplayed in favor of “bringing in the lost.” But we are not using the true Gospel to do it. We’re using techniques. We take the true Gospel for granted. We think to ourselves, “Hey, we’re Lutheran. That cannot happen to us. I mean, my pastor has a Book of Concord sitting on his shelf, after all–– I think.”

Departing from well established Lutheran music to products put out by Nashville and L.A. are sure to threaten our Lutheran identity. The sacraments are not addressed in this music, neither is sin. Nor are a host of other theological distinctions spelled out in our exhaustive Bible commentary, the Book of Concord. So, for those who think that we can start down that list above without directly affecting our historically held Christian and Lutheran distinctions are going to find it to be impossible. No such thing as Evangelical style and Lutheran substance. It just does not exist.

In my next and perhaps final posting in this series, I will speak about how worship music can be contemporary, traditional and authentically Lutheran all at the same time. Better yet, go to a service at Bethany Lutheran in Naperville, IL where Phillip Magness is Cantor. That’s exactly what he does. Bethany and its music should be the standard bearer for the how to be thoroughly, confessionally Lutheran and yet create exciting, fresh musical expressions in a variety of styles. We’ll talk about how they do that in the next post.

What Makes Lutheran Worship Lutheran?

Part 2 in a series.

One of the most challenging things I faced as a former worship leader in the Evangelical Free Church was exactly how to define what worship was. One elder at the time quipped, “Ask 50 different people what worship is and you’ll get 50 different answers.” This was absolutely true and remains true today. One of the great things about Lutheranism is that it recaptures and explains a view of worship that is Biblical and objective–– not according to my whims, but according to what God says.

Worship is God gathering His church together so He might give to us His gifts. These are the gifts of His Word, Baptism, His Supper and His Holy Absolution. We are sustained through these things. Worship in essence calls us to get out of the way and let these things come to us, that we might receive them in gratitude and allow them to renew and shape our faith. As we hear the Word of God read and preached, we also share it together in our songs and hymns. Since we know that the Holy Spirit works through the Word of God, we do not wish to waste time singing things that are not the clear and well-explicated Word. Lutherans have always regarded our hymns as mini-sermons. This is because what we sing is just as important as what we hear preached. The Word of God present in our hymns sustains us in our faith.

The modern praise and worship craze that the Lutherans are now readily employing runs antithetical to our long held definition of worship. The songs do not proclaim God’s Word in any substantial manner. Rather than appealing to the objective Word of God and expounding upon it, CCM appeals to our subjective emotions, insists that it is us who serves God in our worship rather than God who bestows his gifts as we gather. In modern praise and worship practices, we are to ascend into God’s presence. I used several musical techniques used to accomplish this and it was all really emotional manipulation. But the impulse behind it was mysticism.

In Lutheran Worship, God descends to us, making His very presence real in the body and blood of his Son, Jesus Christ. This He does by the power of His Word and promise, and it is objective. Jesus’ body is present in the Holy Supper because He says it is. And what He says, He does. This is a far cry from the impulse in modern Protestantism to want to experience God as some kind of internal happening. I used to hear people say, “Wow, Jesus was sure present in our worship today.” As Lutherans we can be assured, by God’s own promise, that Jesus is present in His Holy Supper, and through his Word, every single week, every time we gather around those things, whether we feel it or not.

The Sandi Patti song, “Lord I praise you because of who you are; not for all the mighty things that you have done…” is not exactly a CCM hit. But it emerged out of a culture where Christian entertainment has become very popular (and unfortunately imported into church worship). Sandi Patti became a very popular Christian version of say, a Celine Dion, but even before her. As you can tell by the first line of the refrain of this song, it is meant to communicate this: “Of course it is easy to praise God when you get something out of it, or when He does something for you. You ought to really praise Him for who he is. Then you know you will be praising Him rightly.” As altruistic is this sounds, it is pure Gnosticism. Everywhere does Scripture praise God because of His actions. Look at song after song in Scripture. Start with the Psalms, look at the praises of Daniel, Moses, Mary the Mother of God and hosts of others. You don’t even have to go any further than Psalm 136 to see how God is perpetually praised for what he does. Indeed, the Incarnation is the supreme act of God coming amongst his people in a tangible, external, real way. Jesus’ life was a life of doing things: healing, teaching, serving, and ultimately, dying to forgive our sins–– an action on His part–– and then rising again, ascending, judging. This is the God who saves. Not the cosmic “who you are” that the song refers to. Folks, the modern praise and worship movement in all its manifestations is infested with Gnosticism. This runs thoroughly contrary to Scripture and the Lutheran Confessions and has been rejected in our historic worship since day one. We know who God is because of what He does!

Lutherans, ask yourselves the question: Is the music we are singing grounded in the objective, external word of God, or in Christian experience? Does it explicate scripture like a mini-sermon, or does it seek to create a mood, elicit an emotional response, or worse, “ascend” into a mystical experience with God?

Lutherans have always rejected a theology of glory in their worship. A theology of glory suggests that we contribute something to our salvation and growth. Everybody wants to feel as though we are gaining God’s favor by our own actions. So we seek the mystical experience. We expect that we can encounter God in some tangible way by using the right music, in the right style, perhaps with a little mood lighting. We want God to make us feel His presence. Take a look at this popular CCM chorus: “In the secret, in the quiet place, in the stillness you are there. In the secret in the quiet hour I wait, only for you, cause I want to know you more. I want to know you, I want to hear your voice, I want to know you more. I want to touch you, I want to see your face, I want to know you more.” Let me just say that one can sincerely believe everything this song says and still die in their sins.

Lutheran theology has always held that salvation comes to us as pure gift. We did not earn it and we do not deserve it. We merely receive in faith what God gives. And, by the way, that faith is a gift too. All of this is outside of ourselves. It is received by believing the promises; by grasping in faith that what God has said is true, not because it is validated through an “experience” with God. So, songs like that above, have no place in Lutheran worship.

Yet, amazingly, God in His grace has given us Himself to experience. He tells us, “taste and see.” His very presence comes into our lives as a pure gift to be received by undeserving sinners. Clamoring after the mystical encounter with God as we are so inclined to do these days amounts to nothing more than unbelief. It is a refusal to believe the words, “This is my body… This is my blood.” It is refusing to believe that those things are enough. We want more, so we must have our favorite music. We want more, so we insist on feeling something. We want more, so we must hear sermons that tell us what to do to be better people and contribute to our own justification. We’re not content with God’s gifts. We spurn His gifts by seeking after a more meaningful experience.

Check out a quote by a fellow named Mike Baker. I do not even know him, but am looking forward to remedying that. He, like me, is relatively new to Lutheranism. He, like me, was a worship leader in the praise band. He, like me, discovered great riches in the Lutheran Confessions. He has left some very inspiring comments in response to my previous blog which was highlighted at The Brothers of John the Steadfast site.

…By the grace of God, the Holy Spirit guides you–a broken desert hermit–to the Lutheran Confessions and you use that like a map to find this remote oasis where the waters of the Gospel flow in endless streams of beautiful, life-giving grace. And it’s free! Not only that, but the water is PURE and there are people in the church [pastors] who have the sole job of just handing it out to you ALL THE TIME. Shoot, if you don’t stick your hands out, they will put it in your mouth themselves! And the water isn’t just to lure in new folk. It’s for everybody! All the time! Did I mention it’s free?

…and the stiff-necked people who have been lounging in the shade the whole time you were out there being made into beef jerky by false doctrine don’t even know what they have. They don’t even teach their own kids about the water. They are too busy complaining about how boring the water is and how it would be better to put in a coffee shop or cut down a lot of these pesky trees to get a better view of the outside world.

Mike did not know he was talking about me and the relief I found in the clear waters of the Lutheran Confessions, but he was. His comments are also about Lutherans who have taken God’s gifts for granted and are seeking after things that will not provide what they think they will. Please consider our warning, not because we deserve to be listened to, but because we learned from our mistakes and observations, from many years of not realizing that God gave us worship so we might receive His gifts – and that is enough!

More Like the Baptists Every Day?

Part 1 in a series.

As a former church musician in the Evangelical Free Church, I was for years immersed in efforts to use music to create enthusiasm for and numerical growth in worship attendance. The LCMS is going where I was, and subsequently left, in favor of a truly Lutheran brand of worship. The LCMS is looking more and more like the Free Church; not everywhere, but in enough places to cause alarm. And it is not so much about who is doing what, as much as there is a consciousness pervading the LCMS that is bound to make us into a more and more mainline protestant church and a less and less Lutheran church. Lutheran theology and worship is distinctive and has certain hallmarks that make it what it is. If we want to preserve these things, we need to speak more clearly about how we are not.

When Jesus comes again in glory to judge both the living and the dead, nothing will be set ablaze more quickly than 21st Century popular culture. Yet, it appears that we cannot wait to befoul ourselves with it. And the 2010 LCMS Convention provided some very good examples as to how. It was disappointing to me to witness the egalitarian manner in which worship music styles were treated. The arguments about how differing musical styles communicate different messages are well established, yet we insist on acting as if they do not, as if differing musical expressions carry no implications, for better or worse, one way or the other. At very least, the music of the pop-culture is carnal and not churchly.

The mainstream evangelical protestant denominations have seen fit to make their worship music reflect the sounds and moods of the secular popular culture almost exclusively. This trend is steadily increasing in the LCMS. The more the music sounds like the world, the better. This usually involves a drum kit, electric bass, electric guitar, and some kind of keyboard. And this has become the essential accompanying entity for their services. Out goes the organ, and even a piano, and in come the trap set, electric bass, and guitar. And this core group of instruments, with the timbres they produce, is the sound that defines contemporary worship music–– and for supporters, it is a requirement. Any other manifestation of a contemporary sound is of little to no interest for congregations intent on going in this direction. This, no matter how much better other contemporary initiatives may serve to uphold and illuminate the texts of the music being sung or how creative and masterful other stylistic renderings may be. For supporters of this approach, there is only one kind of contemporary music: rock-n-roll (or maybe jazz). How many of our churches are moving in this same direction?

It seems apparent to me that the LCMS Convention was trying to model both repertoire and performance standards for this pop/rock style–– a style that was presented, this year more than ever, as a perfectly viable option for any of our LCMS parishes to employ. So, just like the evangelical protestant, we are incorporating into our services a pop-culture sound, some parishes to a significant degree, where the sound of the band becomes normative and essential for our worship music, or so it is thought.

Nowhere was this more dismally exemplified than during the Karaoke styled, congregational hymn singing, setting traditional hymns to prerecorded hymn accompaniment tracks, using this pop-band style. This practice quickly made its way into evangelicalism a couple decades ago. Apparently it is more satisfying to sing a traditional hymn with a back beat, electric guitar and trap set rather than with an organ, piano or both, or even with combinations of other instruments. I seriously question whether most people think this is all that cool to begin with. But even if they do, I am more confident in this: the rock band accompanying a traditional hymn forces its text into a mood or spirit provided by the music. It should be the reverse. The text should inform how the musical accompaniment is crafted. This time-tested, honored, and responsible approach to hymn accompanying is all but destroyed when using the pop-band approach to congregational singing. And the evangelicals who have employed it have essentially given up using traditional hymns in their worship. This is because it does not work! Are we Lutherans doing the same thing?

Like the evangelical, Lutherans in many areas are already closing themselves off to real variety and creativity in worship music, in that, if the service does not have the exact kind of instrumentation and style they want, it does not pass for being contemporary enough. Take away that trap set or remove the electric guitar and the music is not truly contemporary! Like me, those contemporary musicians and composers who resist this style, are open to almost any style of music that does not attempt to mirror or bend the knee to the pop-culture as it is manifest in our day. We are open to a great variety of musical styles, instrumentations, textures, harmonic, rhythmic, and ethnic vocabularies. These are the tools we use as musicians. Our goal is musical quality, as we are musicians. Our great priority is to retain and exalt our rich hymn tradition from ancient and post-Reformation repertoires. Our goal also is to cultivate a churchly, contemporary musical expression that sounds like something other than what the world reserves for it’s most licentious musical entertainments. Is this not a more responsible and creative approach than just simply engaging the pop-band?

Here’s my concern for the LCMS and earnest Lutherans everywhere: After a decade of an all but complete endorsement of pop-culture styled contemporary music (as evidenced by this recent convention) we are moving in exactly the same direction as our Protestant evangelical counterparts. It would be interesting to see how many of our own congregations have minimized the liturgy to the barest framework, altered it to barely recognizable, or jettisoned it entirely–– as the mainline protestants have done. The more of this music parishes employ the less it will be thought that careful adherence to the liturgy will be necessary. Same with our hymns. In evangelicalism, hymns have all but disappeared entirely. How close are some of our parishes to doing the same? How many of your young people are learning hymns? Which hymns? Does it matter? In modern Protestantism, it clearly does not. Insofar as these things are happening among us, we may expect to suffer the same theological fate as the watered down services of the evangelical protestant. It will affect the thrust of our preaching and the definition of our worship, taking us further and further from our confessional moorings.

Next post will discuss how, even in the face of vehement protestations to the contrary, the employment of pop-culture styled contemporary worship music serves to erode our confessional theological precision.

New Hymns at Liturgy Solutions

As a matter of fact these hymns cannot be found anywhere else other than at Liturgy Solutions. These are not hymn stanzas, but multi-stanza congregational hymns for your congregation to sing in Divine Worship as often as you like. Some of these hymns are texts that can be found in LSB, but have tunes that are different from those in LSB. Some of them will have tunes in LSB, but have new texts written to those tunes subsequent to the release of LSB. In either case, the hymns you find at Liturgy Solutions, are not available anywhere else. We offer them exclusively with the permission of the composers and the authors (poets).

Right now, we have several hymns posted by Stephen Starke and Stephen R. Johnson. But there will be more added as time goes by. In any case, these "Starke/Johnson" hymns are unique and are available exclusively HERE.

Now, a bit about the prices: We all know that if you want to use a hymn under copyright, you have to pay the publisher of that hymn a fee. You have to request permission in writing, and they send you their fee requirements for the use of the hymn. This fee almost always is for a one-time use for the hymn you are requesting. In other words, you do not have permission to use it anytime you wish, but rather, just for the one event or service for which it was requested. Fees for this could be as little as $25 or $30, or they could be much more, depending on how many times you need to reproduce the hymn for your congregation. A congregation of 100 attendees will not pay as much as a congregation with 600, and so forth.

When deliberating this at Liturgy Solutions, we determined that we would need to charge a little more for our congregational hymns than for our choral pieces. Here’s why: If you purchase a choral piece for a choir of 25, you will probably photocopy it 30 times. You will likely collect all those photocopies that were used and file them in your choral library after they have been used. You may need to make the occasional additional copy for lost pieces, because music can get lost over time.

On the other hand, when you reproduce a congregational hymn, you will copy it so that everyone in attendance can have a copy in his or her bulletin. This could be 60 or 80 copies, or it could be several hundred. And you will likely not save them. They will get thrown away with the bulletin.

For this freedom, Liturgy Solutions offers you a great bargain. Purchase a congregational hymn that you like for much less than a traditional publishing house would charge and use it as often as you like, knowing that you are supporting the work of the composer and poet who crafted these fine hymns. You may also enjoy the rich substance of these hymns over and over, every year without having to secure additional permission. We hope that this will help the Lord’s song to thrive in your parish.

PROPERS IN THE SUMMER

The main purpose of Liturgy Solutions is to help church musicians proclaim the appointed pericopes of the day that are normally sung. The Lutheran Divine Service is very flexible, and so the particular propers used from parish to parish vary. Some congregations use the appointed Introit to begin the Entrance Rite, others sing an Entrance Hymn instead, and still others sing the Psalm of the Day at that point. Similarly, between the first reading and the Epistle, some sing the Psalm of the Day, others sing the appointed Gradual. Some parishes use the appointed Verse before the Gospel; others use the setting in the service book provided as an alternative, in effect making the Verse an "ordinary" instead of a "proper". Then there is the Hymn of the Day, sung by the congregation. In Lutheran circles, this hymn is appointed and so in a way is one of our "propers". Hence, it is more likely to receive special treatment by the choir, and so we offer hymn stanzas to support that practice.

Most parishes establish a certain pattern about all this. Either the choir is in the habit of singing the Verse or they aren't. The do hymn stanzas or they don't. The Psalm of the Day is used or it is not. Some others, including mine, vary the practice. Some Sundays a choir singing the Verse of the Day, some Sundays the congregation sings what is in the hymnal. We usually sing the Psalm of the Day, but sometimes the choir sings a Gradual. And there about seven different ways we sing the Psalm, so there is variety there as well.

Whatever your custom is, summer usually means a break for your choir. Even where there is a summer choir, it is often a different, smaller group and so a different approach is needed. In places where there is a strict pattern for when the choir sings and when they don't, summer provides an opportunity to do something different. Congregations - and musicians - are more accepting of doing something different because of the season, especially if it is a simple variation. The advantages of this are two-fold: one can readily find something accessible for your musicians (who are fewer and rehearse less in the summer) and the congregation can learn through experience that the pattern of worship is about the Word, not when "it's time for the choir to sing."

Here are a couple of examples. In a place where the choir doesn't take stanzas on the Hymn of the Day, have a summer quartet sing a stanza or two each week using a simple SATB setting such as found in TLH. It'll be easy to put together, and the congregation can readily understand that "they're not doing an anthem because it is summer." (grin) As the people become accustomed to the blessing of this practice, you might continue it on occasion in the fall with your full choir, using a Bach chorale for a stanza on Reformation Sunday or even a creative setting from Liturgy Solutions. (Had to get that in there!)

Or maybe you are in a place where the Psalm is always chanted, and you have no choir for the summer. Once a month, the Psalm could be done instead in a song setting by soloist, with the congregation singing a refrain. Again, since there is no "anthem from the choir", people will be more accepting of this in the summertime. And, once they experience the blessing of the practice, they will be ready to have the psalm sung this way on occasion during the year.

What do you do with your propers in the summer?

What a Great Choir!

So now we are on to Trinity Sunday. Because it falls on Memorial Day weekend this year, many choirs in the church won't be singing. But not at Bethany! I may have the most dedicated - as well as one of the most talented - groups in the whole Missouri Synod. Huzzah! I am a cantor who is indeed richly blessed. :)

I did poll my group to make sure it was going to work for us to sing this Sunday. Turned out more were available for Trinity Sunday this year than Pentecost! As I said in my last post, I had to craft Pentecost for a smaller choir this year (we had 20). It did go very well, though, thanks be to God. I received compliments on the service throughout the week and am looking forward to the service being loaded onto our podcast. (We had a few glitches, to be sure, but, as Robert Preus quipped, "It wouldn't be a Lutheran liturgy without at least one mistake!")

Anway, this Sunday we'll have 29 out of my 36. :) And they will sing for all of both the 9:00am and the 11:15am services. Just like the brass group. (I told you they were dedicated!) On the Entrance Hymn, "O God, O Lord of Heaven and Earth" the choir will sing my Liturgy Solutions setting of stanza 3. The Verse of the Day will use the Caribbean "Halle, Halle". The Voluntary will be Ernani Aguiar's "Salmo 150" (published by EarthSongs), a staple in the modern concert repertoire. It is one of the choir's favorites and a great way to end the choir season. And, yes, we sing it in Latin. Oh yes, one more piece - which we sang at the beginning of the year - the choir & the brass will lead the congregation in Carolyn Jennings' magnificent concertato on her hymn "Voices Raised to You We Offer".

Alleluia, indeed!