This is something so simple and foundational that I would have thought it would have been covered in one of my church music classes in college. Oh well, lucky me I was mentored by the incredible edible Daniel Creswell (okay, not so edible, but definitely an awesome worship pastor). It’s actually very simple. Each song is classified in one of two categories both orientation-wise and focus-wise.

A song’s orientation can be either horizontal (towards other men) or vertical (towards God). And it can be either God-focused or man-focused.

Here’s an example: How Great is Our God, by Chris Tomlin. It’s horizontal in orientation because it is sung to other men (it is a declaration of God’s glory), but it is God-focused because the song is about God.

Another example, a goldie-oldie (at least in my mind): Draw Me Close to You, not really sure who wrote it… But this one is vertical in orientation because it is sung to God, but man-focused because it is focused on man. Note the lyrics in the chorus: “You’re all I want, You’re all I ever needed…”

Why is understanding how songs stand in these two categories essential to developing your worship list for a service? Balance and development. If all of your songs are vertical man-focused songs, though you are getting your congregation to communicate and look to God, you’re encouraging a priority of self in that communication…as well as neglecting to encourage the declaration of God before men.

As you choose songs, it’s great to keep mindful of these as look for songs relevant to your service theme/passage. If possible, you want to have at least one song which falls into each category somewhere throughout the service (preferrably not counting the offertory/special). That way, after picking out a few songs, you can think, “Okay, I’ve got a horizontal God-focused song and a vertical God-focused song, so is there maybe a man-focused song I can use to balance out this service?”

Also, understanding these categories can help in choosing songs for specific portions of the service or special events. An excellent call to worship might be a horizontal man-focused song calling men to worship the Lord. A more appropriate song for communion might be a God-focused vertical song.

Just start looking at the songs you’ve picked out for this week or next and see how the worship songs fall into these categories.