How Worship Became Music

From history to practice: making sense of Contemporary Praise and Worship.

How Worship Became Music traces the development of worship music and the evolving role of worship leaders within Contemporary Praise and Worship (CPW). Focusing particularly on the past century in the United States, this volume gathers a carefully curated collection of quotations and historical materials that highlight many of the most influential voices shaping the adoption and growth of CPW across Protestant traditions.

Designed as both a textbook and a resource for practice, the sourcebook is well-suited for undergraduate and graduate students in worship studies programs, as well as pastors, church musicians, and worship leaders. By situating key documents within their theological and ecclesial contexts, it provides readers with a clear understanding of how CPW has emerged, developed, and reshaped the church’s worship life.

Organized around the central themes that define CPW, the book illustrates the theological convictions, practical patterns, and leadership models that have guided this movement. Each section not only presents historical sources but also offers interpretive commentary, helping readers see how these voices connect within broader networks and movements. In doing so, the volume reveals both the diversity and the common emphases that have given CPW its distinctive character.

This resource invites students, leaders, and practitioners to engage critically with the history of Contemporary Praise and Worship in order to better understand its impact on today’s church and to discern its role in the future of Christian worship.

Jonathan Ottaway is an assistant professor of Christian Theology at Regent University in Virginia Beach, Virginia. His work has appeared in venues such as Worship, Studia Liturgica, Liturgy, and Proceedings of the North American Academy of Liturgy and focuses on the historical development of worship theologies in Pentecostal and evangelical Christianity. Adam A. Perez is an assistant professor of worship studies at Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. His work focuses on the history and theology of contemporary worship music. He is co-senior editor of The Journal of Praise & Worship, collaborates on the Worship Leader Research project, and hosts The Worship Nerds podcast. Lester Ruth is a historian of Christian worship with a particular interest in the early church and the last 250 years, especially the history of contemporary praise and worship. He is passionate about enriching the worship life of current congregations, regardless of style. He believes that careful reflection on the worship of other Christians--whether past or present, whether Protestant, Roman Catholic, or Eastern Orthodox--can serve to enrich the church today. Dr. Ruth is a member of the North American Academy of Liturgy and the Society for Pentecostal Studies. He is also the former president of the Charles Wesley Society. Able to range across the entire breadth of Christian liturgical history, his most recent studies have been on the band-based worship known as contemporary praise and worship. Along this line, he has recently co-authored, with Dr. Lim Swee Hong, A History of Contemporary Praise & Worship and Lovin’ On Jesus: A Concise History of Contemporary Worship. He has also edited both popular, Flow: The Ancient Way to Do Contemporary Worship, and academic studies, Essays on the History of Contemporary Praise and Worship, on this worship phenomenon, each of these volumes featuring essays by Duke doctoral students. Dr. Ruth’s works exist in Korean, Chinese, Indonesian, and (soon) Ukrainian translations.