Scott Aniol
Ministry, Worship, Culture, Aesthetics
Popular
Holy Spirit: God of Order considers how Christians should expect the Holy Spirit to work today. Scott Aniol contends that charismatic views of the Spirit have influenced much of evangelicalism in ways that often go unnoticed, largely because of a lack of clear teaching on who the Spirit is and what his normal work is according to Scripture.
Rather than a general treatment of pneumatology, the book focuses on the Holy Spirit’s work in history. Aniol moves through each major category of the Spirit’s activity in Scripture and assesses its role. He concludes that believers should expect the Spirit to work normally today in ways that bring order and completion to God’s plan and people.
In this talk on vocation and calling, Scott Aniol challenges the idea that one can truly serve Christ only through full-time church ministry. Working from Colossians 3 and 1 Corinthians 7:17, he argues that Christians may serve the Lord in every calling, and he applies this to church musicians and artists, encouraging them to do their work heartily as unto the Lord, whether inside or outside the church. The video was published by Artistic Theologian in 2020.
In this conference session on planning a gospel-shaped worship service, Scott Aniol, then at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, speaks to music ministers and worship leaders about how to order corporate worship. Drawing on 1 Corinthians 14 and Old Testament patterns of drawing near to God, he argues that services should be orderly and edifying, and that a service shaped to represent the gospel forms worshipers to live out the gospel. The video was published by Artistic Theologian in 2020.
This audio recording presents Scott Aniol’s address on the regulative principle and hymnody, given on October 20, 2018, at the Reformation Worship Conference hosted by Midway Presbyterian Church in Powder Springs, Georgia.
This audio recording presents Scott Aniol’s address on the last half century of worship music, given on October 19, 2018, at the Reformation Worship Conference hosted by Midway Presbyterian Church in Powder Springs, Georgia.
In this lecture, Scott Aniol compares the errors in medieval worship that the Protestant Reformers rejected, such as sacramentalism, with similar ideas he sees returning in some contemporary and charismatic worship, including the view of music as a means of experiencing God’s manifest presence. He proposes a common solution in the regulative principle of worship and the teaching of Hebrews that believers draw near to God by faith. The video was published by Artistic Theologian in 2018.
An audio recording of Scott Aniol’s session “Citizens and Exiles: Christians, the Church, and Culture,” given at the 2018 Knowing, Loving, and Ministering conference on the substance of conservative Christianity, hosted by Religious Affections Ministries.
This conference address asks whether differences over philosophy of culture and worship should affect cooperation among Christians. Aniol defines a conservative philosophy of culture by two pillars, belief in transcendent absolute principles and the importance of aesthetic form, then distinguishes the gospel as the boundary of Christian unity from secondary matters. He argues that philosophy of culture and worship ranks high among secondary issues and must shape the extent of cooperation. Delivered at the Conference on the Church for God’s Glory in Rockford, Illinois.
In this conference address on the regulative principle of worship, Aniol develops the thesis of his book By the Waters of Babylon that the aesthetic forms God inspired in Scripture should inform and regulate the cultural forms churches use in worship. Responding to reviewers who asked for clarification, he grounds the argument in verbal plenary inspiration, contending that biblical truth includes the affections and imagination conveyed through inspired literary forms. This audio recording is from the 2016 Religious Affections conference at High Country Baptist Church, Colorado Springs, and includes discussion.
This video recording presents Aniol’s address “Form and Substance,” which extends the regulative principle of worship to the aesthetic forms of Scripture. Building on his book By the Waters of Babylon and on the doctrine of verbal plenary inspiration, he argues that the poetic and literary forms God chose to communicate his truth should shape the forms churches use in corporate worship today. Recorded at the 2016 Religious Affections conference at High Country Baptist Church in Colorado Springs, followed by questions and discussion.
This audio recording presents Aniol’s talk on Christian education, which builds on Douglas Wilson’s Recovering the Lost Tools of Learning to ask how educators can teach children not only to know what is lovely but to love it. Aniol proposes the Christian tradition of beauty, or rightly ordered loves, as the missing link between right thinking and right action, aiming at students formed in mind, will, and emotions.
A video recording of Scott Aniol’s lecture “Toward a Biblical Understanding of Culture.”
This video recording from Religious Affections Ministries features Scott Aniol on how to evaluate musical communication, a topic related to choosing music for worship. It was published in 2013.
This audio recording presents “God Is Really Among You: The Evangelistic Impact of God-Centered Worship,” a session Scott Aniol gave at the Wilds Christian Camp and Conference Center Music Conference in early January 2012. Aniol noted that the session drew on his paper “Toward a Biblical Understanding of Culture.”
This document accompanies “God Is Really Among You: The Evangelistic Impact of God-Centered Worship,” a session Scott Aniol presented at the Wilds Christian Camp and Conference Center Music Conference in early January 2012. Aniol based the session on his paper “Toward a Biblical Understanding of Culture,” which is the document linked here. An audio recording of the session is also available.
This audio recording presents “Train Up a Child: Teaching the Next Generation to Worship,” a workshop on children and worship that Scott Aniol taught at the Wilds Christian Camp and Conference Center Music Conference in early January 2012.
These are Scott Aniol’s notes for “Train Up a Child: Teaching the Next Generation to Worship,” a workshop on children and worship given at the Wilds Christian Camp and Conference Center Music Conference in early January 2012. Aniol described the notes as sketchier than his other sessions, drawing on earlier writing along with some new material. An audio recording of the workshop is also available.
An audio recording of Scott Aniol’s lecture “Toward a Biblical Understanding of Culture.”
This audio recording presents Aniol’s conference paper on what God said about worship, given at the Conference on the Church for God’s Glory in Rockford, Illinois. Aniol argues that worship is rooted in God’s own speech: his self-revelation is the basis of worship, his word through his Son is its means, and what he has said regulates the elements of corporate worship.
In this paper on biblical worship, Aniol argues that God did not merely say something about worship; worship itself is grounded in what God has said. He traces how God’s self-revelation is the basis of worship, how sin prevents it, and how God’s speech through his Son makes it possible, describing worship as drawing near to God in dialogue: hearing his Word and responding with fitting affection.
The paper concludes by applying the regulative principle to corporate worship, arguing that God alone determines its acceptable elements and that churches should therefore keep services simple. It was presented at the Conference on the Church for God’s Glory in Rockford, Illinois.
This audio recording presents “Conservative Christianity 101,” a session Scott Aniol gave at the Wilds Christian Camp and Conference Center Music Conference, held in early January 2012. Aniol posted the notes and audio from this and his other conference sessions on the Religious Affections Ministries website.
These are Scott Aniol’s session notes for “Conservative Christianity 101,” presented at the Wilds Christian Camp and Conference Center Music Conference in early January 2012, where he was a keynote and workshop speaker. An audio recording of the session is also available.
This audio recording presents Scott Aniol’s talk “Preserving the Truth in Our Worship” (2011), on conservative worship and the preservation of biblical truth. In the companion paper of the same title, Aniol argues that truth is preserved only when it is rightly imagined, and that the forms of corporate worship a church uses shape how its people imagine the truths of Scripture.
In this paper, Aniol argues that conservative worship is essential to the preservation of truth, because truth is preserved successfully only when it is rightly imagined, and right imagination depends heavily on the forms of worship a church employs. He contends that biblical truth is more than factual correspondence, noting that Scripture comes largely in literary and poetic forms rather than bare propositions, and he explores the relationship of truth to the moral imagination, to worship forms, and to tradition.
Against the popular distinction between theological and cultural conservatism, Aniol maintains that theological conservatism cannot last without cultural conservatism. He concludes that churches should preserve forms that express doctrine in the ways Scripture does, nurture the Judeo-Christian worship tradition, and pass that tradition to their children by immersing them in worship early.
This video recording from Religious Affections Ministries features Scott Aniol speaking on truth in corporate worship. It is listed on Vimeo under the title “Communicating Truth in Worship.”
This audio recording is the second of two lessons on the hymnody of the Christian church. Aniol argues that cultural forms are cultivated over long periods, then surveys hymnody in the Judeo-Christian tradition from Old Testament and early church song through medieval and Reformation hymns to the Enlightenment and the new tradition that followed. He urges churches to cultivate forms that nurture noble affections and to pass that tradition to their children. Recorded at Bethany Bible Church in June 2010.
In this essay on the history of Christian hymnody, Aniol surveys the development of church music to answer common appeals to Luther, Bach, Watts, and Wesley in defense of contemporary worship. Building on the claim that form shapes content, he argues that cultural forms are cultivated over long periods and express value systems, and he traces a largely continuous Judeo-Christian tradition of hymnody from Scripture through the Reformation.
Aniol then describes how the Enlightenment and nineteenth-century revivalism, especially Charles Finney’s pursuit of excitement, set the church on a second road that adopted popular musical forms. He closes by urging churches to recognize the importance of form, to distinguish forms that nurture noble affections from those that excite base passions, to cultivate the historic tradition, and to pass it on to their children.
This audio recording is the first of two lessons on the hymnody of the Christian church, focusing on function and form. Aniol surveys the biblical mandate for congregational song and the purpose and power of hymns, then examines how word choice, poetic meter, melody, rhythm, harmony, and performance shape a hymn’s content and the affections it expresses. Recorded at Bethany Bible Church in June 2010.
In this paper on Christian hymnody, Aniol considers what Scripture says about the church’s songs and why hymns matter, arguing that form shapes content. After defining the term “hymn” and discussing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs, he analyzes the anatomy of a hymn, showing how word choice, poetic meter, melody, rhythm, harmony, and performance shape the affections a text expresses.
He concludes that because hymns express affections to God, some are fitting for worship and some are not, so Christians must discern their meaning. This is the first of a two-part series on the hymnody of the church.
This video recording from Religious Affections Ministries features Scott Aniol speaking on preparation for and participation in corporate worship.
This audio recording presents Aniol’s talk on how conservative Christians can preserve biblical worship and pass it to the next generation. Following Paul’s charge to deliver the whole counsel of God, he proposes four commitments: worship regulated by the Word of God, forms that foster ordinate affection toward God, forms nurtured within the community of faith, and transmission of those forms to future generations.
In this paper on conserving biblical worship, Aniol asks what it will take for churches to transmit worship that is acceptable to God to the next generation. Written for pastors and church leaders, it argues that conservative Christians must commit to worship regulated by the Word of God, to forms that foster ordinate affection toward God, to forms nurtured within the community of faith, and to deliberately passing those forms to their children.
Aniol stresses that the aim is not loyalty to tradition for its own sake but faithfulness to the whole counsel of God. The material was also published as a six-part series by Religious Affections Ministries.
In this paper on music and emotion, Aniol aims to help believers apply the Bible to their musical choices by correcting presuppositions he believes Modernism and Postmodernism introduced, which opened the way for Revivalism and Charismaticism to shape views of worship. He addresses biblical authority on matters Scripture does not directly address and argues that music communicates through emotional metaphor and that spiritual affections are distinct from physical feelings.
Contrasting Dionysian and Apollonian forms of art, Aniol urges churches to reject music that manipulates physical feeling and to favor simple, rich hymns with strong texts and modest music. The paper was first prepared for a class at Bob Jones Seminary in November 2008.