Bring Back the Seven Eleven

“Seven Eleven’s”

Not the corner superette, but seven words repeated eleven times.

Years ago, this is what we used to call the practice of contemporary Christian music to repeat the same line of a song over and over and over and over…

What was the point? Could they not think of additional lyrics?

Fast forward 10 years,  and now a similar-seeming practice is often called (in musical lingo) a ‘bridge’.

The same inquiry (do I sense suspicion?) is raised.

What’s the point? Is there value to repeating a phrase again and again and again…?

To some it may seem laborious, needless…even irritating.

May I offer a simple answer from my own life and experience?

I have found value in the thoughtful practice of this contemplative repetition of words.

Indeed, it offers three opportunities:

1)  Deliberate Consideration

As a content-rich verse of a song concludes with a chorus of praise, the  bridge of a repeated phrase provides opportunity to reflect and think on what was just sung.  

“Let your glory fill the earth….You will reign forever”  is a current example from our church’s worship.

The ease of singing the repeated phrase offers my mind and heart the time to think on God…his glory, his current sovereignty over all, and his eventual victorious reign forever.  I am musically meditating; that is, turning a truth over and over, and offering its truth back in my voice's song as I mull its grandeur in my heart.

The contrast is analagous to the difference between rushing by a waterfall with a quick glance versus stopping the car, getting out to admire in awe, and then returning to your journey with clear, substantive memory.

You can’t stop and admire every masterpiece of nature, but you do take time to stop for some.

Musically, this is what a bridge can do to assist a worshipper. 

      2)  Determined Affirmation

Music communicates a message.  Some songs articulate truth, others affirm and spotlight tenets of orthodoxy’s moorings, classic  hymns assert qualities of God or His children in timeless ways, and some music expresses the overflowing worship and wonder of a soul’s admiration of its Creator and Savior.

Many songs combine these qualities.

Praise songs, the typical genre which includes a musical bridge, fall largely in the latter category, though often sprinkled generously with qualities of the others.

In these songs by singing a simple phrase in repeated fashion, the gathered worshippers join mind and heart to affirm in unified voice a truth about God or a response to the God of that truth.

It is a powerful confirmation that mass voices offer together.

The bridge exists as an melodic testimony of personal belief, response, and conviction.

3) Delight-laden Communion

Music is an expression of the heart and gives a channel to express the joy of communion with our Savior and God, the great Lover of our Soul.  

A musical bridge, in this context, is like both the unconscious ooh’s and ahh’s that result from  taking a jewel of infinite beauty and turning its facets to discover its intricate nuances AND  then running to describe the experience to another.

The sheer joy of it all makes these responses inevitable and unpreventable…the overflow of the heart demands expression!

A love-filled heart for one’s Savior delights in expressing the wonders of His beauty.

A  bridge facilitates this in one small, moment-suspended-in-time, sacred opportunity.

Efficiency may suggest skipping a bridge.
Logic may propose it as needless repetition.
Tradition and custom may suspect or even perjure its existence.

But this worshiper offers 3 reasons which offer credibility, value, and purpose.

I propose this bridge enhances worship.

My advice? 

Don't skip over the bridge.