Expert: Dr. Ronald E. Shultz - 6/11/2007

Question
Why is the "doxology" sung after an offering?

Answer
It isn't used at all at most Baptist churches that I know be they Independent or Southern Baptist.  Of the churches that I know that use it many use it at the beginning of the service before or after the opening prayer.  It was used regularly in the Methodist Church that I grew up in and there are several variations.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doxology

Being it was designed as a praise to God I can imagine it is sung after the offering as a thanks for the many blessings God has provided the members so that they are able to give this offering back to Him.  

Depending on the age of your Church it has possibly become a ritual without much meaning.  That is the danger of such things.  If asked, many of your members may not be able to give an answer other than it is what we have always done.  At that point it is just tradition and needs to be scrapped.  

When I was first saved I was given the task of doing the bulletin and I decided to change things up a bit and left the doxology out for a few weeks.  The pastor asked me to put it back in because some folks threatened to leave the church.  That was a bit silly and actually turned me off to singing it.  When a manmade song or ritual becomes a fundamental reason for belonging to a church the point of church and worship has been entirely missed.

Yours might be a Reformed Baptist Church, in theology if not in name, or what is called a "high church" making it similar in rituals as some of the other mainline denominations.

I associate with those who would be called "low church" folks that don't really have set rituals or litanies though they do have an order of worship but it is not set in stone.

Once I had the sermon first and then we sang at the end of the service.  We have had the offering at the end of the service instead of in the middle.  We have even left the written order of service completely and have done something else because the pastor felt led to do so or because someone needed to give a testimony or prayer request.  At one church a man dying of cancer gave his testimony and it caused such a holy hush that the pastor just prayed after the man finished and dismissed us without a sermon or an offering.

Those kinds of things would never happen in a "high church." Well, maybe once and then people would leave the church or fire the pastor.  ;-)  

That being said, if signing the Doxology after the offering is truly an outpouring of your congregation's thankfulness then by all means sing it but there are other songs that could be sung or no song need be sung at all if it has just become a ritual.  

May God bless you richly as you grow in His Word by His Spirit.