Rethinking "Every Tribe and Tongue" - Glenn Packiam
As the famous American worship leaders returned to the table with platefuls of aromatic curries and rice boiled in coconut milk, their faces wrinkled with curious interest in something other than their discoveries at the buffet line. It was the faint lines of music drifting through the humid air. The sultry notes being squeaked out on a stringed instrument defied conventional pitch. And the light tapping on small bongo-like drums had no sense of "groove" or, for that matter, time signature.
"Why don't Malaysians write worship songs like this-in their own style?" blurted one of the Americans.
Because it's awful, is what I thought. What I said was simply, "I don't know." Which only encouraged the famous American worship leaders to launch into an exhortation to break our dependence on "Western worship songs" and to write in our own "indigenous" language and style.
I was about 15 at the time, and it was as puzzling to me then as it is now. Here they were speaking to us in English (they had just done a whole worship seminar and concert in English!), ministering in a country that owed its schools to Catholic missionaries and its Parliamentary system of government to the British, and they were telling us that we should worship with aboriginal instruments and ignore the 12-tone scale? Was this some version of colonial guilt? Had they really come all this way and taught us how to be better drummers and keyboardists and electric guitar players only to undo it all by suggesting we get in touch with our cultural roots instead?
The tension of these worship leaders may have been wrestling with is one that any missionary or person interested in "taking worship to the nations" is familiar with. It follows the contours of the central debate in globalization: is it right to export one culture's art, values, leisure activities, tastes, etc to another? Where is the line between building a global village-in which we all eat Big Mac's and drink over-priced Starbucks lattes and root for the Lakers-and cultural imperialism, where we have destroyed every trace of indigenous culture?
The answer is layered. As you navigate the ever-changing landscape of our connected world, it might be helpful to remember a few things:
A "People Group" May Not Be the Group You ThinkThomas Friedman describes how the Internet has flattened the world, making the way people group themselves no longer along strictly cultural or nationalistic lines. We have our own tribes, people who share our values and tastes, that may have nothing to do with common geography. A worship leader in Mumbai may identify more closely with John Mayer than Ravi Shankar.
More than that, it would be wrong to view globalization as means of purely Western cultural export. Globalization is a two-way street, as evidenced by Chinese food in rural Iowa and European soccer league games on ESPN. In the same way, what you would typically call "modern worship music," a trademark in Westernized countries, is an amalgam of world sounds from African drums to Scottish pipes.
Speak the Language of the PeopleTo lead people in worship, we must be willing to discover their language and to learn it. We must never assume that we know which musical language they'll choose. (Do all African-Americans like Gospel? Or all Latinos love Salsa? Or all Southerners like Country?) Worse yet, we can't assume we know what musical language they
should choose. As journalist Franklin Foer points out in his fascinating book "How Soccer Explains the World," there is a "tendency toward glorifying all things indigenous, even when they deserve to be left in the past." It is just as imposing to suggest that a culture
should retain its indigenous art as it is to suggest that it adopt ours.
The fact is, certain musical styles have been carried across the world by the same trade winds that flung McDonald's and Starbucks and Democracy and the English language across continents and cultures.
The Global StewThe irony of my opening story is about 15 years later, I returned to Malaysia, as a heralded "American Worship Leader." (That role was overstated by their filial love.) But there was no doubt which musical language the Malaysian Church had chosen. Playing with their "rock band" configuration, we spent the weekend singing "modern worship" songs from the UK, Australia, the U.S., and few written by a Malaysian kid who lives in Colorado. Which means that even what we fear is an American export-modern worship music-is really becoming a global stew. Maybe globalization itself isn't always the cultural steamroller that ruins indigenous art; maybe sometimes it's a swelling river, absorbing as tributaries the diverse elements of each particular culture. Maybe the cacophony of musical languages is becoming a chorus of praise from every new tribe and every musical tongue.
Along with being a columnist for Song DISCovery, Glenn loves teaching, writing, and leading worship, most of which happens at New Life Church in Colorado Springs. His new book, Secondhand Jesus: Trading Rumors of God for a Firsthand Faith is available everywhere, but you can find out more here: glennpackiam.com.
