I recently had the pleasure of spending four wonderful nights preaching in revival services for Pastor Tom East and the Williams First Baptist Church of Williams, Indiana. Williams is down near Bedford, more-or-less. You drive to Bedford, turn right, and then drive to the edge of the world.
When Pastor Tom called to invite me, at first I turned him down. My first thought was: “It sounds exhausting!” Then I thought: “I don’t want to be the guy who just wants to sit in a rocking chair!” I debated back and forth internally, talked to my wife, talked to our chairman of deacons and a couple others. Finally, after much vacillating and asking God what to do, I told Pastor East I’d come. (Then I immediately had second thoughts!)
Well, it was exhausting, but also renewing for me personally. I’d have to let the people of Williams First Baptist tell you how they thought the meetings went; but for my part, I stood up at the right time, faced the right direction, and managed not to say anything too embarrassing.
But I felt ministered to by this wonderful church and its pastor, way out there on a ridge in southern Indiana. I found in Tom East a brother and new friend, not only in Christ but in the ministry. And the personal conversations we had were such an encouragement to me. I hope they were to him as well.
Williams First Baptist has a sweet spirit…such a sweet spirit! You can feel it when you walk in, and you can see it on the faces of their people. I told them how wonderful it was, and to guard it well because it really ticks the devil off!
But the thing that surprised me most, for which I was totally unprepared, was the singing. They sang! When it came time for the congregational singing, some of them walked up on the platform and grabbed microphones, some of them picked up instruments, and all of the opened their mouths and sang! It was electric!
I don’t mean the instruments were electric (though some of them were). I mean the atmosphere of the meeting was electrifying, energetic, enthusiastic. It was joyful! And by the time they were done singing, even an Episcopalian could have preached!
Let me let you in on a little secret: how the congregation sings and the musicians play in the first part of a church service is either an immense help or an immense obstacle to the preaching of the Gospel. The President of the Bible College I went to, Dr. W. E. Dowell, told our class of young preachers that the song leader, choir and musicians can either make or kill a service. He said sometimes he’d had to get up to preach after a real dead song service, and felt like he had an immense obstacle to overcome before he could get the message of the Gospel over to the people.
I understand what he meant. Sometimes I have stood up to preach and felt as if I had to climb a 45-degree slope just to “get going” in the sermon. It really does feel like you’re somehow trying to climb uphill.
Now I will admit to you that Williams First Baptist has an advantage we don’t have: they have a relatively flat, wooden ceiling. All the sound they make goes up, bounces off that ceiling, and is reflected right back down to the congregation. You are literally surrounded by the music and the singing. Not like a rock concert: not painfully loud. But the music and the singing fills the space and encourages people to sing!
And folks: the first night we had 22 people. Twenty-two people sang their hearts out and “blew the lid off the place!” And I sat there and thought something I didn’t want to think. I thought: “These folks put our bunch to shame!”
God has given our church so much. We have great buildings, plenty of parking and a beautiful sanctuary. But “If you build it, they will come” only worked in an old Kevin Costner movie (and even that story was made up). Sometimes I think we have allowed all God has given us to lull us into spiritual complacency.
Our sanctuary is so big, most people think they are invisible as part of the congregation. But you’re not. What you do (or don’t do) has a direct effect on the service. When you’re sitting in a sanctuary that seats maybe 50 people, you automatically know everybody can see and hear you. But it’s still true even in a larger space. And if you don’t participate in the worship, if you don’t sing, it has a direct and dragging effect on the church service.
Folks have told me repeatedly how much they love the old hymns. Let me tell you something that is as true and important as anything I’ve ever said to you: You’re going to make people hate those old hymns unless you sing and play them with some life and energy and enthusiasm. Why should people who visit our services care enough to come back if we don’t sing and play to the Lord Jesus like we care, about Him and the things we’re singing about?
Our coming together as a congregation is part of our Christian witness and testimony. Genesis 4:28 says that when Adam and Eve’s son Seth was born, “At that time people began to call upon the name of the LORD.” That didn’t mean nobody prayed before that. The sense of the Hebrew wording is that at that time people began coming together publicly in order to pray and worship God. This, in the face of an increasingly ungodly society. Their coming together to worship and call on the name of the LORD was an important part of their testimony to the True and Living God before an unbelieving generation.
But what we do when we come together is just as important as assembling as a congregation. You can’t come in, plop down, fold your arms and exhibit an attitude of “Bless me, I dare you!”, and think that you are being a good Christian. You may be coming to church and being a bad Christian! (It happens, believe me.)
There’s a parody of an old Gospel song that goes like this:
I shall not be, I shall not be moved! I shall not be, I shall not be moved! I’ll sit right here and hinder those around me, I shall not be moved!
You don’t have to be a great singer to help make our services live and wide awake. Just sing: “Make a joyful noise” , Psalm 66:1 says (in the King James Version). The key concept is joyful.
“Oh, magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt His name together!” (Psalm 34:3) “Sing to Him a new song: play skillfully on the strings with loud shouts.” (Psalm 33:3)
Oh, church: let’s do this, with all our hearts! It will make a difference in our services like nothing else we can do. Old songs, new songs, it doesn’t matter: sing to the LORD! Let’s let our brothers and sisters at Wiliams First Baptist stir us up to love and good works (Hebrews 10:24). I really believe one of the reasons God had me go over there was to hear them sing, and to remind us how we need to sing together, too. It is part of our work together in bearing testimony to the Gospel of Jesus in our generation.
And besides: it really helps me preach!
Soli Deo Gloria!
Pastor David