Most of us in the Chokehold Nation™ live a somewhat sheltered life when it comes to liturgical practice and hymnody. As a result, we may not be aware of how precipitous the decline is. There is a facebook group called “I’m Fed Up With Bad Church Music” that is mostly populated by church musicians who commiserate about what goes on in their congregational worship settings.

It’s really bad.

Here are the lyrics of a popular Christian worship song that you will hopefully never hear sung as a hymn in a Lutheran service - but I would not put money on it. This is where the trajectory leads once a church exchanges traditional hymnody and liturgy for the dark pottage of fads and fashions from outside of our tradition of rich biblical confession in song.

Do not grow weary! Continue to fight the good fight! Support Gottesdienst and your local liturgical parish and pastor. If you are able, serve your congregation in ways that will maintain and encourage proper liturgical worship. If nothing else, vocally support the liturgy during Bible class or in congregational meetings. Your voice is important, and it counts! You might consider upgrading your subscription to Gottesdienst to a bulk subscription - keep one and put the other nine out in the narthex (this will cost you a net of $40 for the year). Like and share our posts on Gottesblog. Use your own social media to extol the rich blessings of our hymns and liturgy! Share a stanza of the Hymn of the Day or part of the Divine Service on your social media. We also have to vocally let candidates for office in the LCMS at every level know that this is a top-tier issue.

We must not let this kind of thing creep into our churches:

How He Loves

by John Mark McMillan

He is jealous for me
Love's like a hurricane, and I am a tree
Bending beneath the weight of His wind and mercy
When all of a sudden,
I am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by glory
And I realize just how beautiful you are and how great your affections are for me.

And oh
How He loves us oh
Oh how He loves us
how He loves us oh

He is jealous for me
Love's like a hurricane, and I am a tree
Bending beneath the weight of His wind and mercy
When all of a sudden,
I am unaware of these afflictions eclipsed by glory
And I realize just how beautiful you are and how great your affections are for me.

And oh
How He loves us oh
Oh how He loves us
how He loves us oh

Yeah He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves

Yeah He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves

We are His portion and He is our prize
Drawn to redemption by the grace in his eyes
If grace is an ocean, we're all sinking (ha ha)
So heaven meets earth like a sloppy wet kiss
And my heart turns violently inside of my chest
I don't have time to maintain these regrets
when I think about the way

He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves
Yeah He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves yeah yeah

hey yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah yeah

Yeah He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves yeah yeah
Yeah He loves us
He loves us
He loves us (ha)

[Kim Walker speaks]
Yeah
His presence. His love.
Is so thick and tangible in this room tonight.
And there are some of you here that have not encountered the love of God.
And tonight God wants to encounter you.
And wants you to feel His love.
His amazing love.
Without it these are just songs.
These are just words.
These are just instruments.
Without the love of God, it's just like we're just up here just making noise.
But the love of God changes us,
And we're never the same,
We're never the same
After we encounter the love of God
We're never the same after we encounter the love of God
And right now if you haven't encountered the love of God,
And you would know,
Because you wouldn't be the same.
You would never be the same again.
And if you, if you, want to encounter the love of God right now,
You better just brace yourself because He's about to just blow in this place
And we're gonna encounter the love of God right now.
So God I speak to all the hearts
And I ask God that every heart be open right now
Every heart be open.
Every spirit be opened up
To you God. To You.
And a love encounter
A love encounter from you tonight
A love encounter from you tonight God.

Yeah He loves us
Oh how He loves us
Oh how He loves
Let it go deep go deep go deep

He loves us
Oh how he loves us
oh how he loves us
oh how he loves
His love is going deep
His love is going deep tonight
His love is going deep tonight
See the Father
Behold the Father
Behold the Father (ha)