They say music reflects culture. If this is the case I have no concept of where the state of the contemporary church is. I don't normally listen to the music radio, tonight I decided to see what kind of contemporary Christian music is out there nowadays, because I have no clue. We have a couple of Christian radio stations in our city, keeping in mind that style and genre are all relative...I find one radio station mostly cheesy and lyrically lacking in any deep revelation of God; and tonight I discovered that the other station seems more like a non-Christian-Christian radio station (both are run by the same people). The latter station can technically call themselves Christian radio because all the bands they play consider themselves Christian bands. Now I am not questioning the faith of the radio station people or the bands; my concern lies in my beginning statement. "Music reflects culture". During the time I listened to the more alternative station I got through about 8 songs before turning it off, all 8 songs had absolutely nothing to do with God. I heard 1 positive message, 3 about relationships with girls and the rest of them were incoherent non-sense. The lyrics made no sense. This was literally one of the choruses, "How can I not love you? You give me flowers. How can I trust you? The flowers died." Another one talked about chasing a little girl around the house.
I'm willing to give these bands the benefit of the doubt, but as for me; I now feel as my kids grow older, I will have to preview even Christian music before they listen to it. If this is contemporary Christian culture, I don't want anything to do with it. Is this music reflecting what is being taught on many of our pulpits? I have no clue (it's not where I come from.
I don't want to come across as judgemental, but I always have to ask my self, "Is this music engaging my heart with God's heart? Or is it simply feeding me a positive message on how to live better in the world?" I don't want to learn how to live better in the world because I know where it is going. I want to be clothed in Christ and walking in Holiness. I want to be listening to music that is God breathed and is ministering to my Spirit and not my flesh. Music that creates worship in my heart. Considering all this, I may have just listened to a REALLY bad stretch of songs on the radio. If people are finding music from these bands that sows into their Spirit, that is awesome and continue in it. This experience has just caused me to pay closer attention to what I'm giving my ears to and it makes me desire the church to have a deeper revelation of who he is.
Now to plug my friend Alyssa on University radio who does the Righteous Radio program, if you are looking for good Christian music, check out her show! http://www.myspace.com/righteousradio/
