Men and Worship

 

Why Do Many Men Resist “Getting into” Worship?

 

Those who lead worship commonly agree that men don’t seem to “get into” worship like women do.   Why?  Why is it that males seem resistant to whole-heartedly losing themselves in a melting mystical experience like women seem to be able to do? 

 

There are other factors beyond the one I will address in this article.  For instance the numerical factor: the American church is made up of 70% females—and the men the church has captured are mostly married.  But that is about why men don’t particularly get into church—this article is about why men seem reluctant to “get into” worship—particularly the musical praise element of worship.   

 

This article is not long, but since it unfolds precept upon precept the best way to read it is to pause after each point and think a moment before moving on to the next point.

 

 

  1. Christians have a long history of considering our affiliation with Jesus using a romantic motif.  This is a legitimate way to see our relationship and it is supported in the Bible.  For instance, Ephesians 5 describes the church as the “bride of Christ” and perhaps one might extrapolate that to be also a personal relationship—that I am the bride, the feminine member of a marriage with Jesus.  So there is a Bible basis for seeing (at least the collective church) in a romantic relationship with Jesus as the male and the church as the feminine partner and bride.  In fact, through church history this notion of seeing our relationship with Jesus as sexual—a male and a female role—has often been personalized: Jesus is my bride, the lover of my soul, my groom. This movement has at times been mighty powerful and influential.  It is called “Bridal Mysticism.”  In the last several hundred years (and especially recently) we have seen a re-emergence of bridal mysticism in our music.

 

  1.  Evangelicals tend to load all of their relationship with God into a “personal relationship with Jesus.”  We Evangelicals believe in the Trinity, of course, but we tend to pack most of our relationship with the Trinity into the person Jesus and thus see our religion as primarily a “relationship with Jesus.”

 

  1.  Since the 1960’s our image of Jesus has been increasingly human.  Just look at our artwork.  Beginning in the 1960’s “Salman's head of Christ” was discarded in favor of  Frances Hook’s “head of Christ.”  She painted Jesus as a rough and ready cowboy type hunk and the pasty-faced halo-wearing apparition that was hardly human disappeared.  Jesus became increasingly human in our artwork.  Jesus became for us a real human.  A man.  A male.

 

  1.  Love is now the central defining term of our human relationship with God.  There are scores of other relationships that might be used: patron-client, king-subject, shepherd-sheep, and the related responses (gratitude, loyalty, trust).  But “love” has become not just the primary theme representing our relationship with Jesus, but almost the exclusive one. Since (as mentioned above) most evangelical load their entire relationship with God into a “relationship with Jesus,” combined together, it leaves us with a personal relationship with Jesus built on love as the central emotion.

 

  1.  The word “love” cannot be defined too far from the term’s meaning in culture.  Words derive their meaning from culture.  They do not contain meaning themselves.  Thus I can no longer tell you “I’m gay” and mean I’m happy.  The culture has defined what the term “gay” means and I can no longer insist it means something else. Same for “love.”  Our music and movies define “love” for us, and though we insist that “love” means something totally different, it is as difficult for most men to define “love” the old way as it is to define “gay” the old way.

 

  1. Sentimentalism and romanticism has become increasingly common in musical praise since the 1700s.  Until then musical praise in worship was mostly objective truth about God.  Beginning with the Wesleys in the 1700’s, lyrics moved to more subjective truth about our relationship (e.g. Wesley’s “Jesus lover of my Soul). Then came the sentimentalism of American revivalism and Fanny Crosby’s gospel songs which pushed song lyrics more toward the relational-love motif. Finally mixed in with the objective “praise choruses of the Charismatic movement came a new spring of lyrics that used romantic lyrics to represent our relationship with Jesus. Through these 250 years music continually moved from the head to the heart, from cognitive truth about God to affective feelings about Jesus.  True, for a while the “Praise and Worship” movement was a counter trend, but it is in total meltdown today and romantic lyrics are making a major comeback.  The result of these 250 years is an increasingly use of romantic metaphors for describing our relationship with Jesus.

 

  1. Males perceive sexual subliminal meanings of words more than females.  I have seen this a thousand times. No, more than that.  Men readily see sexual/sensual double-meanings more often than women.    Of course they do this when they are with a group of men most of all and it contributes to lots of humor.  But they also do it in mixed groups.  Women present usually completely miss it.  Men hear certain words and phrases from women and toss each other a millisecond glance-and-faint-smile.  Other men get it while the girl continues on oblivious to what she’s said (and if she did know she’d merely say, “Shame on you guys—you have such dirty minds” or “why don’t you grow up.”  But it is the truth.  Men tend to run on two tracks—the face of a conversation and a subliminal second track—a second sexual meaning of words and actions.

 

  1. All the above combines to make it harder for men to “get into” much of today’s worship.

 

OK, there are some prominent exceptions to all this.  Homosexual men and highly effeminate men seem quite able to sing about how they are “madly in love” with Jesus.  And almost every church over 100 in attendance has at least one or two males with strong homoerotic tendencies—but with such music what are we teaching him?   Is this a good thing—to stir up homoerotic tendencies in these men?  Face it, the Hunk-Jesus can come to fill a void for these men in a way that is unhealthy.  Many gay males have what orthodoxy would consider weird ideas about Jesus, John, the disciples and the Bible.  Even if such men enjoy romantic worship songs to Jesus, should we be fanning these flames?  But there are some straight men who are not at all bothered by these songs.  This who article seems nutty to them.  But fine, I am not saying this apples to all men, just many men. 

So, what am I calling for here?   Simply this: if we want more men to “give themselves totally to worship” we’ll have to downplay the sexual/romantic metaphors.  We should do this not because the male-female motif is absent in the Bible and church history—but we should do it because if we don’t, many men will end up absent from worship.  Even if they are there in body.

 

So, what do you think?

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To contribute to the thinking on this issue e-mail your response to Keith@tuesdaycolumn.com  

Keith Drury November, 2003.  May be duplicated for free distribution only; provided these lines are included.

Other "Thinking Drafts" and writing by Keith Drury – http://www.tuesdaycolumn.com  _________________________________________________________________

è Click here for few thoughtful responses this article

 

 

Other writing on worship by Keith Drury

§         Nine kinds of worship services today

§         MUSIC: the latest sacrament to experience the "Presence of God" in worship?

§         What to do about a “dead” Traditional Service?”

§         Wonder what worship songs appeal to students these days?

§         Pssssst…Boomers: They‘re laughing at you!  

§         BOOMERS: Will your church become a boomer nursing home in the next 20 years?

§         COMMUNION: John Wesley's sermon The Duty of Constant Communion -- a modern paraphrase.

§         EASTER: Why don't many Protestants take Good Friday seriously?

§         LEADING: Is this letter written about YOU? (Responses)

§          SONG LEADER: Have you noticed how cheerleading has changed?.....( Responses)

§         MUSIC: Can you guess where I got these Thoughts on the Power of Music?

§         MYSTERY: Why do they yearn for mystery in worship?..... responses

§         CHORUSES: Are you frustrated by these shallow praise choruses?.....( responses)

§         LEADING: O How We Love The New Worship Leader we just got .....

§         CHANGE: Will your church become a boomer nursing home in the next 20 years?

§         CHANGE: The Generation Skip Factor in the worship wars. (outdated—for historical reference)

§         CHANGE: Have you been on the battlefront in the 'Worship Wars?" ....

§         TRENDS: The latest worship trend unplugged worship! (outdated—for historical reference)

§         BOOMER WORSHIP: The 15 unalterable doctrines of the Baby Boomer Worship Creed

§         GEN X WORSHIP: Are you ready for this? Here comes GenX Worship!

§         ALTAR CALL: NO NO I won't go to the altar!

§         CHORUSES: Why are young people so transfixed with praise Choruses ?........ ( responses) 

§         Have you ever seen Totally Useless Worship?

§         Five recent trends in Worship.