In his book Why Johnny Can't Sing Hymns, T. David Gordon writes:
"No one has ever written a requiem, for instance, to be accompanied by three people playing guitars. Why? Because death is still . . . a fairly serious matter, and guitar-playing just doesn't sound serious. It sounds like casual amusement."
Gordon goes on to make the exception for classical guitar, but his point is that in present day culture the overwhelming majority of people associate guitar playing with casual entertainment and hear guitar playing only in that context.
Gordon's book--along with his previous one, Why Johnny Can't Preach--is an excellent brief introduction into the ways in which musical forms and words shape religious experiences in ways most people are no longer aware of. His main argument is that the culture of amusement (pace Neil Postman, whom Gordon frequently refers to) now dominates nearly all thinking in the church, especially thinking about music. People today by and large no longer even are aware of different musical traditions and the ways they can convey religious truths and values (such as repentence from sin). Gordon's short study is provocative--and Christians today need to be provoked since most of their fundamental assumptions about worship are probably wrong, especially when it comes to music.