To be completely honest I didn’t want to write this post, but during the past few months I’ve felt the Lord urging me to talk about this. Some background first. God created mankind; we sinned, and incurred His holy wrath. We took the world with us (now disease entered, pain, sadness, etc). However, God still gives us certain common grace (if He didn’t, our societies’ over history would have torn each other to pieces in a way that no one could imagine, and natural disasters would destroy what’s left). Thus, it is due to God’s common grace toward to each of us (including those who have not accepted Jesus’ payment for their sins) that He allows us to keep living and enables any person can do “good works” (i.e. the kindnesses that fellow humans–even unsaved–give each other). God also endowed all of humankind (e.g. people building architectural wonders, inventing new things, writing, using the Arts). Music is included in this list. These gifts somehow (even coming from those who spurn God’s special grace) glorify God–even when used for personal fame and fortune. Thus, even if I listen to secular music, my soul can still glorify God and extol His greatness, but there can be two problems: the lyrics and my heart. 1) Lyrics do not necessarily glorify God–glorifying sin is one example of un-glorifying lyrics. When I hear these words of this type, I cannot glorify God because sin is being exemplified. Thus, this music is not good for my soul. 2) My heart: if I’m focusing too much of my attention on music (even “good” music) and not on God, then I have created an idol in my life that needs to go. So, even if the music is fine, I’M not fine because it’s not drawing me closer to God.
On a personal level, when it comes to listening to music I listen to practically everything: classical, jazz, rock, metal, rap. However, recently I’ve been evaluating my music determining a few things. First, why do I listen to the music I do? Second, how does the music affect me and make me feel when I listen to it? Third, is what I am listening to glorifying to God? If not, what are my reasons for listening to it music? I challenge you to ask yourselves these same questions. A few days ago I was going through my music library synching music to my mp3 player, when these thoughts came to mind. As I thought about the music I was listening to, and I came to realize that the music I was listening to was not something God would want me to listen to or support. A lot of today’s secular music is focused on profanity, sex, drugs, pimps, adultery, the list goes on. And sadly, most of the rap in my music library was filled with this.
If anyone has music consisting of things I’ve mentioned above, I ask you to take it before God because it’s not right. As Christians is it our responsibility to give all of our tastes, our likes and dislikes over to God. Romans 6:13 says
“Do not offer the parts of your body to sin, as instruments of wickedness, but rather offer yourselves to God, as those who have been brought from death to life; and offer the parts of your body to him as instruments of righteousness.”
Offer your whole self unto God. To offer means to give in to, to submit, and to surrender. Romans 12:1 speaks of presenting our bodies as a living sacrifice unto God. I believe this means that we should come to God in prayer and tell Him that we want to give ourselves unto Him. We choose to give Him our lives and surrender to Him by telling Him that we have decided to do so. You must decide that you want God to have you entirely and that you are willing for Him to be in charge of your life. Tell Him that you want Him to have you entirely. If there is any area of your life that you have not surrendered to Him, tell Him that it also is His to do with as He pleases. For me this area was music, I just recently I gave that part of my life over to him. Yet I know for myself, there are still things in my life I haven’t given fully to God yet, and it’s vital that I do. I also know that God may still address music again in the future. My heart needs to be willing to follow His leading
Moving back to the music subject, I would say that I believe music is inherently powerful. It affects people physiologically, psychologically, and spiritually. Now, that is not necessarily the same thing as saying music is inherently moral, or immoral. A gun is inherently powerful, but not inherently moral. The same gun can be used for good or for evil. Can the same thing be said of music?
My personal belief is that there is some music which produces no good and therefore I’m willing to call it inherently bad. I do think, however, that most types of music can be used for good effect, and for evil effect. I think the power of music is clearly visible in the Bible. Music is present in much of the ceremony and ritual God prescribes in the OT, David drove demons away by playing on his harp.
One thing I think the Bible has to say about all “Christian arts” is that to a Christian, all arts are Christian. What I mean by that is the Bible teaches us to do everything as unto the Lord. To see that we serve and glorify God in everything we do. A part of that is recognizing that even in the mundane everyday tasks we do, God is present. How much more so in our art when we pour our hearts and lives into it; so a piece of instrumental music, made by a Christian, is as much “Christian music” as a song about Jesus.
Now, in terms of the Contemporary Christian movement, I would say there are a good many solid-out, rock-solid bands and artists - ranging in style - that are worth listening to, especially when they are truly worshipping God with what they do (i.e., MercyMe, Casting Crowns, Stellar Kart etc.).
Bands that are allegedly Christian but do not make clear statements about God, I don’t think should be associated with that movement, but rather perceived as secular. That doesn’t make them bad; just that they don’t really fit the criteria. And well… a lot of Christian music doesn’t fit the correct criteria.
With that said, I’d like to move lightly into a genre of music, known as “Screamo’ or/other 'metal' with examination and study I’ve come to the belief that this sort of music culture is not honoring to God in anyway. (That does not mean it’s wrong to listen to) Usually then, people then ask me, “What’s wrong with it” I’m usually put in the position to defend my belief, however, now it’s your turn. I ask, “What’s right with it?”
