Why Make Music Together?

One thing Anabaptists are known for is our four-part a cappella hymn singing. We sing hymns in church, we sing them at hymnsings, and we sing them around the supper table. In most cases, everyone, not just a special choir, is joining in.

It’s incredibly important to us to have everyone joining in, no matter how gifted they might be. That’s why we don’t typically sing accompanied by instruments, since we want the responsibility of making music to rest with the entire group. But why is singing together so important?

It celebrates the beauty that God created

God didn’t just make the world for utilitarian purposes. He filled it lavishly with beautiful things. There’s no reason he would have had to make spring so colorful or stars so plentiful—they serve no utilitarian purpose.

Similarly, God created the world in such a way that beautiful music can exist. But we need to make it. It will never make itself. Creating beauty in response to God’s gifts is one of the best ways that we can thank him.

It brings a community together in praise

We could all praise God quietly in our backyards. However, I don’t have much enthusiasm for that. Coming together and praising God through singing is much more inspiring. My most memorable religious experiences have been when singing with a group of people. Music becomes exponentially more beautiful when done together, and God deserves all that beauty.

When we praise God, our minds are free to leave the mundane worries and stresses that we continually face, and instead we can focus on what is entirely good. We can turn our minds toward God, the paradigm of goodness, and toward music, which is good because it is beautiful.

It brings a community together in fellowship

While singing with people, we act out the unity and harmony that we should be living out in our day-to-day lives. If we try to sound better than everyone else, the music will sound less beautiful overall, because it won’t be unified. Instead, if we support each other and try to blend with each other, the sound will improve. Music makes this fun and gives us a vision for what the rest of our lives can be like.

Here’s what this kind of hymnsinging can look like:

And after the event, we feel more connected with each other and can have meaningful personal interactions with each other. My church always ends with a snack and fellowship after a hymnsing.

It’s not focused on ourselves

I think pretty much everyone has to admit that our culture today is very self-centered. Advertisements are aimed at personal gratification. We are told that we should live out our own dreams without worrying what anyone else might think. Legally, we can now make more and more choices that are aimed at our own pleasure. While taking care of ourselves is not wrong, if we focus on ourselves first, we will likely set ourselves up to experience loneliness and depression. Making music together requires us to put the focus on the sound of the music as a whole rather than our own personal glory. I think that’s healthy for us.