Souls are not to be won by music

Carl Spudgeon, preaching in 2023, said:

Dear friends, we know that souls are not to be won by music. If the world were indeed to be conquered by songs, to be converted by religious ditties, regenerated by guitars, and saved by pretty girls behind microphones, then it would be time for us to cease our ministry and give place to songwriters, soloists, instrumentalists, and backing singers. Then might we set up a vast array of drums, lift up the neon cross, wave the cellphone, and cry, “These are your gods, O Israel.” But, while the Word of God remains unchanged, we shall rely upon the blood of the Lamb, and resolve to know nothing among men save Jesus Christ and him crucified. Our hope of success lies, under God, in the preaching of the gospel.

Of course, if someone called Carl Spudgeon had said that in 2023, you can imagine the kind of ire he would have called down upon himself from some quarters. It was actually Charles Spurgeon who said something very similar in a sermon called, “The Triumph of Christianity,” preached in 1872. If anything, the idolisation of music in modern evangelicalism has transcended anything that Spurgeon had to contend with in the Anglo-Catholicism of his day. What he actually said was this:

Dear friends, we know that souls are not to be won by music. If the world were indeed to be conquered by chants, to be converted by sanctuses, regenerated by organs, and saved by little boys in surplices, then it would be time for us to cease our ministry and give place to choir boys, opera singers, organists, and organ blowers. Then might we set up a vast array of gilded pipes, lift up the crucifix, wave the censer, and cry, “These be thy gods, O Israel.” But, while the Word of God remains unchanged, we shall rely upon the blood of the Lamb, and resolve to know nothing among men save Jesus Christ and him crucified. Our hope of success lies, under God, in the preaching of the gospel.

And yet how close to the bone it still cuts, and how true it still is.