There has been a controversy for some time now between the old church hymns/songs, and the new what they call worship or praise songs. Our Assembly of God church we attended for years, and actually I was dedicated there when I was months old. They stays with the hymns/songs longer than most other churches/groups. We had a pastor that liked the hymns. We sang a quite a number of choruses, mostly by memory without written music, although I think there is written music available for most of them. When we would visit other churches we most of the time didn't know their worship/praise songs as we didn't sing them in our church. This happened mostly until the mid 1990s when we started attending a very good Free Methodist Church which believed mostly like we did, although not 100% as I learned when I became interested in membership, which didn't happen after I learned they didn't believe the Bible exactly as we did, and also we move away for 10 years. They had 2 services; one they called the traditional with the older hymns/songs, and another called the contemporary with the new worship/praise songs. We attended the first service almost without exception because we identified with the hymns/songs. Then after we moved with started worshipping with some people who sang those worship/praise songs, so we sang along and learned many of them.
Now we are back to attending that Free Methodist Church, which is a good church. Now they have 2 identical services, so we attend the later one as it is easier to get out of bed and get to town in time for the second service. They sing a lot of the worship/praise songs and we are singing along, although we prefer the hymns/songs. It is a real controversy where our kids attend church near Spokane where our grandson is the worship leader with his guitar, the piano, which makes me happy, drums, and second guitar. The older people are complaining, and our grandson is in the middle of the controversy. Our daughter told him she wanted him to push the worship/praise songs as it is a University city, and those songs draw the younger people whereas they are not fond of the hymns/songs. She wants to attract the younger people because she says that the older peope who like the hymns/son are dying and if they don't keep the younger people their church will die also, and she has a point. I still love "What If It Were Today',"Nearer, Still Nearer," "Jesus Is Coming Again,""I Won't Have to Cross Jordan Alone,""Safe in the Arms of Jesus." "My Savior First of All, "Where the Roses Never Fade,"'He Is Coming Again,""He the Pearly Gates Will Open," "He'll Understand and Say, "Well Done, and so on.
