Should evangelicals sing Hillsong, Bethel and Elevation songs in evangelical churches? - with Mal York

Church music is one of the most formative and contested parts of local church life.

People join churches because of music. People leave churches because of music. But music is not a filler between the sermon and the prayers. The songs we sing put theology into people’s mouths and memories.

So how should we choose the songs we sing in church?

Mal York, the dean of students at Sydney’s Moore Theological College, joins us to talk about principles and pragmatics in choosing songs for church.

We discuss theological depth, singability, musical excellence, doctrinal drift, performance culture and what to do with songs from movements like Hillsong, Bethel and Elevation.

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Transcript

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SPEAKER_01 0:30

Hey Dominic Steele here and we're looking for your support for the Pastor's Heart ahead of the end of the Australian tax year on the 30th of June. We're aiming to raise 40,000 Australian dollars over the next six weeks. If you like what we're doing with the Pastor's Heart and you want to encourage us in our mission of assisting senior leaders of churches, please go to the pastorsheart.net slash support and you can make a gift that's tax deductible in Australia. We'd love support also from the many people who engage with us from around the world as well. So if you could help out, we would really appreciate that. Please pray for us in this work and I'll keep you posted on how we're going towards our total over the next six weeks. Should we sing Hill Song, Principles and Pragmatics in Choosing Songs for Church? Mal York is our guest. It is The Pastor's Heart. My name is Dominic Steele, and church music is one of the most formative, emotionally charged and contested parts of church life. There's a saying, you tell me what songs you sing at your church, and I'll tell you who goes to your church. Or you tell me what songs you sing at your church and I'll tell you who won't go to your church. People join churches because of music.

Why Church Music Shapes Church Life

SPEAKER_01 1:53

People leave churches because of music. And sometimes pastors and musicians avoid the hard conversations because we know how personal it can become. Music is not just the filler between the sermon and the prayers, it's a massively important ministry. So how do we choose the songs? What makes a song suitable for evangelical congregational singing? And how much should we scrutinize the lyrics? And what do we do with songs from movements like Hillsong, Bethel, Elevation, where there are serious questions about the teaching of the movement, and yet even a broken clock is right twice a day. Mal York is Dean of Students at Sydney's Moore Theological College. And uh, Mal, your pastor's heart for music in church, you've had a deep interest for a long time.

SPEAKER_00 2:45

Yeah, thanks, Dominic. Um, I have, and my uh pastor's heart is uh in response to Jesus' command to uh make disciples of all the nations, and uh when it comes to music, uh it is a massive discipleship moment. Uh and I think that um most people uh go away from church not remembering most of the sermon, but actually singing the songs that they've loved and enjoyed. And so how can we use them to continue to disciple and teach our people more about the Lord Jesus?

SPEAKER_01 3:15

And when we were chatting about this uh a few days ago, you said to me um, your theology of music needs to start with your theology of church.

SPEAKER_00 3:24

Absolutely. It is crucial. If you don't understand what uh church is uh on about theologically in the first place, what uh God is doing and what Christ is doing uh at church, then you'll never get the right place of music in it.

SPEAKER_01 3:37

Okay, I'll bowl up the Dorothy Dixer. What is the theology of church?

SPEAKER_00 3:41

Well, uh church is all about gathering around the throne of God, gathering

Start With A Theology Of Church

SPEAKER_00 3:45

around God's word. It's a reflection of the heavenly reality that we see happening in uh Revelation. Uh and so we read in places like Hebrews um that uh that Christ uh is uh ruling his uh uh church through his word. Uh and as we gather around uh the throne of God to uh understand uh and learn from God's word, uh it's about glorifying him and teaching one another and helping each other to grow as disciples in that way. I mean, that feels right, but it's also broad.

SPEAKER_01 4:17

How does that apply to music?

SPEAKER_00 4:19

Well, in terms of um music uh is uh a word-based ministry. Um the words that we sing are uh really important because uh they either reflect what the Bible teaches us or they don't reflect what the Bible teaches us. Uh and we need to ensure that um we treat music uh as a word-based ministry, uh, like um I guess we do preaching uh in that sort of way. We've scrutinized preaching. We want to ensure that preachers are basing what they say uh

Lyrics As Word-Based Ministry

SPEAKER_00 4:49

on God's word, and we want them to be clear, we want them to be faithful. Uh, and I think we need to be uh we need to scrutinize music in the same way. Uh is it clear? Is it faithful to what God's word is teaching?

SPEAKER_01 5:01

And um talk to me about Amos 523, away with the noise of your songs. Not all songs are going to be pleasing to God.

SPEAKER_00 5:11

Yeah, I think this is one of the things that uh we really need to consider. Uh now Amos is really talking about a heart motivation. What's behind uh the heart of the people of Israel uh as they sing their songs? And uh it says that God says the the songs aren't acceptable because their hearts are not in the right place. And I think that's a real challenge for us all uh in our church. Uh are our hearts in the right places when we are singing praises to our God and King? Are we singing with the

Amos And Heart-Level Worship

SPEAKER_00 5:38

right motivation? Uh now that uh that then you need to question from even the senior minister down to the uh uh per the congregational member as to are they singing with that right motivation? Is it about glorifying God? Is it about teaching other, or is it a selfish desire? Is it about what I want and and what I want to happen in in music and in church?

SPEAKER_01 6:01

So talk to me about how you have over the years, because I mean you've led a number of churches and and been on the staff of others. Talk to me about pastoring the heart of the musicians. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:12

Yeah, so first and foremost, it's about teaching them God's word. Uh it's about helping to ensure that they are understanding the Bible uh in a correct uh and helpful way. Uh it's about praying with the musicians, ensuring that um uh they're serving with the right motivation, um, that it's not about um serving themselves, but actually being uh involved in the music ministry is part of serving the body of Christ. Um and so that means they need to think through uh how they lead,

Pastoring Musicians As Disciples

SPEAKER_00 6:41

uh what songs we choose. Um and I think in terms of that, uh it's it's also uh, I mean, I I need to be a pastor to the musicians as well. And I need to pastor them and care for them in that sort of way. So so I guess those sort of three things, you know, reading God's word together, praying together, uh, but also pastorally caring for the musicians in that way, uh, helping them to understand what they should be doing.

SPEAKER_01 7:06

So, what are you looking for in church music in the church where you're the senior minister?

SPEAKER_00 7:14

Uh I'm looking for um words that are um reflective of what the scriptures uh teach. I'm looking for songs that are actually singable. Uh so as a musician myself, um I'm what instrument do you play? Uh so I'm I'm a singer-songwriter, I play the guitar and write songs and things like that. Um, but I want to ensure that um uh the songs are uh have got a melody that's easier to sing. There are some songs out there. Um I I used to go around to churches playing

Singable Songs And Suitable Keys

SPEAKER_00 7:43

my own music and uh they're rock songs, and the church people in the church would say, Oh, these songs are great, can we sing them at church? And I said, Well, I actually haven't written them to be sung in church. Actually, they're too complex, those ones to be singable. I don't I don't have the they're not the best melodies. Right. Like they're they're rock songs. Rock songs don't always have the best melodies. Um, but um, but to write a good song for a congregation to sing is actually a really hard thing to do. Um, but it's not just also the um uh the singability in that way. So singability in the key that it's in, is it a helpful key for both men and women to sing? I had some a lovely uh couple at a church I was at that went through every song and found the exact perfect key for both men and women to sing so that when we all sang, we could all sing it together clearly and faithfully. They will. It's a great active service, isn't it? Wonderful service.

SPEAKER_01 8:32

Now, Philip Percival uh from EMU Music has said evangelicals used to be defined by gospel proclamation and rich him singing, but that we've experienced a doctrinal drift. Um, do you think our congregations have become theologically malnourished in their musical diets?

SPEAKER_00 8:53

I think in some ways uh yes. Um I think in other ways no. Um, so let me speak to the first part of that. I think one of the challenges

Clarity Without Killing Artistry

SPEAKER_00 9:02

uh is that as we have uh allowed music such as uh secular music or similar music like that to come into our songs that we sing in church, we've gone down a very artistic line. And quite often we're finding that our songs are not as clear as they used to be. So there are one or two lines in the song, or sometimes even more than that, that you sing it and you think, I actually don't know what that means. And I think the challenge is if you applied that to preaching, if you suddenly had preachers get up there and use artistic language that where they came away going, oh, that's not clear, well, we would we would say they need to change that. They need to be clear in their teaching. Well, we actually do need to be like that uh in our our music as well.

SPEAKER_01 9:43

Well, let me put let me push back on you, dude. Um how about uh somebody might reply to you if we scrutinize that intensely, are we flattening artistic expression?

SPEAKER_00 9:54

Uh not at all. Uh I think you can look at uh uh the Psalms uh and you can see that there's clear um uh artistic expression, but in a clear way. You know, you can you that just because it's artistic expression doesn't necessarily mean there can't be clarity about it. And I think there's really it's really important that we actually have clarity in our music because uh statistics show that if you take notes during preaching, you you uh you you learn about 30% of the sermon. Uh if you're not taking notes, it's even less. And so actually people are walking away from sermons, not remembering as much as as we would like them to. But they're walking away from songs that have been sung over and over again, and so they're remembering them really well. And so we actually want clarity around what our people are remembering when they leave church.

SPEAKER_01 10:39

Are you treating songs like doctrinal essays? I mean, you're a lecturer at theological college. Um, I'm just playing devil's advocate here.

SPEAKER_00 10:47

Uh as a musician, I I think no, I'm not. Um, because you can actually look at some wonderful great hymns that have got a lot of doctrine in them, are very easily uh easy to sing um uh and are very edifying for everyone. So it can be done. And I do think there are some modern uh uh songs that we sing in church today that actually do the same sort of thing. And so I think it can be done today, um, but it's just hard work. What makes a lyric in a song unacceptable? Well, I think one that you can't understand, that's not clear, or that points to something that is not true uh in what the scriptures teach.

SPEAKER_01 11:22

So you're saying it's um it's not just if it's teaching the wrong thing, but imprecision is a problem.

SPEAKER_00 11:31

Absolutely, because uh what we've got to think about is uh the weaker brother, the weaker sister, the person who is coming to church, who is wanting to learn about the

Poetry Versus Theological Vagueness

SPEAKER_00 11:41

Lord Jesus Christ. And so we need to help them have clarity on what the truth of the gospel is, and particularly the uh importance of music and the strength of music is that you remember these things long after you've left church because you that's what songs do.

SPEAKER_01 11:56

How do you distinguish between poetic expression and theological vagueness?

SPEAKER_00 12:02

Well, I think that's uh in terms of understanding uh someone's general understanding, if you talk to them uh afterwards and they say, Oh, did you understand what the song meant by that? And they go, No, which I have heard before in the past, um, well then obviously that's gone too far, hasn't it, in terms of its um um in terms of its artistic uh um understanding. Um but if you uh if you think about uh the theological depth, well, does it does it actually match what the scriptures say? Can we understand what the song is singing from the t uh the scriptures? Where where do we get it from in the scriptures? I think we want to be comparing our songs uh to the scriptures in that sort of way.

SPEAKER_01 12:45

Now there's an elephant in the room, Sydney is the city of Hillsong. Um and the question is that we evangelical ministers have to address is should we sing Hillsong songs? Should we sing Bethel songs, elevation songs? And um, what about where you might have a song which is lyrically good but coming from an organization that you are theologically skeptical about?

SPEAKER_00 13:11

Yeah, look, I think a lot of wisdom is needed uh in this area.

Hillsong And The Cost Of Partnership

SPEAKER_00 13:15

And I think particularly one of the things I was struck by when I some of their songs will be lyrically bad, but we're doing the Well, that's right. And I I think one of the challenges that I had have found, particularly myself as a senior minister of a church, is that when I would drive to my kids somewhere and I was listening to radio stations like Hope FM, uh Christian radio stations. Christian radio stations. Actually, I think it was even on WSFM this ad came up, and it was a Hillsong ad and it said was advertised in their conference, and it said, You've heard our songs, so now come to our conference. So what that made me realize is that Hillsong, whether we like it or not, Hillsong see their songs as advertising for them. So they see that whenever you sing a Hillsong song in your church, you are advertising their ministry. Now, some churches might be happy to advertise their ministry, but um uh for me, I found it hard to sing those songs uh in particular churches that I was in because I thought I didn't want to be advertising their ministry. Uh in terms of privately listening to those songs, I I I've got less of an issue with that because uh when you're doing something publicly, you're uh you're uh partnering with these people. You whether you like it or not, they they see that you're partnering with them. And I think when we look at books uh like Philippians, uh and Paul talks about partnerships, we want to be really careful about who we say that we are definitely partnering with or not.

SPEAKER_01 14:35

Now, I mean, again, some of my pastor friends would say, uh, I don't think of it like that. I'm uh, I don't know, eating the meat, leaving the bones, um, or or that broken clock is right twice a day, and I'm grabbing hold of the correct one.

SPEAKER_00 14:51

Debate that with me. Well, I think that uh it doesn't whether you like it or not, um, I I would say um Hillsong sees their songs advertising. So whether you don't think you're advertising them or not, they actually see that you are. And so you need to uh you need to consider that.

SPEAKER_01 15:06

Um I think that there this means you're not for singing Hillsong Bethel songs.

SPEAKER_00 15:11

Well, I think that one of the yeah, one of the challenges, so definitely in one of the churches that I uh led, we didn't sing Hillsong songs. Um, and there was a challenge in that because there are some songs that I think are quite good. Uh you know, there are some songs that I personally like, there are some songs that the um uh they've taken an old hymn and they've put it to new music, and that's really good. Um, and so it was a challenge for me as to whether uh whether we um we sang those songs or not. Quite often, um, one of the arguments that I came up with against myself was that if I'm preaching God's word clearly and faithfully, uh, and then singing some songs that might have um be done by a place like Hillsong, that people would actually, well, they would listen to the words of the sermon and they would understand what the truth of the gospel is. Um but what weighed on my conscience was the uh the weaker brother or sister, uh, who might not be as discerning as some of the uh more mature people in church, who therefore might say, go to the conference or something like that and get caught up in uh in teaching that I might not want them to be caught up in. And so it was a real tension for me. Uh, and I imagine it would be a real tension for a lot of ministers out there uh as to whether they should sing them or not, because there's also a lot of pressure from your congregation members who like those songs, who would like to sing the songs. But actually, what we need to be doing is teaching God's word and teaching right gospel partnerships.

SPEAKER_01 16:30

I want to come back to the discussion of how you interact with the congregation on this. But first, I'm imagining that there's be some people watching, listening to us now and thinking, hang on, I was in church with Mal when he was the senior minister, and we sang a song from Hillsong or Bath Bethel. And is he a hypocrite here?

SPEAKER_00 16:52

Yeah, absolutely. And look, this is absolutely you are a hypocrite. No, absolutely, they could be thinking that. Right, okay. Um, but uh no, not a hypocrite in terms of I think it this is a wisdom issue, and this is uh something that we still continue to need to talk about and we need to discern as a team what is right and what is wrong in various contexts. So the context where we didn't sing um Hillsong songs for most of my ministry uh was uh probably in a time when Hillsong uh conferences were quite popular and quite um uh and and it would the draw was quite strong. Whereas probably at other churches where I went to, that wasn't such of an issue at the time. In fact, a lot have come sadly has come out of negative things that have happened again.

SPEAKER_01 17:35

I mean that is interesting that um yes, I mean obviously Hillsong is much less of a force than it was um ten years ago and um and also I think I mean potentially has improved, it's hard to tell, but yeah, potentially, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 17:52

There was a lot of uh a lot of things that were leaning towards that sort of message. Um and so so that's why it's a a wisdom issue. Uh and there are some songs that are actually really quite good. So uh so it is a challenge.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

Um what about change management? You but I mean, I've just become uh I've just taken on the leadership of a new second site at Concord, uh just 20 minutes west of here. And um uh there are some songs on the playlist there that I'm a bit skeptical about. And um for for many of the reasons we've discussed the last few minutes. Um uh you teach change management.

SPEAKER_00 18:33

Tell me what to do. Uh look, I th I think

Leading Song Change Without Fallout

SPEAKER_00 18:36

it is a slow. Uh it's a teaching of God's word, and it's uh as people continue to grow in that understanding of God's word and the truth of God's word, and then you reflect it against the songs that you're singing uh over time, uh people become self-selecting as well. They realize that actually maybe that's not such a helpful song to be singing. And so um uh so I think you work with people, but it it does take time. Uh, and I particularly think of uh of some churches that I've been at where we did uh used to take slowly take songs off that we thought, no, this was not helpful, this was not good. Uh and so I'd work with my uh music team. Uh and can I just say I've worked with some wonderful musicians over the years and and many people who have uh uh who have thought one way about songs, but then over time changed their mind as well uh and decided not to sing it as well. And that's not just the churches that you've mentioned as well. I mean, we're talking whoever writes songs, we need to be discerning about these places like Sovereign Grace and English music and all those uh they're great places, but we need to be discerning about all of them.

SPEAKER_01 19:35

So you take over uh the leadership of a church and you think, wow. Okay. That one's terrible. And um uh that one is fuzzy. And that one, the lyrics are okay, but I don't like where it's from. Um help me on each of those categories. Um that one's terrible is theologically misleading.

SPEAKER_00 20:01

Yeah, I look, I think in terms of um uh I guess how you you first question I was is how do you choose the songs with the musicians? And so um I would used I I used to have days where we'd get together with the musicians and we'd go through all the song choices and we'd we'd uh we'd go through them when we talk about them, we'd talk about the theological issues that we might have with them. Uh and as we did that, uh I was able to point out some of the either the more theologically incorrect songs um or the songs that were uh written by places that I wouldn't want to support and and talk with the musicians about why uh I had some concerns about them. And quite often that meant I would need to compromise on some of the songs that we we we then ended up singing, uh, but it also meant that other times they would agree with me and we'd take them off. Uh, but then that would take that's we're talking talking about years that this can take sometimes take, uh, depending on what people think about the music. You've been talking in the abstract so far. Give us some concrete examples. Well, when I were that happened at West Ride uh when I started West Ride, really wonderful, faithful church. Um, there was uh a service there in one of the evening services where some of the songs that uh we were singing I thought were very uh they lacked theological depth. Um but uh but I was bringing about change in many other areas of the church at that time. So I thought that's not uh a battle that I could fight early on in the six months. Not not for this six months, and uh but then after uh other things settled down, I started to address that and we would um we made changes quite well. But but people were very open uh um because by that time I'd been teaching the Bible um for for six months, and so by the time it came to addressing those issues, uh people were on board because they were on board with what the Bible was teaching.

SPEAKER_01 21:52

What about the issue of the song words being outsider um aware or outsider focused or guest focused rather than um just um or keeping the newcomer in mind? Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 22:06

Yeah, I think in terms of keeping the newcomer in mind, just like you would for a sermon, uh, you want to have words that are clear, uh, that are faithful to um uh God's word that are uh easily uh that have a good tune and uh easily easy to sing. Uh and so if you're thinking about those

Helping Outsiders Understand The Words

SPEAKER_00 22:21

sorts of things when it comes to music, I think that the outsider, when they come in, they're expecting generally that there'll be music there because that's what Christians do. Uh and so as long as you make it uh easy enough for them to either follow along, because they might not know the words, but but it's uh easy tune to sing, but also that it's got good words that reflect the sermon, um, so that when you're you preach and you sing, there's um a connect as opposed to a disconnect.

SPEAKER_01 22:47

You know, one of the things we've done um is uh that song uh Come Thou Fount and um the line Um Here I Raise My Ebenezer. Now I am thinking that most non-Christians in the inner west of Sydney don't know what an Ebenezer is.

SPEAKER_00 23:06

I would say but maybe many Christians don't know what an Ebenezer is.

SPEAKER_01 23:10

So in fact, I think we're singing in tongues at that point, you know. And so we've actually put um a photo of an Ebenezer and a little thing that says an Ebenezer is a rock that and uh and put that on the bottom of that slide. So we're giving the interpretation at the moment that we're singing in tongues, you know.

SPEAKER_00 23:32

And that could also be uh uh the job of a good song leader. Uh if they introduce the song, hi just so you know, in this song we're gonna sing, it's gonna talk about this and this is what it means. So when you do sing that line, uh you know, uh you can know what it means and be praising God in that way.

SPEAKER_01 23:48

Philip Percival said that the modern song uh can lead towards um performance rather than pastoral care. Um, how do you stop the music ministry from becoming a spectator sport?

SPEAKER_00 24:01

Yeah, this was a real challenge um uh for me in one particular church uh where uh they had guitar solos and they had uh things like this. This was in the early days of my ministry. And um uh and that's when I I needed to run a theology

From Performance To Service Ministry

SPEAKER_00 24:17

of music night. So I actually got all the musicians together and ran uh a theology of music. And what I really wanted to land on is that being involved in music is uh is all about serving God, uh, serving the Lord Jesus and his church. It's not about a performance, it's not about you. And I think that's um uh can be really challenging uh for some musicians who want to uh who use the music at church as their way of uh artistically expressing themselves in the way that they play music. Um and the same is with song leading in terms of if you think through uh do we sing harmonies or not? Um harmonies can be helpful and lovely and nice, but are you leading the singers in the way that you do that? Um you leading the congregation or is it more about you want it to sound good? Oh well, of course we want it to sound good, but first and foremost we should be serving God and serving the congregation, and that's what music uh ministry should be about. So I would be encouraging and leading musicians to thinking about uh music being a service ministry, uh, first and foremost.

SPEAKER_01 25:21

What if you've got a highly skilled musician, but they they don't feel to you to be aligned with your pastoral vision of the direction you're wanting it to go.

SPEAKER_00 25:30

Oh, well that's again, that's where you meet up and you teach. So that's what I did with uh this theology of music night. You teach through what a theology of music is um and how it's related to servanthood. Um, and most musicians that I've worked with in that way have come around. Um, so yeah.

SPEAKER_01 25:46

Mal, thanks very much for coming in. Mal York has been our guest. He's Dean of Students at Sydney's Moore Theological College. My name is Dominic Steele. You've been with us on The Pastor's Heart, and we will look forward to your company next Tuesday afternoon.