Fall 2009 | Volume 68, No. 1

There is Hope for Church Music

by Benjamin Hawkins

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As Stephen Johnson, dean of the School of Church Music, began his career at Southwestern, he was determined to serve Southern Baptist churches. For several months, he visited various congregations to learn about the churches he had been hired to serve.

Johnson discovered diversity: churches filled with young and old alike, with cowboys, businessmen, bikers, and homemakers. Each congregation worshiped according to its preference, one with high-church music, another with Southern Gospel music, and still another with contemporary music.

“I began thinking,” Johnson says. “There are about 45,000 Southern Baptist churches, each autonomous, local churches. I am supposed to serve these people.” How, he asked himself, can Southwestern Seminary prepare music leaders who are able to lead a denomination with such musical diversity?

“There are a number of people out there in church music who are bitter,” Johnson says. “They had an ideal, a musical standard for the church. And now that things are so diversified in the local church, they see that people didn’t follow their advice. ... So they don’t have any hope.

“I see just the opposite. With this diversity, there is so much hope for music in the local church.”

The temptation, he says, is to invest in a single style of music. No one can predict the musical trends of the future, “but you can say, ‘This is well crafted;  this is not. This has quality; this doesn’t. This is true theology; this is not.’”

Johnson desires to develop a program that gives students the ability to handle any musical style and the theological training to enhance worship and discipleship in the church. To make this possible, he and the other faculty members from the School of Church Music reviewed the curricula in the three major master’s-level degrees that existed when Johnson came to the seminary: the Master of Music in Church Music, the Master of Arts in Worship, and the Master of Arts in Church Music. They also reviewed the doctoral programs. As the faculty evaluated the school’s programs, they realized their students needed more biblical training.

“We want to make sure that people are thinking theologically as they are leading musically,” Johnson says.

The faculty of the music school adjusted the Master of Music degree to require 24 hours of music classes, which is a competitive musical foundation, even when compared to secular music schools in the nation. They then added 25 hours of biblical, theological, and ministerial classes. Prior to this development, the program required only eight hours of theology. Other degrees within the music school also reflected an increased requirement for theological training.

Ministers of music, Johnson says, need to know that they “are gatekeepers of truth in the church.” The new re-quirements in the master’s programs will help music students develop worship services that enable people to understand and interact with God’s Word better. “When great music is combined with the proclamation of the Word of God,” Johnsons says, “it touches the soul of the listener in a way that speaking or music alone cannot.”

“Recently, we have had a music faculty professor, Lyndel Vaught, pass away,” Johnson says. “And when you see someone on his deathbed, he wants to hear Scripture, and he wants to sing. He wants to hear those songs that combine good theology with quality musical aspects that give him a chance for a heartfelt response to what God is doing in his life. The songs people want to sing when they pass away are really important, moving songs.”

Although Johnson was reminded of the power of Christ-centered music when he saw its impact on those who approach life’s end, his own love for music began early in life. He professed faith in Christ as an 8-year-old boy at his father’s church in Johnstown, Ohio. As a pastor’s son in a small church, he spent many evenings in the church’s sanctuary, playing music as his dad counseled church members. He was without the modern distractions of Internet, texting, and video games, he says. “I just had a piano, a synthesizer, and time.”

Johnson surrendered to the ministry as a teenager, and after high school he earned his Bachelor of Music in Composition at Moody Bible Institute. After graduating, he and his wife, Michelle, pursued master’s degrees: Johnson at DePaul University and his wife at Northwestern University. They then earned doctoral degrees at the University of Southern California, where Johnson studied music composition and where his wife studied piano. Afterward, they taught at The Master’s College in Santa Clarita, Calif.

In 2005, President Paige Patterson surprised Johnson with an invitation to lead Southwestern Seminary’s School of Church Music into a new century. When he arrived at the seminary, he found a music school with wide renown. He had previously worked with the compositions of Southwestern faculty members like Benjamin Harlan.

When Johnson considered the music school’s purpose, he looked to the vision established by the leaders and faculty members who founded the music school in 1915: “spiritual and evangelistic fervor, scholarly and efficient musicianship, and practicality in application.”

“That,” Johnson says, “is really a beautiful balance of what you need as a Christian musician ministering in the life of a church.” With this well-rounded emphasis, he added, hope remains “for the School of Church Music at Southwestern to make a difference in the life of the local church.”

 
As You Go 

As you go, preach, As you go serve.
Holding forth the riches of His word. ?
Facing uncertain cost, Seeking the lost.
Christ crucified and risen again,
Declare the King, Who reigns within.
Reaching, teaching, preaching as you go.

As you go, preach, As you go, love. 
Standing on each promise from above.
A living sacrifice, Willing to pay the price.
Our Savior lives, He reigns on high,
Proclaim the news, His kingdom nigh.
Reaching, teaching, preaching as you go.
 
As you go, preach, As you go, share.
From the book with truth beyond compare.
Lifting high the cross,
Counting other things as loss. 
Seated at the Father's hand. 
Soon upon the earth He'll stand. 
Jesus Christ, our one desire,
Fill us with Your Spirit's fire. 
We're reaching, teaching,
preaching as we go!

©2008, Garry Joe Hardin, II
All Rights Reserved

"As You Go" was written by music professor Garry Joe Hardin II. The song captures the heart of Southwestern's mission, and its title reflects the inscription on the cornerstone of Fort Worth Hall, the seminary's first building. The anthem was performed regularly during Southwestern's centennial cele-bration and continues to be sung in chapel services.

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