Come on, As a P&W leader I have to use what moves people. Most people this day in time do not have music class in school so they can’t follow the hymnals like I can. Young people want lyrical depth, old people want traditional foundations and the middle ground is use what works with your congregation. and if you don’t have a congregation to use it on that’s probably because of your nasty attitudes about certian types of music because you’ve judged them “lame.”

I’ve got to reach people of every age group with every style type of music from Hillsong to Gaither to Crabb Family to vinyard-which personally gags me, but the people relate to it. and that’s the point isn’t it.

Not all christian music is P&W and not all P&W is fit to sing. But the difference between Friend of God and Amazing grace is very little because its going to be sung over and over by the people in whom it touches something deeply for years and years to come.

So please stop being critical of the huddled un-musical masses who need something simple to tap their feet to or raise their hand with. It meets their need and they are willing to put money behind it.

For what its worth, the early 90’s CCM band “East to West” became as who we know now as Countrys-pop “Rascal Flatts” but not before becoming Micheal English’s band, along with Gary Levox singing the tenor.”

It’s inaccurate to say East To West transformed into Rascal Flatts via Michael English’s band. A former member of East To West named Jay DeMarcus joined Michael English’s touring band for a while, before going on to become a member of Rascal Flatts.

Neil Coomer (who was 50% of East To West, and carried on with East To West for a bit after DeMarcus left the group as I recall) was never in English’s band (or Rascal Flatts either, as far as I know).

To follow your logic, you could also say Petra became Michael English’s band because one of their guitarists played in his band briefly, but that just isn’t the case.

Check out the first song that is written in the Bible found in Deut. 32. The songwriter is God and He expresses His heart in 43 verses (uh oh - we just lost several of you who suffer from Worship ADD and are turned off by multi-versed compositions). The song starts out sweetly enough with a little Praise and Worship but by verse five God is no longer just “great, faithful and awesome” but somewhat disappointed in His people for their worldliness, idols and their rejection of the ways of their fathers. Can you imagine how this song would be received in our hip feel-good worship service today?? Like a smoked pig at a Bar Mitzvah.

How we approach the throne of God is no trifling matter. I’m afraid our flip-flop, cavalier, whazzup-God attitude will not cut it when we actually enter the presence of the Almighty as described in Revelation chapter five. Our suits, ties and designer dresses won’t impress Him either. It all comes down to the heart (which is desperately wicked, who can know it? - Jeremiah) and the music/lyrics we choose will either lead us to deeper devotion and greater commitment or to vain repetitions just like the heathen.

One of your VERY best, and most insightful posts yet. Several years ago, I read an article where the author lamented the spiritual shallowness of this genre of music. He mentioned opening one of these songbooks, and found that the majority of the songs made no reference to the Lord Jesus Christ in any way, shape, or form. The phrases, he said, were mostly taken from the OT- and as such, were so generic in their praise to God, that any Jewish person could have sung them, and felt completely at home. Furthermore, other believers pointed out to him that even Buddhists and Hindus could have done the very same with some of them, as they refer to their heathen ‘gods’ as ‘god’ and ‘lord’.

The Psalms are fine in themselves. But they do not represent the highest level of praise for any Christian. The song around the throne in Rev. 5 is to the LAMB, who redeemed us with His blood, and much is made of His work on Calvary. THIS is why He is worthy of our praise.

One poster mentioned ‘It Is Well With My Soul’. (see verse two of this hymn…) Other hymns, such as ‘When I Survey the Wondrous Cross’, ‘Man of Sorrows’, ‘And Can It Be?’ and the like, literally dwarf the theology of 99% of these so-called ‘praise and worship’ songs.

I will give credit to one song, however- ‘How Deep The Father’s Love To Us’, written just a few years ago, is one of the lone magnificent exceptions.

As far as “Friend of God,” yeah, the chorus may be cookie cutter, but “Who am I that You are mindful of me…” is pretty thought provoking to me when I really think about it. My personal favorite P&W is Hillsong’s “From the Inside Out” which, to me, is lyrically and musically stimulating without either element getting in the way of the process of bringing people to worship.

I remember well one pastor telling me that certain hymns and songs were NOT to be played during worship services because they were not easy for the congregation to follow. He wanted songs that you could memorize within a week so everyone could sing along (augmented with the song lyrics projected overhead).

When writing songs (as with everything else), you should give everything you have. Sure, Gloria Gaither may be long-winded and overly-complicated when writing, but at least she puts a lot of time and effort into it. I doubt Fanny Crosby had “easy to sing” in mind when she wrote her many song lyrics; she had absolute praise in mind.

For me, the most moving song I’ve ever sung or heard includes such lines as:

And Lord haste the day
When my faith shall be sight
The clouds be rolled back as a scroll
And the trumpet shall sound
And the Lord shall decend
Even so, it is well with my soul!

Just within those 6 lines, you have so much description that it feels as though it is actually happening. This is light years ahead of

Here I am to worship
Here I am to bow down
Here I am to say that You’re my God
You’re altogether lovely
Altogether worthy
Altogether wonderful to me

You’re here to worship. Great. The best you can do is “You’re lovely, worthy, and wonderful”??