Furthermore, there are lines of church activity which need the religious atmosphere and suggestiveness but are concerned with social and administrative work, with the temporalities of church life, for which many of these Gospel hymns are eminently fitted. There are campaigns, drives, and movements that need musical help such as many of the less subjectively pious Gospel hymns can give.
Gospel Hymns in the Preparatory Service.
There are large and miscellaneous church gatherings where there is no preparation of mind to sing worthily and deeply religious hymns, and where it would be a sacrilege to ask the miscellaneous crowd to take upon their lips such a hymn as “O Love that wilt not let me go” or “Oh, worship the King, all-glorious above.” Better to sing the semi-religious and shallow “Brighten the corner where you are” until the crowd has been psychically organized.
Gospel Hymns in the Laboratory.
When we come to organized campaigns to persuade unconverted persons, old and young, to accept Jesus Christ as Saviour and Lord, the need of these informal, stimulating, emotional folk songs becomes immediately apparent. Awe, impressiveness, spiritual elevation of mind, such as are supposed to be produced by the standard hymns, are not the stimuli that create aggressiveness of mind among Christian workers, nor are they calculated to awaken a response among the unspiritual. It is proved as surely by actual laboratory experiment that Gospel songs produce the conditions needed for securing a religious revival as that hydrochloric acid and water poured over zinc clippings will produce hydrogen.
Lord Shaftesbury, the great English philanthropist and Christian worker, speaking in Ireland in the interest of evangelistic work there, said: “Therefore go on circulating the Scriptures. I should have been glad to have had also the circulation of some well-known hymns, because I have seen the effect produced by those of Moody and Sankey. If they would only return to this country, they would be astonished at seeing the influence exerted by those hymns which they sing.”
It is worthy of incidental note that the most of those to whom the Gospel hymn is anathema are not much in sympathy with any evangelistic methods; nay more, they seem to shrink from popular manifestations of religious life. They have sharpened the edge of their religious refinement until it will no longer cut.
The Advantages of Gospel Hymns.
These Gospel hymns have several distinct advantages that should not be overlooked. They are simple, easily understood by everybody, quickly appropriated as his own expression by the most limited in education or culture. They are quite emotional, expressing feeling and creating it. They are spontaneous and free, with no labored subtlety or recondite allusion. They are usually more or less rhythmical and stimulating, physically as well as mentally. They are adaptable to various situations and states of feeling. Even more than standard hymns they express personal religious experiences, and are more direct in their hortative method. The chorus, if intelligently written, emphasizes the fundamental idea of the hymn in an unescapable way. As a tool for aggressive effort it has no substitute, and but one rival—earnest and spirit-filled preaching.