Clearing out music - having a theological clear out

OK so today's ADHD hyper focus led me to start tidying up my study. Before I knew it, I got distracted sorting out the immense piles of worship music taking up one of my shelves and realising just how much my theology has changed over the years.

I've been playing church music almost as long as I can remember. I have a love hate relationship with songs such as Shine Jesus Shine, It is one of the first pieces of worship music I learnt and I have a distinct memory of inflicting it (in the key of C) on a Baptist church in London. I think I was about 12. When I was 15 we moved to Texas where I remember leading some worship at a youth group on a tinny Yamaha keyboard, and sang as part of the worship group. Moving back to the UK a few years later I was shocked to find the Minster of the village church I'd grown up in loading MIDI files into the organ, I very quickly got behind the console, I still don't like using tinned music for worship.

Over the last 20+ years I have played in numerous worship groups and ended up leading worship in churches all over the country, and have amassed a large collection of worship music, both in book form and in numerous photocopies and printouts ... today i threw half of them away.

I started to try and tidy up my study, it had become a bit of a mess and needed a sort out. Over the last couple of years I've pulled pieces of music out of the folders and never got around to re-filing them. Today as I started to go though the folders and piles I discovered how much my understanding of who God is has changed since I first started leading worship. So many of the songs have lyrics that I now find myself unable to sing, with a focus on judgement, and God coming in glory or the promise of Christians being taken into heaven as a reward for believing the right things. Very little of it was related to Gods justice, love and mercy. "Love" wrapped in a mailed fist of judgement and condemnation rather than justice wrapped in Grace and Mercy. When I look at the sheet music I've kept, there is a lot that speaks of God revealed in creation, a lot of the revelation of God's grace and mercy, the only themes of judgement and condemnation are of the unjust systems and abuses of power and authority.

I've always loved worship, I possibly remember now scripture through song than through Bible study, and when I'm struggling I play the piano as a form of prayer, using music and song lyrics to express the things I can't. One of the hardest parts of training for ordained ministry is knowing that I will spend less time playing the piano in worship. However, I have noticed that I spend as much if not more time making sure that I have the right prayers and hymns as I do on the sermon. For me this often involves playing in my study and I don't imagine that is going to change. I'm always hopeful that something I say will touch someone, that they will remember it, but I know that it is likely that, even if they don't remember a word I say in the sermon, people will remember the hymns and worship songs, and the words to those songs will stick in people's hearts and minds, they will challenge people to think about what it is they believe.

Clearing out that pile of music has challenged me to look again at what I believe and who I believe God is, and to reflect on the way that understanding has changed. I suspect that If I come back in another few years and have a similar sort out, I'll discover another shift in the songs I sing. Over the last few years I've enjoyed writing a few songs of my own, looking at them today there are a few I'd change musically, but not lyrically, it will be interesting to see what happens when I look at those in the future.

The one thing I know is that even as my understanding of God grows and evolves, I won't stop singing Gods praise.