Are we Christians?

"Woe to those who are at ease in Zion!" Amos 6:1

What do we say to . . .

our self-indulgence,
our spiritual sloth,
our love of ease,
our avoidance of hardship,
our luxury,
our pampering of the body,
our costly feasts,
our silken couches,
our brilliant furniture,
our gay attire,
our jeweled fingers,
our idle mirth,
our voluptuous music,
our jovial tables, loaded with every variety of rich viands?

Are we Christians? Or are we worldlings?

Where is the self-denial of the New Testament days?

Where is the separation from a self-pleasing luxurious world? Where is the cross, the true badge of discipleship, to be seen--except in useless religious ornaments for the body, or worse than useless decorations for the sanctuary?

"Woe to those who are at ease in Zion!" Is not this the description of multitudes who name the name of Christ? They may not be "living in debauchery, lust, drunkenness, orgies, carousing and detestable idolatry." But even where these are absent, there is 'high living'--luxury of the table or the wardrobe--in conformity to 'this present evil world.'

"At ease in Zion!" Yes! there is the shrinking . . .

from hard service; from 'spending and being spent;' from toil and burden-bearing and conflict; from self-sacrifice and noble service;for the Master's sake.

There is conformity to the world, instead of conformity to Christ!
There is a laying down, instead of a taking up of the cross.
Or there is a lining of the cross with velvet, lest it should gall our shoulders as we carry it!
Or there is an adorning of the cross, that it may suite the taste and the manners of our refined and intellectual age.

Anything but the bare, rugged and simple cross!

We think that we can make the strait gate wider, and the narrow way broader, so as to be able to walk more comfortably to the heavenly kingdom. We try to prove that 'modern enlightenment' has so refined 'the world and its pleasures', that we may safely drink the poisoned cup, and give ourselves up to the inebriation of the Siren song.

"At ease in Zion!" Even when the walls of our city are besieged, and the citadel is being stormed!

Instead of grasping our weapons, we lie down upon our couches!
Instead of the armor, we put on the silken robe!
We are cowards, when we should be brave!
We are faint-hearted, when we should be bold!
We are lukewarm, when we should be fervent!
We are cold, when we should be full of zeal!

We compromise and shuffle and make excuses, when we should lift up our voice like a trumpet! We pare down truth, or palliate error, or extenuate sin--in order to placate the world, or suit the spirit of the age, or 'unify' the Church.

Learn self-denying Christianity. Not the form or name, but the living thing. Let us renounce the lazy, luxurious, self-pleasing, fashionable religion of the present day!

A self-indulgent religion has nothing in common with the cross of the Lord Jesus Christ; or with that cross of ours which He has commanded us to take up and carry after Him--renouncing ease and denying self.

Our time,
our abilities,
our money,
our strength--
are all to be laid upon the altar.

"Woe to those who are at ease in Zion!" Amos 6:1

(Horatius Bonar, "Self-Denial Christianity")
(19 December, 1808 – 31 May, 1889) He was a Scottish churchman and poet.

Sharing Your Gifts

In ways you least suspect, God answers prayers.  I have been praying for a couple of years that the Lord would bring someone into our lives with a heart for music.  My husband, who neither reads nor can write music, has been given over 70 songs (both the words and melodies).  His only way to capture those songs is to record them acapella.  He can hear orchestra's playing them, congregations and choirs singing them; but, that is impossible without sheet music for them.

We met Celeste and her husband Mike last December when members of our church and others came to Atria, where my husband ministers, to share a Christmas Program with the residents.  Celeste accompanied the group on piano and Mike sung in the choir.  At that time we had no idea how gifted this young lady was.

As we got to know Celeste and Mike we discovered that they both love the Lord and are both gifted in many ways.  As a side note:  They will be leaving for the mission field and will be gone sometime before the end of this year. Mike is a doctor and will be joining a medical missionary team in Africa.  Celeste will be working with women trapped in the sex trafficking industry with the desire to win them to Christ.

Through our relationship with them, we discovered that Celeste has been singing since she was a tiny little girl and also plays the piano--even composing her own musical arrangements.  Michael shared a few of his songs with Celeste and she was able to write the piano chords for them.  Three of Michael's songs became part of a one woman, outreach concert,  that we hosted at Atria on April 19th.

As we sat listening to this gifted young woman sing praises to the Lord, our eyes filled with tears.  As we heard Michael's songs being played and sung by someone who we have both grown to love, we were overwhelmed with thanksgiving to the Lord.

Little did we know, another sweet Christian sister, India Curry, who is a gifted artist as well, video taped Celeste practicing for the concert in her home and posted that video on Youtube.  You can watch it here:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GcXn5x26Alo

This is the body of Christ working together to build up and edify believers, bring glory to God, and reach the lost.

What God has taught me through this is that He has everything and everyone under His sovereign control and overcomes all obstacles that we may think are present in our lives.  He will bring those members of His body together who will glorify Him with their gifts in the most unexpected ways--even if it's only for a season!

Rejoicing in Christ - The Center of Our Joy!

whose experiences almost daily mingle with their own in the sweet sympathies of song

Poets are the song-birds of human nature, the interpreters of human feeling; and they only are worthy of the name, in whose interpretations we find our own unexpressed thoughts and feelings and experiences. The sacred poet, like the Levite of old, is still a minister in the temple; he still kindles the altar fires of holy feeling, and from his own spiritual indwelling, insight, and inner communings, he puts into language for as those emotions, dispositions, desires, that our hearts recognize and yet our lips fail of uttering. He takes us to mountain tops of feeling, into valleys of shadow, and leads by streams of refreshing, and into solitudes of restfulness and calm. But to understand him best, we must know the ways by which he himself has been led, and have the assurance that it is a trusty guide with whom we enter into holy companionship.

The above is an excerpt from the preface of a book published in 1875 entitled, Story of the Hymns.  Our best friend, Denise McCool found this book (which is a first edition) at a second hand story.  She stopped by this past week and presented it to Michael, stating, "I came across this and knew that it was meant for you".

Over the past 4 years, my husband, Michael, has written over 70 original songs/hymns and well over 600 poems which all exult Christ and express honor and glory to God.  I have been blessed to be able to say, I have first hand knowledge of  "the ways by which he himself has been led, and have assurance that it is a trusty guide with whom I enter into holy companionship"

What a blessing this little book has already been in just 4 short days.  God has used it to encourage my husband when all around him can be such discouragement.  In the current Christian culture, so few understand and appreciate the gift of praise and worship that God gives some of his people through the writing of both poems and hymns.  It is wonderful to read that it has not always been that way.  The preface ends by stating:

"...The religious experiences out of which these hymns grew are not as familiar to those who have not made a special study of the subject. That the book may lead some to better know the guides of their spiritual journey, whose experiences almost daily mingle with their own in the sweet sympathies of song, is the devout wish of the author."

Thanking the Lord this morning for His sweet presence and providence in our lives as he orchestrates even the smallest thing, like a friend finding a book in a second hand store, to encourage His people through our sojourn here on earth!

MYSTERIOUS VISITS

(O' Lord, thank you for Spurgeon and for all the other godly men who have long sense left this earth.  Without their teaching and encouragement, I would, more often then not, be left all alone to wonder if I were actually crazy and had silly notions about you)

I do remember well when God first visited me; and assuredly it was the night of nature, of ignorance, of sin. His visit had the same effect upon me that it had upon Saul of Tarsus when the Lord spake to him out of heaven. He brought me down from the high horse, and caused me to fall to the ground; by the brightness of the light of His Spirit He made me grope in conscious blindness; and in the brokenness of my heart I cried, "Lord, what wilt Thou have me to do?" I felt that I had been rebelling against the Lord, kicking against the pricks, and doing evil even as I could; and my soul was filled with anguish at the discovery. Very searching was the glance of the eye of Jesus, for it revealed my sin, and caused me to go out and weep bitterly. As when the Lord visited Adam, and called him to stand naked before Him, so was I stripped of all my righteousness before the face of the Most High. Yet the visit ended not there; for as the Lord God clothed our first parents in coats of skins, so did He cover me with the righteousness of the great sacrifice, and He gave me songs in the night It was night, but the visit was no dream: in fact, I there and then ceased to dream, and began to deal with the reality of things.

Believe me, there are such things as personal visits from Jesus to His people. He has not left us utterly. Though He be not seen with the bodily eye by bush or brook, nor on the mount, nor by the sea, yet doth He come and go, observed only by the spirit, felt only by the heart. Still he standeth behind our wall, He showeth Himself through the lattices.

Do you ask me to describe these manifestations of the Lord? It were hard to tell you in words: you must know them for yourselves. If you had never tasted sweetness, no man living could give you an idea of honey. Yet if the honey be there, you can "taste and see." To a man born blind, sight must be a thing past imagination; and to one who has never known the Lord, His visits are quite as much beyond conception.

For our Lord to visit us is something more than for us to have the assurance of our salvation, though that is very delightful, and none of us should rest satisfied unless we possess it. To know that Jesus loves me, is one thing; but to be visited by Him in love, is more.

Nor is it simply a close contemplation of Christ; for we can picture Him as exceedingly fair and majestic, and yet not have Him consciously near us. Delightful and instructive as it is to behold the likeness of Christ by meditation, yet the enjoyment of His actual presence is something more. I may wear my friend's portrait about my person, and yet may not be able to say, "Thou hast visited me."

At such a time a flood of great joy will fill our minds. We shall half wish that the morning may never break again, for fear its light should banish the superior light of Christ's presence. We shall wish that we could glide away with our Beloved to the place where He feedeth among the lilies. We long to hear the voices of the white-robed armies, that we may follow their glorious Leader whithersoever He goeth. I am persuaded that there is no great actual distance between earth and heaven: the distance lies in our dull minds. When the Beloved visits us in the night, He makes our chambers to be the vestibule of His palace-halls. Earth rises to heaven when heaven comes down to earth.
C.H. Spurgeon
(exceprts from - MYSTERIOUS VISITS)
AN ADDRESS TO A LITTLE COMPANY AT THE
COMMUNION TABLE AT MENTONE.
"Thou hast visited me in the night."—Psalm 18:3.

'If this is Christianity; I may not be a Christian!'

The full quote is, "If this is Christianity, then I have never really known what Christianity is. In fact; If this is Christianity, I may not be a Christian". This was a quote from a pastor of a church, after he was introduced to the "Christianity" expressed and experienced by men who lived over 400 years ago. He was filled with sorrow and with joy (all at the same time) for the very first time in His walk with the Lord.

I have found this to be my own same experience and I have found that many genuinely "born-again" believers are moved in the very same way when they discover the depth of the hearts of these men for Christ. This is truly one of God's precious gifts to His people.

Why is this important? It is important because we are living in "shallow", "superficial", "man-centered times" and yet true believers hunger and thirst for Joy--for REALITY; for purpose.

Read this excerpt (unfortunately many of you won't) from Thomas Watson's treatise on "Men's Chief End" and tell me if this is your experience. Tell me if you hunger for this. Tell me if you experience this beauty and depth with the Lord while you attend His ordinances. This is "Christianity" and this is what our souls long for and can experience.

The enjoyment of God in this life. It is a great matter to enjoy God's ordinances, but to enjoy God's presence in the ordinances is that which a gracious heart aspires after. Psalm 63:2, "To see thy glory so as I have seen thee in the sanctuary." This sweet enjoyment of God is when we feel his Spirit co-operating with the ordinance, and distilling grace upon our hearts.

When in the Word the Spirit quickens and raises the affections. Luke 24:32, "Did not our hearts burn within us?"

When the Spirit transforms the heart leaving an impress of holiness upon it. 2 Cor. 3:8, "We are changed into the same image, from glory to glory."

When the Spirit revives the heart with comfort, it comes not only with its anointing, but with its seal; it sheds God's love abroad in the heart. Rom. 5:5, "Our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son Jesus Christ." 1 John 1:3.

In the Word we hear God's voice; in the sacrament we have his kiss. (Have you felt the kiss of Christ in the sacraments?) The heart being warmed and inflamed in a duty is God's answering by fire. The sweet communications of God's Spirit are the first fruits of glory. Now Christ has pulled off his veil, and showed his smiling face; now he has led a believer into the banqueting-house, and given him of the spiced wine of his love to drink; he has put in his finger at the hole of the door; he has touched the heart, and made it leap for joy.

Oh how sweet is it thus to enjoy God! The godly have, in ordinances, had such divine raptures of joy, and soul transfigurations, that they have been carried above the world, and have despised all things here below. (Is this your experience?)
Is the enjoyment of God in this life so sweet?

How wicked are they who prefer the enjoyment of their lusts before the enjoyment of God! 2 Pet. 3:3, "The lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, the pride of life," is the Trinity they worship. Lust is an inordinate desire or impulse, provoking the soul to that which is evil. There is the revengeful lust, and the wanton lust. Lust, like a feverish heat, puts the soul into a flame. Aristotle calls sensual lusts brutish, because, when any lust is violent, reason or conscience cannot be heard. These lusts besot and brutalise the man. Hos. 4:11,"Whoredom and wine take away the heart;" the heart for anything that is good. How many make it their chief end, not to enjoy God, but to enjoy their lusts; as that cardinal who said, "Let him but keep his cardinalship of Paris and he was content to lose his part in Paradise." Lust first bewitches with pleasure, and then comes the fatal dart. Prov. 7:23, "Till a dart strike through his liver." This should be as a flaming sword to stop men in the way of their carnal delights. Who for a drop of pleasure would drink a sea of wrath?

Let it be our great care to enjoy God's sweet presence in his ordinances. Enjoying spiritual communion with God is a riddle and mystery to most people. Every one that hangs about the court does not speak with the king.

We may approach God in ordinances, and hang about the court of heaven, yet not enjoy communion with God.

We may have the letter without the Spirit, the visible sign without the invisible grace. It is the enjoyment of God in a duty that we should chiefly look at. Psalm 13:2, "My soul thirsteth for God, for the living God." Alas! what are all our worldly enjoyments without the enjoyment of God?

What is it to enjoy good health, a brave estate, and not to enjoy God? Job 30:28, "I went mourning without the sun." So mayest thou say in the enjoyment of all creatures without God, "I went mourning without the sun." I have the starlight of outward enjoyments, but I lack the Sun of Righteousness. "I went mourning without the sun." It should be our great design, not only to have the ordinances of God, but the God of the ordinances.

The enjoyment of God's sweet presence here is the most contented life: he is a hive of sweetness, a magazine of riches, a fountain of delight, Psalm 36:8,9. The higher the lark flies the sweeter it sings; and the higher we fly by the wings of faith, the more we enjoy of God. How is the heart inflamed in prayer and meditation! What joy and peace is there in believing! Is it not comfortable being in heaven? He that enjoys much of God in this life carries heaven about him. Oh let this be the thing we are chiefly ambitious of, the enjoyment of God in his ordinances! The enjoyment of God's sweet presence here is an earnest of our enjoying him in heaven.

Ah, yes! This is Christ and this is Christianity.

There are times when solitude is better than company...

Psalm 119:15
I will meditate on your precepts.

There are times when solitude is better than company, and silence is wiser than speech. We would be better Christians if we were alone more often, waiting on God and gathering through meditation on His Word spiritual strength for service in His kingdom. We ought to ponder the things of God, because that is how we get the real nutriment out of them.

Truth is something like the cluster of the vine: In order to have wine from it, we must bruise it; we must press and squeeze it many times. The bruiser's feet must come down joyfully on the bunches or else the juice will not flow; and the grapes must be properly tread or else much of the precious liquid will be wasted. So we must, by meditation, tread the clusters of truth if we desire the wine of consolation from them.

Our bodies are not supported by merely taking food into the mouth, but the process that really supplies the muscle and the nerve and the sinew and the bone is the process of digestion. It is by digestion that the outward food becomes assimilated with the inner life. Our souls are not nourished merely by listening for a while to this and then to that and then to the other part of divine truth. Hearing, reading, marking, and learning all require inward digesting to complete their usefulness, and the inward digesting of the truth lies mainly in meditating upon it.

Why is it that some Christians, although they hear many sermons, make only slow advances in the Christian life? Because they neglect their closets and do not thoughtfully meditate on God's Word. They love the wheat, but they do not grind it; they want the corn, but they will not go out into the fields to gather it; the fruit hangs on the tree, but they will not pluck it; the water flows at their feet, but they will not stoop to drink it.

Deliver us, O Lord, from such folly, and may this be our resolve this morning: "I will meditate on your precepts."

Do you have a song in your heart?

When churches are revived, what life there is in them, and then what singing! Never comes a revival of religion without a revival of singing. As soon as Luther’s Reformation comes, the Psalms are translated and sung in all languages; and when Whitfield and Wesley are preaching, then Charles Wesley and Toplady must be making hymns for the people to sing, for they must show their joy, a joy born of life.

When the Lord gives you, dear friend, more life, you also will have more joy. You will no more go moping about the house, or be thought melancholy and dull when the Lord gives you life more abundantly. I should not wonder but what you will get into the habit of singing at your work, and humming over tunes in your walks. I should not wonder if persons ask, “What makes So-and-so so happy? what makes his eyes twinkle as with some strange delight? He is poor, he is sick, but how blissful he appears to be!” This will be seen, brother, when you not only have life, but when you have it more abundantly.

C. H. Spurgeon

Are You Touched to the Heart by Sacred Excess or Do You Have a Sneering Heart?

As you read Spurgeon's statement below, think about your church and your own heart.  We are personally very aware of , and have personally experienced, the reality of those truths penned two centuries ago.   Think about this.  Does your church err on the side of decorum?  Does your church stifle the genuine Spirit led joyful expression of praise during corporate worship because of a fear of excess?   Does it disturb you if a brother or a sister were to dare raise their hands in praise to the Lord during the corporate singing of hymns, because, "We don't do that here?"   How sad it is to witness and realize that most care more about what man thinks than what God delights in, as we try to "control" everything with our rules and regulations regarding what is appropriate and what is not, at the expense of true worship.

Perhaps one of the reasons a church doesn't want to move from holding a hymnal to reading the words of that very same hymn on an overhead projection is because, "If their hands are free, who knows what might happen?"   Read the warnings and wise insight of C. H. Spurgeon, who could never be accused of fanaticism, and yet who saw the very same things that I see in the churches today and examine your own heart as it pertains to these things: 

"Our happiness should be demonstrative; chill penury of love often represses the noble flame of joy, and men whisper their praises decorously where a hearty outburst of song would be far more natural. It is to be feared that the church of the present day, through a craving for excessive propriety, is growing too artificial; so that enquirers' cries and believers' shouts would be silenced if they were heard in our assemblies. This may be better than boisterous fanaticism, but there is as much danger in the one direction as the other. For our part, we are touched to the heart by a little sacred excess, and when godly men in their joy over leap the narrow bounds of decorum, we do not, like Michal, Saul's daughter, eye them with a sneering heart."

How "Irregular" is the "Regulative Principle"? - Part One

So your church holds to the "Regulative" principle.  Once again, I must say, "Tell me what you mean by "regulative" and I will tell you if my church adheres to it?  I purpose that there are so many versions being played out that the term has lost any clear meaning.

During my studies, I came across an article written by a professor at a Reformed Baptist Seminary.  It is appalling.  (I have pasted an excerpt below followed by a few comments).  Keep in mind, this is a man who is teaching and influencing the impressionable minds of young men; some, who will one day take the pulpit of a local church.

In my travels, I occasionally find myself present in a less-than-simple worship service. Most of our churches take the regulative principle of worship seriously, and avoid the intrusions of choirs and solos. But every once in a while I am invited to preach in a congregation that does not understand (or sometimes accept) the RPW, and have to endure the stylings of the not-so-special music.


Let’s be honest. Most church music of this type is mediocre at best. The pastor (or worship leader) smiles after the performance, duly thanking the individual(s) involved, and the people say ‘Amen’-or worse, they applaud; what an abomination!-and the performer returns to his/her seat alternately to revel in the acclaim for a job self-perceived to be well-done or wallow in self-deprecation over a poor performance.


There have been moments when I wish that I could be Simon Cowell: “That was Cruise-ship karaoke” or “that was bad even for a high school musical” or even “That was a nightmare”. At least Mr. Cowell is honest in his evaluations of those who wish to be America’s Idols.


Perhaps we should give our ‘special’ musicians a title like ‘Ecclesiastical Idols.’ That would fit in well with the mood of the day, and more accurately express just what they are doing-performing, not worshipping. And then, the leaders of the church can give proper evaluations. It might even be possible to let those who sit on the platform respond to the routine with comments.


I guess that it does say something about our culture that those who covet stardom are titled ‘Idol’. But isn’t it ironic that in worship, the same kind of idolatry is overlooked. Shouldn’t we call it there exactly what it is?

The lack of understanding exposed in this man's thoughts is alarming.  Every single argument that he holds about music, can be equally applied to all elements of corporate worship.  Think about this.  Public reading of scripture can be a "performance"; Preaching can also be a performance; Congregational singing can be a performance.  What do I mean?  Well, is it not possible for one to be singing a hymn during congregational singing with the thought, "I wonder what the people in the pew in front of me think of my beautiful voice?   Perhaps if I sing loud enough, even those two or three rows in front of me will hear how gifted I am."

Cannot a man who leads a corporate prayer be entirely focused on the eloquence of his words; the melodious tone in his voice; his ability to move people emotionally by his strategically planned pauses and his powerful speaking voice?

Cannot a man who takes the pulpit to preach be doing so as a performer?

Cannot the people in the pew be also guilty of "judging the performance" of the man leading a corporate prayer, or the man preaching a sermon?

If you are an honest, thinking man at all, it is crystal clear that the answer to the above questions is YES!  Any form of worship; whether it be singing, praying, preaching, and, yes, even the public reading of scripture can be as a stench in God's nostrils.

What a sad state the church is in today.  I will close with another quote from "Worship by the Book":

"What is at stake is authenticity...Sooner or later Christians tire of public meetings that are profoundly inauthentic, regardless of how well (or poorly) arranged, directed, performed.  We long to meet, corporately, with the living and majestic God and to offer Him the praise that is His due."   - D.A. Carson 

Quoting Carson on "Worship"

When time permits, I will be posting an article on the "regulative" principle.  For now, I will simply share a few D.A. Carson quotes from "Worship by the Book":

• The New Testament does not provide us with officially sanctioned public “services” so much as with examples of crucial elements. We do well to admit the limitations of our knowledge. (Carson, 52)

• There is no single passage in the New Testament that establishes a paradigm for corporate worship. (Carson, 55)

• Corporate meetings of the church, however much God is worshipped in them, have the collateral responsibility of educating, informing, and transforming the minds of those who attend, of training the people of God in righteousness, of expanding their horizons not only so that they better know God (and therefore better worship him) but so that they better grasp the dimensions of the church that he has redeemed by the death of his Son (and therefore better worship him) – and that means, surely, some sort of exposure to more than the narrow slice of church that subsists in one particular subculture. The importance of intelligibility (in music, let us say) must therefore be juxtaposed with the responsibility to expand the limited horizons of one narrow tradition. (Carson, 56)

The Music Wars - Part One

The next few posts will contain excerpts (from a variety of sources) that I have come across during my studies on the history of music in the church.   If nothing else, these posts should make us all more aware that this is not an issue that is unique to our generation; nor one that will soon, if ever, be resolved on this side of heaven.

Benjamin Keach (1604 – 1704) was a reformed Baptist Pastor. He was the pastor of a Baptist church in Horsley Down, Southwark (London, England) that later became Metropolitan Tabernacle, whose later pastors included John Gill and Charles Spurgeon. Benjamin Keach was one of the original participants and signers of the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith.

Although the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith states the following:
“…the acceptable way of Worshipping the true God, is instituted by himself; and so limited by his own revealed will, that he may not be Worshipped according to the imaginations, and devices of Men, or the suggestions of Satan, under any visible representations, or any other way, not prescribed in the Holy Scriptures,…”

Keach’s interpretation was different than others as to what the statement meant. Many church leaders and members at that time felt that only the Psalms should be sung. Meaning that only direct verses of Scripture could be sung,and not any man-made songs.

Somewhere between 1671 and 1673, Benjamin Keach lead his congregation in a hymn after the observance of the Lord’s Supper. This continued for almost twenty years. Just a hymn after the Lord’s Supper, then later a hymn on a Day of Thanksgiving. In 1690, Keach asked for a vote about allowing congregational hymn singing regularly. However it became a very heated meeting with several objectors. The vote to allow hymn singing did carry and a regular time of hymn singing was instituted after the sermon and prayer time. Some objected so much to this that they left after the sermon and prayer time. A few members objected so much that they split off and formed another church.

This resulted in a pamphlet war. Benjamin Keach arguing for restoring hymn singing as an “ordinance” of the church. Isaac Marlow, a church member, wrote against hymn singing in the church.

One of Keach’s arguments was that just because Catholics did allow hymn singing (by a choir in Latin) did not make it wrong to allow hymn singing. During the Protestant Reformation there were some who were so Anti-Catholic that if Catholics did it it must be wrong and thrown out. The battle that Keach fought has led to us being able to sing hymns and express ourselves in worship to our Lord. Keach wrote many hymns in his lifetime, often even writing a hymn to go with his message passage. However, his songs weren’t of a type that they were easily sung. Music tunes then were much different from what they are today. Isaac Watts was one of the first to write hymns in English for a congregation to sing. Without a study of church history we don’t appreciate how something as simple as singing a hymn was hard fought and won hundreds of years ago.

Author unknown