"I Wanta Sing, Sing, Sing..."

I had an interesting experience while on vacation recently. It may have been the first time that I have ever attended a church service where the singing was led so poorly that on 2 or 3 songs I and most of the audience just had to quit. The song leader may have been doing his best, but the congregation couldn't sing. If you know me, you know I love to sing. I was very young when I was asked to take a whole service because all of our regular song leaders were either sick or unable to attend on a Wednesday night. I think I was about 9 years old or so. Anyway, I got "on the job experience." Certainly I could have done a better job if I had had some training. This brings me to my point- churches need to teach people how to sing and how to lead singing.
According to scripture, worship attendance is vital(Heb 10:24-25.) It is by this means that we exhort one another as well as worship God in "spirit and truth"(John 4:24). Part of worship is singing songs, hymns and spiritual songs.(Ep. 5:19, Col. 3:16). And we must be taught to do this by some means. No part of our Christian worship is simply an unplanned "experience" as some would like it to be. It takes study, preparation and forethought.
Some are leaving the Biblical way of "teaching and admonishing one another" for various forms of man-made worship. But the doctrines and commandments of men are vain(Matthew 15:9). One of the reasons men abandon Biblical singing is obviously that men are not being taught what the Bible says. Another is that some churches sing so poorly it would run the church mice out of the building. This is actually the reason that the preacher gave for introducing instrumental music into worship in Midway, Kentucky. And while it is true that God looks on the heart and that is where we "make melody", it is also true that we have to have some type of leadership and planning to sing together.
There are many good methods of teaching singing and song leading. One that has been very effective for our congregation is using Lads to Leaders. For a period of several weeks each year, boys and girls practice singing and song leading for about 45 minutes before Sunday night services. Some question whether girls should be taught to lead. Certainly we do not advocate that they lead the entire congregation in singing(See 1 Tim 2:14-16), but older women are to teach the younger. This is often done in children's Bible class where song leading is essential. It is also helpful to have women who can lead other women for Ladies Days and other women's gatherings.
In the past many congregations had singing schools for a week or more. This is seldom heard of today. A monthly singing night would be more effective if someone would actually take time to teach at least some of the elementary parts of singing and song leading. A singing emphasis workshop or special Sunday can help in teaching singing.
Whatever means you choose, choose some means. The old saying, "Everybody complains about the weather, but nobody does anything about it," is quite true. But you can't do anything about the weather. You can and should do something about poor singing. Provide opportunities to teach people how to do it. David Courington