In Christ Alone?
T. David Gordon
I was chatting with a clergyman friend/colleague some time ago, and we were
talking about how bad so much of the contemporary music is, and he observed, “But
some of them aren’t too bad,” and mentioned “In Christ Alone” as an example of a
contemporary hymn that isn’t “too bad.” I concurred then and now with his judgment;
the song is not “too bad.”1
I wondered then and now, however, if the proper criterion for selecting a hymn
for Christian worship was “it’s not too bad—there are worse ones out there.” If I were
shopping for jewelry for an anniversary present for my wife, I doubt I’d ask the jeweler
to show me the three worst pieces of jewlery in the store, and then ask him to wrap up the
third-from-worst, on the ground that two other pieces were even worse. Nor would I ask
a chef what the three worst entrees were, and ask him to bring me the third-from-worst.
Indeed, I have difficulty imagining any scenario in which our selection would be
determined by the mere criterion: “it’s not too bad; there are worse.”
Why do we “settle” for “not too bad” in liturgy? Isn’t that somewhat counterintuitive? Would not our worship be the one thing we do each week that we endeavor to
do our best (not merely our “not worst”)? Would we be satisfied with sermons that were
“not too bad—I’ve heard worse,” or be content with rambling, disorganized prayers
whose only virtue was that they weren’t “too bad”?
I think we evaluate worship music differently than we do the other elements of
worship; and we do so not for liturgical/theological reasons, but because our sensibilities
1
At the time of our conversation, neither of us was aware that the song had become
controversial in the PCUSA, whose hymnal revision committee had rejected it because of
the language of “wrath of God was satisfied.” I actually think the hymn is entirely right
and orthodox to affirm this important reality. The reservations I express in this essay are
not at all the same as the reservations the PCUSA committee expressed, and I
respectfully (yet entirely) disagree with the committee for rejecting the hymn on the
ground that the hymn affirmed that the crucifixion satisfied God’s wrath.
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regarding music have been shaped by our culture’s ubiquitous pop music (about which
I’ve written more elsewhere). Among the traits of our culture’s ubiquitous pop music is
that it is more expressive than ascriptive. Its lyrics are self-referential,
describing/expressing how I feel, but not ascribing very much to any one or any thing
else outside the self. “Holy, Holy, Holy,” by contrast, repeats (for emphasis) the majestic
holiness of God by simply repeating it thrice; it ascribes holiness to God. It says
something about a reality outside of me. Now, of course, when I sing it, I acknowledge
this reality that I affirm/ascribe, and perhaps have feelings about such a reality. But the
language itself is ascriptive; it talks meaningfully, truthfully and helpfully about
something outside of me. Bernard of Clairvaux’s “O Sacred Head, Now Wounded” talks
about Christ’s passion; it does not talk about me, until it raises the question: “What
language shall I borrow to thank thee, dearest Friend,” or when it affirms “Mine, mine
was the transgression, but thine the deadly pain.” But even here, the first person single is
“everyman” (or, at least, every believer); the language denotes the proper response
anyone who believes the gospel has to the passion of Christ.
If we accept out culture’s reduction of language to expression, if we accept the
notion that language serves the pupose of talking about me and my feelings, then our
hymnody will naturally reflect that, and most contemporary hymnody does. It has
ambiguously juxtaposed phrases and clauses that, by their very juxtaposition, confuse the
internal and the external, that make it hard to distinguish the expressive from the
ascriptive. “In Christ Alone” does precisely this. On the surface, it appears to be an
ascriptive hymn, affirming something about “Christ Alone.” But closer examination
indicates that it is much more about myself, “In Christ Alone.” It is about the one who is
“in Christ;” more than it is about “Christ” (whether alone or otherwise). If it is sung this
way, as an expressive hymn, I suppose it is fine, but if one attempts to evaluate it as one
would most historic hymns (as ascribing something about God or Christ), it is
disappointing (“not too bad”).
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Effectively, what has happened is that corporate worship has disappeared; all
worship is what we once called “private worship,” a thing once distinguished from
“corporate worship.” What we now call corporate worship, dictated by the musical
sensibilities of our culture, is effectively a gang private devotion. The language and
sentiments that might be perfectly appropriate in our own private prayers and devotion
are employed in public worship. Corporate worship no longer is designed to ascribe to
God those traits and acts that are worthy of our devotion, but to express our feelings of
devotion about God. So if we look at “In Christ Alone,” we discover that it is “not too
bad,” in the sense that it articulates no particular heresy, and describes no particularly
impious feelings. On the other hand, it is confusing at best and narcissistic/privatized at
worst.
In Christ alone my hope is found
He is my light, my strength, my song
This Cornerstone, this solid ground
Firm through the fiercest drought and storm
What heights of love, what depths of peace
When fears are stilled, when strivings cease
My Comforter, my All in All
Here in the love of Christ I stand
In Christ alone, who took on flesh
Fullness of God in helpless Babe
This gift of love and righteousness
Scorned by the ones He came to save
‘Til on that cross as Jesus died
The wrath of God was satisfied
For every sin on Him was laid
Here in the death of Christ I live, I live
There in the ground His body lay
Light of the world by darkness slain
Then bursting forth in glorious Day
Up from the grave He rose again
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And as He stands in victory
Sin’s curse has lost its grip on me
For I am His and He is mine
Bought with the precious blood of Christ
No guilt in life, no fear in death
This is the power of Christ in me
From a life’s first cry to final breath
Jesus commands my destiny
No power of hell, no scheme of man
Could ever pluck me from His hand
‘Til He returns or calls me home
Here in the power of Christ I stand
So what do we say about such a hymn? Well, it’s “not too bad” if we accept from
the outset that music—even music employed in God’s worship—is not ascriptive but
expressive. If we accept the premise2 that language does not refer, objectively, to reality
outside of us but only to reality inside of us, then it really is not “too bad.” There are
indeed other contemporary hymns that also are expressive-not-ascriptive that are even
worse. On the other hand, for those of us whose musical sensibilities were shaped
differently, we can stand at a certain distance from such music and both lament its
narcissistic tendencies and question their propriety for corporate worship. We still want
musical language that appears in public to say something about what is publicly true and
publicly important; I can stay home from church and write poetry if all I wish is to think
about me and my feelings.
Note, then, that this hymn is “not too bad.” I don’t think its writers failed to do
what they intended to do; they intended to write an expressive-not-ascriptive lyric, and
they achieved what they intended to do. If we accept that intention, there is little to fault
in it. The authors were not entirely unskilled, and they carefully crafted lyrics that
A premise promoted by most deconstructionists and lamented as “dissolution” by
people such as James Davison Hunter, in his To Change The World: The Irony, Tragedy,
& Possibility of Christianity in the Late Modern World (London: Oxford, 2010).
2
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largely achieved what they intended to achieve (though, as my comments indicate, there
were a few ambiguities where one cannot discern what their intent was).3 Employed in
private worship, I suspect the hymn might easily encourage true devotion to Christ.
Employed in public worship, however, it is out-of-place; for public worship to unite us in
praise and thanks, our own private feelings can never do so, because they vary so much
from individual to individual and from day to day. Hymns for public worship should
celebrate what is common to that public: God’s attributes and works that are publicly
significant regardless of how we feel. By this criterion, the hymn is “not too good,”
rather than “not too bad.”
What unites the hymn, of course, is that it says good things about Christ outside
of me and good things about Christ inside of me; commendable things in themselves.
But it says too many things to develop any of them well; measured by the unity that
characterizes the Psalms, it does not succeed well, despite the fact that it is often regarded
as “the best” (or one of the best) of the contemporary hymns. It rightly appeals to the
grateful soul’s desire to thank Christ for both his objective and subjective work (and
perhaps this accounts for how well-loved it is), but it surely does not serve to organize
that thanks very well. Why not have the objective verses before the subjective verses (as
the historical ground for our present experience), or vice versa? Why should the three
objective verses not appear first as the redemptive-historical basis of our experience?
Many older hymns had such historical arrangement, where one verse might deal with the
Old Testament expectation of Christ, and the next might deal with some aspect of his
work, then another might trace his providential care for the church through the ages, the
3
In this brief essay, I am merely evaluating the lyrics; musical analysis would need to
stand on its own basis, and I regard the one-octave interval (first two syllables of lines 6,
14, 22, 30) that appears in each stanza to be un-singable for most congregations. The
song probably was not written to be sung by a congregation, but for Christian
entertainment/performance, and any trained singer can easily handle a one-octave interval.
The average congregation has some difficulty with it, however.
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next with the present militant church, and the next with the church triumphant in the life
to come (the Psalms often did a similar thing, where past, present, and future were all
there, but in their temporal order). When I attempt to find such order in most CWM, I
just cannot find it; it eludes me.
Teaching the Psalms has ruined me; hymns that were fine before are not fine now.
Hymns that I accepted without complaint before I cringe at now; if the canonical Psalms-with their carefully-wrought words, phrases, and stanzas—are the standard, then
many/most of CWM is merely, as my friend said, “not too bad.”
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