One can also easily guess, by the kind of songs they favour, the age groups on each side. Those who yawned at the ‘oldies’ find the tunes boring and repetitive, the words incomprehensible. Obviously, today’s lower standard of English has not helped our youths appreciate the deep meaning of the songs of yore.

On the other hand, there are those who covertly disdain, what they call, today’s "shallow, meaningless worship songs dressed in melodic tunes produced by a dizzy array of musical instruments." What’s worse is that our modern songs contain serious doctrinal errors, huffs our indignant brethren.

Sandwiched between the two groups are the moderates – normally middle-aged Christians – who grew up on a more balanced diet of hymns, gospels and modern songs.

Most churches these days try hard to accommodate the likes of both groups in their worship service by inserting one or two ancient songs in the line-up, but this sometimes causes a ‘hiccup’ to the flow.

To ease the flow, the worship leader may like to consider this suggestion from Dr Gordon England: Set a theme and choose songs from both the old and new eras that carry the theme. For example, the worship leader may start the worship with contemporary songs about the cross and move to hymns or yesteryear songs on the same subject.

England holds a Master’s degree in Music from the University of Denver, US, and degrees in Sacred Music from Moody Bible Institute and Ethnomusicology from UCLA. He was sharing at the workshop Traditional vs Contemporary Music at the recent Men’s Conference with the Promise Keepers organised by NECF Malaysia.

England urged both sides of the divide to appreciate each other’s preferences. He said our youths need to recognise the rich heritage of the ‘oldies’ while the more elderly need to understand how music affects youths and be more appreciative of their struggles.

To order the taped message, contact 03-7806 2640 (tel.) or tkee@pl.jaring.my.