Percussive worship and hypnotic rhythms

December '15

An enthusiastic  young pastor came to report on a recent crusade in the community. Many came to worship, to hear the praise and dance, the musicians were exuberant and  the atmosphere one of celebration. The report was encouraging, the report was good. 

Anthony, one of our senior workers, later came aside and gently added an addendum to the praise report that when the music stopped, the dancing ceased and the Bible came out, the majority faded into the night as the preacher took to the pulpit. Astutely he suggested that to preach the Gospel first may have the best hope of holding attention, the allure of percussive worship and hypnotic rhythms yet to come for those able to bear the ‘good news’ heard so oft before.

It’s true, the sexualised dancing and much of what goes on in the church in Africa seems to vary little from any dance seen in bars or festive occasions, and remains the principal draw for many.



Switch to the western church and the sea of raised hands before a band of tousled haired worship leaders bears little difference to a generic chart band, the sensuality of the experience reinforced by lights, smoke and ascending anthemic tunes, the mesmeric chords of which The Edge would be proud. The large African rallies with a hive mentality before the besuited evangelist working the crowd, or the christian festival bands that pander to adolescent tastes differ little, and the mature christian, and those in leadership collude lest the whole debacle seems too dull or culturally irrelevant. Let us be serious about this, we have become a culture that worships worship instead of a culture that worships God above all. This is abhorrent to God Himself:

“Take thou away from me the noise of thy songs; for I will not hear the melody of thy viols.
But let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream” Amos 5 23-4.

David danced with a holy fervour before his God lost in praise, delivered from the philistines and in the unmediated presence of the Ark of the Covenant, a direct expression of relational gratitude. It all remains the affair of the heart. As the crowds disperse with the last fading chord, and rush to the next celebratory convention (yes, for another ‘breakthrough’) it seems that the anguish and joy of David's relationship with his God has been substituted by something more sensual, and more man centric, one of acquisition and not of sacrifice.

Both in Africa and indeed the emergent seeker friendly church in the West we delight in the carnal and have little appetite for the convicting message of the Cross. Maybe the Free Church of Scotland rightly shunned the instrumental in favour of plainsong to the Almighty, choosing the psalms as their lyrics rather than the infantile choruses sung now when even the Redemption Hymnal is deemed too theologically dense for the modern church.

Even in our little team we have dancing and worship. As I shuffle around devoid of rhythm and with an all pervading awkwardness I can’t help but notice Anthony, dancing yes, but with hands raised and quietly communing with his God in a manner that so obviously differed to less mature colleagues sweating, shrieking and gyrating with sensual abandon. The following day at our daily devotional another mature worker in Christ challenged the team with‘ What does Jesus mean to you?”, her eyes were steely, her manner searching.

A good question I reflected, is He our Saviour who shed His blood at Calvary, who became the propitiation for our sins?  Can one sing or dance and worship in reverent awe of a wonderful truth barely grasped, Grace so undeserved, so unmerited ? Well yes, of course…. 

But unless the true Gospel is preached that brings about conviction, repentance and regeneration then the dancing and music becomes the focus of our worship, self absorbed, devoid of meaning, inevitably sensual or unwittingly sexualised, the expression of a corrupt, and base mind, deluded that in its expression we draw closer to the divine. In fact, with bitter irony, it becomes the very reverse.