The term Gospel Song, first used by Philip Bliss, was created in order to describe a new genre of spiritual songs that originated out of the church hymn singing tradition and was meant to support the preacher's message, the Gospel, at huge gatherings of faithless audiences during the Great Awakening of the Methodist Church in the U.S. during the late 19th century by finding new, easy to learn expressive melodies and using a repetitive structure of Verses and Choruses. Wikipedia