What happens when the emotional highs of worship music begin to rival the excitement of a concert? A Winnipeg worship leader is challenging Christians and non-Christians alike to think more deeply about modern worship.
Aleah Kamerman, a recent graduate of Red River College in Winnipeg and PR Communications Professional, recently published an article in a secular online magazine called Working Draft. Her article is titled ‘What Are We Worshipping?’
“There’s the audience that hasn’t really engaged much with church, and I wanted to show them that there’s diverse thought in the church,” says Kamerman. “Then there’s obviously the Christian audience, and I just wanted to make them think. I wanted worship leaders and church participants to think about the way we do services, and what worship really means.”
There are three main focus points in Kamerman’s article. These include the feeling the music invokes, who the congregation is actually worshipping, and finally the artists and churches behind the music.
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Who are people worshipping?
Kamerman is a worship leader at her church, so she understands what it means to be on stage, hopefully leading people into the act of praising God.
“If God is meant to be worshipped, then it’s a way, not for us to feel good, but for us to glorify Him. When everything’s right, I feel like I want to see it as a way to glorify and honour God. To put my pride aside, my ego aside, and even the quality of music doesn’t have to be perfectly there. But if God is glorified, that is what it means to me. That’s its purpose.”
Whether the congregation sings from a hymnal or modern-day worship songs produced mostly by mega churches in the U.S.A., Kamerman says she believes what makes worship meaningful is the posture of a person’s heart.
Evoking a feeling, but for what purpose?
Kamerman interviewed Dr. Robert Zatorre from McGill University, the leading music scientist in Canada, to find out more about the physical feelings music produces in the listener.
“He talked about what triggers goosebumps. A lot of it is certain components, like a key change or a long build in a song. When you do an analysis on modern worship music, it has all of these components to make you feel shivers down your spine. It’s interesting when you look at it from a scientific perspective; the way worship music is curated just so happens to be eliciting these really intense emotions.”
Going further, Kamerman’s article encourages the reader to ask themselves questions such as, ‘Why am I worshipping? Is it to feel good? Or is it something more?’
“If we’re focusing on our own feelings, and how the music makes us shiver, then we might be missing the whole point.”
Kamerman shares that she knows a man who grew up in a mega church, listening to songs that produced serotonin, making him feel good on Sundays. After he attended a One Direction concert in his teen years, having the same feelings as the worship music he listened to at church, had him questioning his faith.
“As far as I know, he doesn’t attend church anymore. These feelings, when you’re told, ‘This is God,’ and then you feel it elsewhere, that’s very confusing.”
Choosing songs based on production, content, or entertainment
During her research, Kamerman interviewed the worship director at the church she now attends. One of the questions she asked him was how he picks the music they’ll sing on a Sunday morning.
“What I appreciated was him talking about content being the primary way he sorts through songs. So not even, is this a song coming out of a controversial mega church, but what is the content of this song? If the song doesn’t stand with the theology of your church and you’re still singing it, I think that underscores the fact that it’s a performance.”
When it comes to the people on stage, leading worship, Kamerman hopes people also investigate why people are up there. Is it for their recognition or fame? Or is it to lead people to sing praise to the Lord?
“I’m guilty of this myself. I’m not thinking about the quality of the theology. My band will choose a song, and say, ‘Well, we can’t do that one, we already have two slow ones, we need a fast one.’ I’m thinking about what’s going to please the crowd, and it’s so easy to fall into that with the way it’s set up right now.”
At the end of the day, whether people reading Kamerman’s article believe in God or not, she hopes readers think further and speculate on the way worship is led in Winnipeg today.