Church Music Quotes

1. "In previous centuries, the Church was the great controller, dictating morality, stifling free expression and posing as conservator of all great art and music. Instead we have TV, doing just as good a job at dictating fashions, thoughts, attitudes, objectives as did the Church, using many of the same techniques but doing it so palatably that no one notices. Instead of ‘sins' to keep people in line, we have fears of being judged unacceptable by our peers (by not wearing the right shoes, not drinking the right kind of beer, or wearing the wrong kind of deodorant). Coupled with that fear is imposed insecurity concerning our own identities. All answers and solutions to these fears come through the television, and only through television. Only through exposure to TV can the new sins of alienation and ostracism be absolved."
Author: Anton Szandor LaVey

2. "Westboro Baptist Church: STOP. Stop protesting the funerals of our soldiers who died in action because you are anti-gay. When one of you dies, I'm going to show up with a couple of gay veterans and we're going to do a musical at your funeral."
Author: Billy Crystal

3. "It is a strange world, a sad world, a world full of miseries, and woes, and troubles. And yet when King Laugh come, he make them all dance to the tune he play. Bleeding hearts, and dry bones of the churchyard, and tears that burn as they fall, all dance together to the music that he make with that smileless mouth of him. Ah, we men and women are like ropes drawn tight with strain that pull us different ways. Then tears come, and like the rain on the ropes, they brace us up, until perhaps the strain become too great, and we break. But King Laugh he come like the sunshine, and he ease off the strain again, and we bear to go on with our labor, what it may be."
Author: Bram Stoker

4. "If we admit instrumental musick in the worship of God, how can we resist the imposition of all the instruments used among the ancient Jews?—yea, dancing as well as playing, and several other Judaic actions? or, how can we decline a whole rabble of church-officers, necessary to be introduced for instrumental musick, whereof our Lord Jesus Christ hath left us no manner of direction?"
Author: Cotton Mather

5. "There is a very important connection between the Church's worldview and the Church's hymns. If your heart and mouth are filled with songs of victory, you will tend to have an eschatology of dominion; if, instead, your songs are fearful, expressing a longing for escape-or if they are weak, childish ditties-your worldview and expectations will be escapist and childish. Historically, the basic hymnbook for the Church has been the Book of Psalms. The largest book of the Bible is the Book of Psalms, and God providentially placed it right in the middle of the Bible, so that we couldn't miss it! Yet how many churches use the Psalms in musical worship? It is noteworthy that the Church's abandonment of dominion eschatology coincided with the Church's abandonment of the Psalms."
Author: David H. Chilton

6. "Therefore, when I look for a church, I look for the music that best fits me and the programs that best cater to me and my family. When I make plans for my life and career, it is about what works best for me and my family. When I consider the house I will live in, the car I will drive, the clothes I will wear, the way I will live, I will choose according to what is best for me. This is the version of Christianity that largely prevails in our culture. But it is not biblical Christianity."
Author: David Platt

7. "Blake had his own idea. He didn't lead her to the dancefloor. Blake took her deeper into the corner behind their table.With the pink rose cradled carefully in their combined hands, Blake and Livia began a slow dance to music only they could hear. Livia danced to the symphony she heard flowing out of the church window the night she found out he could play. She opened her eyes to see Blake's serene face. She wondered if he danced to music he was composing in his head at this very moment—music that had not yet been played."
Author: Debra Anastasia

8. "I was in a church choir early on and that really helped me musically in terms of chops, learning how to sing harmonies."
Author: Emily Saliers

9. "Youth leaders, are you holding aloft our standards, or have you compromised them for the lowest common denominator in order to appease the deceived or vile within the Church? Are the dances and music in your cultural halls virtuous, lovely, praiseworthy, and of good report (Articles of Faith 13), or do they represent a modern Sodom with short skirts, loud beat, strobe lights, and darkness?"
Author: Ezra Taft Benson

10. "As expected, the church lady grumbled something incoherent and put Bridget's call on hold. A peppy rendition of "City of God" blared as hold music just long enough for Bridget to start to sing along with the chorus. Catholic brainwashing at its best."
Author: Gretchen McNeil

11. "I'm in a band. I don't go to church every Sunday. I love punk rock music. Sometimes I use swear words a lot. I respect and admire gay men and women. I'm obsessed with horror films. I know what shame feels like. And guess what old man? Jesus is still my Savior."
Author: Hayley Williams

12. "Classical music only really came into my life in 1969. I wish I had heard classical music and church music when I was a teenager or even as a child."
Author: Ian Anderson

13. "I have always kept one end in view, namely ... to conduct a well-regulated church music to the honour of God."
Author: Johann Sebastian Bach

14. "No, of course not," Belle said, playfully swatting him on the shoulder. "I never, never even once thought I was making a mistake. I was just a bit at odds with myself because my wedding wasn't exactly how I dreamed it was going to be.""I'm sorry," John said softly."No, no, don't be. Just because it wasn't what I thought I wanted doesn't mean it wasn't absolutely perfect. Oh, dear, am I making any sense at all.?"John nodded solemnly."I thought that I needed a church and hundreds of guest and music that actually sounded like music, but I was wrong. What I needed was a drunken priest, irreverent guests, and a companion who learned to play piano from a goat.""Then you got exactly what you needed.""I suppose so. But then again, all I really needed was you."John leaned down to kiss her again, and they remained thus occupied for the next hour."
Author: Julia Quinn

15. "I thought that I needed a church and hundreds of guests and music thatactually sounded like music, but I was wrong.What I needed was a drunken priest, irreverent guests, and a companionwho learned to play piano from a goat.""Then you got exactly what you needed.""I suppose so. But then again, all I really needed was you."
Author: Julia Quinn

16. "This church picnic ain't no picnic./You're my fried chicken./ Holy finger-lickin'..."Savannah yelled at him over the music. "Are you callin' me a piece a fried chicken?""Nah. Not you, Slush Queen. Never." He closed his eyes and pounded out the drums on the dashboard of the Beater. As I got out of the car, I felt sorrier for Link than ever."
Author: Kami Garcia

17. "I have such happy memories of performing in a choir and I don't think I'd have got where I am today without all that experience. So my advice to young singers is to either join your school or church's choir or find one in your local area. Choral music at any level teaches you so much about musicianship and blending your voice."
Author: Katherine Jenkins

18. "I love church buildings, particularly cathedrals, and I like living in spaces that remind me of music or evoke that creative energy."
Author: Laura Mvula

19. "I come from an African Caribbean background. I've been influenced by a reggae church music style, contemporary gospel, and rock all fused together."
Author: Laura Mvula

20. "As you consider selecting songs for your worship services, consider them in light of the truth of the gospel. Imagine the songs as teachers--because they are! If your people could understand your doctrine only through the music you sing, what would they know about God and His pursuit of us? If your people could understand your church's beliefs only through the music, what would they know?"
Author: Matt Chandler

21. "And you know, we'd go to church. We were Baptists. And every now and then there'd be a tent would set up, and it was the Holiness folks. And we liked their music."
Author: Mel Tillis

22. "For two thousand years, the Church has guided the development of music, carefully legislating to fuse artistic talent and aesthetic beauty with the demands of the Faith."
Author: Richard Morris

23. "Regular church-goers are substantially more likely than non-attenders to read, to take newspapers and magazines, to listen to classical music, to attend symphony concerts, operas, and stage plays."
Author: Rodney Stark

24. "There are many critics who think the megachurches thrive on people who enjoy dramatic Sunday services with fine music but don't wish to become very 'religious' on a day-to-day basis - that the megachurch appeal is a mile wide and an inch deep."
Author: Rodney Stark

25. "I began with dance, doing ballet at 3, then tap, jazz, modern. Then I sang in church choirs, learned how to play clarinet and drums, sang with rock bands and only then did I get into musical theatre."
Author: Samantha Barks

26. "With unclosed lids, already had I dreamtOf my sweet birth-place, and the old church-tower,Whose bells, the poor man's only music, rangFrom morn to evening, all the hot Fair-day,So sweetly, that they stirred and haunted meWith a wild pleasure, falling on mine earMost like articulate sounds of things to come!So gazed I, till the soothing things, I dreamt,Lulled me to sleep, and sleep prolonged my dreams!"
Author: Samuel Taylor Coleridge

27. "A Lutheran church in Nebraska is typically a place where any mad passion for Christ is politely concealed. Men and women recite the various creeds in hypnotic monotone; the hymns, pumped from wheezy organ pipes, are sung with no lilt or musicality. The members of the choirs not only don't dance, they don't sway. That's not to say no one is ever smacked hard with God's love or filled up to the eyeballs with the Holy Spirit, but when you are, you keep it to yourself." (48)"
Author: Timothy Schaffert

Church Music Quotes Pictures