The following is from a book review I wrote for
The Life of God in the Soul of the Church by Thabiti Anyabwile. Hope it's helpful. His chapter, called "Sing To One Another" is great, and talks about how the popular idea of a "personal worship experience" in a church gathering is a very wrong idea about how and why we gather.
"As a corporate worship leader in my church body, I devour chapters on
church music in the books I read. Some end up being better than others,
but Anyabwile’s treatment of the subject is great, and he puts church
singing in just the right place in the life of the church. He rightly
emphasizes the benefit to one another that we provide as we sing
together, saying, “Too many Christians think the public gathering of the
church is basically a couple of hundred people having their personal
quiet time in the same place [...] Privatized religion destroys
spiritual communion. Privatized views of the faith tear apart the body
[..] When we gather with a hymn or song we do so for the benefit of the
church, the entire body of Christ, the whole group of people” (169-170).
What we do, even as we sing, has to be with a view to build up one
another, and thus the whole group."
Again, hope that's helpful. "Preparing For Sunday" post coming soon!
Josh
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