Raising Worshippers, Part 2 of a Series on Education

In my first blog I argued for movement toward a liturgical education, an education based on worship, because God desires worshippers. I'd like to submit a few ideas on why and how we can incorporate worshipping opportunities in an education. I'd like to thank James Jordan for an essay he wrote that inspired some of these thoughts.

First, our bodies are musical instruments. When I talk I make percussive sounds using my lips and tongue, my vocal folds are strings in my throat, and no sound will come out if I don't exhale wind. A musical education ought to train these parts of our bodies for worship to God.

Second, music education is trinitarian. The third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, is the Music of God. What does the Holy Spirit do? He glorifies the Son, the Word (logos) of God. Therefore, music is the glorification of language. I can speak to you in my normal voice or I can sing/chant to you. The latter is going to help you remember what I said; I'm glorifying my speech. 

Ok, so how can we create worshippers? It's not hard if we make time for worship every day. Wouldn't it be wonderful if we start our day with at least a 30 minute worship service where we sing Psalms and psalm like hymns, read Proverbs, and pray? If we follow this consistently a child can have all 150 Psalms memorized by the time he's a teenager, and probably the book of Proverbs, too.

But, we don't stop there because the Bible tells us to praise him with instruments (Psalm 150). A good music teacher can teach young kids a variety of instruments. Let's enroll our kids in violin and piano lessons and guitar and drum lessons. We do this so they can be better worshippers, not because it will help them achieve better math scores - though it will.

Every teenager should be in choir all four years of high school, just as they should study the great Christian writers like Shakespeare, Milton, Dante, and Jane Austen all four years. They should be in a good choir, a choir that will introduce them to the works of the great Christian composers. Our teenagers should be saturated with the counterpoint of Bach and the beauty of Handel and understand the old plainsong melodies of the Medieval period.

This is our foundation on which to build. This can be done right along your current curriculum.