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Re: Christian music



<< How much of what you guys listen to is "Christian" music and how much is 
 "secular"?
 

 Sarah:
 >I went through a phase where I didn't want to listen to any Christian 
 music,

**I went in just the opposite direction.  I grew up on rock and roll.  
Started listening to the Beatles and Hendrix at like 6-7 years old and my 
love for it grew with every year.  I became a Christian at 26 and started 
analyzing everything and I mean everything.  As I found out more about 
Christian rock the less I listened to *secular* music (1) until around a year 
after I became a Christian I found myself boxing up my 1000+ record 
collection and putting it on the floor in my closet.  I came very close to 
throwing them all away.  Man, I'm glad I didn't now!  I did, regretfully, 
throw out hundreds of horror novels.  Thankfully, I don't read much in that 
genre any more anyway.  But I do miss my autographed copies of Robert Bloch, 
Richard Matheson, and Stephen King.  I came to my senses within a couple 
years but not before driving one girl I worked with totally nuts. She always 
had a R&R station on and I'd constantly say: "do you know what this song is 
about!!!  How can you listen to this!?!"
(1)Even though to my trained rock and roll ears, much of it was subpar, I 
thought: it is Christian after all so you better get used to it!  A good 
thing to come out of this time was that I searched hard enough and did find 
some of the truly good musical gems early on: Daniel Amos, the 7's, etc.
 
 >One question I've always had about Christian music is: what is the goal? 
 Singing to the choir? If it's to evangelize, how's it gonna do that if it's 
 only sold in Christian music stores to other Christians?

**Simple answer, when talking about stuff on major labels that only gets 
Christian airplay and distribution -- it's not.  Early on it wasn't so 
separate.  Larry Norman even started out on a secular label.  The same label, 
in fact, that Frank Zappa was on: Verve.  Then he created his own label, 
other small labels followed, the walls started going up and it became more 
and more isolated.  They didn't go up immediately though, it took a while.  
It was originally all about evangelism from what I know and I hear the then 
small labels did their best to get their product out to *secular* stores.  
I'd imagine that as Christian bookstores became more and more the thing and 
labels grew bigger and bigger the music started to be sold exclusively at 
them.  And the rest is history.  Funny, to me, it's kinda come full circle, 
most of the best music being made by Christians today is again on small 
labels trying to get their product out right alongside the rest of the 
musicians out there. This might not be totally accurate as I wasn't there for 
the whole thing but I'd surmise it's pretty close.

 >Also, I think secular music can be a conduit to God's truth as well. If we 
 listen only to Christian music, we'll miss out on what non-Christians are 
 going through everyday. Music is an outlet for people's pain, hopes, dreams. 
 And God's truth is apparent in all of creation, so how can non-Christians be 
 blind to it?
 
**Very good observation Sarah.  We're all part of the same world.  I'm 
convinced that art, if it is to say anything real, has first and foremost to 
be honest.  Which means a Christian writing music faces the same hard 
questions as a non-Christian.  If he/she is to speak anything real to their 
generation they will speak not only of the love, peace, and joy found in 
Christ but about the pain, lost dreams, struggles and doubts of being human.  
And when speaking of truths, they won't shy away from the fact that dress she 
wears is often laced with shadow and ambiguity. 

. >The Bible's got the 
 sinners and the saints mixed together in one book, so why can't music be the 
 same?

**Touche. see my last entree
 
 > I always got this feeling like we were competing with the secular music 
 industry or something. Trying to prove ourselves in our separate little 
 world.

**Mark Heard (1) addressed this attitude of the modern church and how we've 
*ghettoized* (to use his word for it) ourselves so much that we've come to 
the point where we often have little effect on the world at large. 
To introduce his song Orphans of God which is partly about this very thing at 
Cornerstone in 92 he said:
  
 "You know, we've grown up in a time where most people take it for granted 
that
the universe is cause and effect and nothing more; and our voices aren't heard
because we fail to address how that all got started in the first place.  When
we shout our slogans and we say the things that we've been taught to say, they
don't mean a thing to other people.  It's no wonder we live in a ghetto, on 
the
other side of a wall from other people. So I wrote a song for us who have been
victimized by ourselves in such a way."
                --Mark Heard, 1992

(1) I always gotta get Mark in on a post about Christian music


 >Pretty much I listen to bands that are 
 unique and have depth of meaning and emotion. Regardless of which category 
 they get put in.

**Sounds like you've come to a good place to me.  Now, as Dan said in his 
most excellent post, just start thinking "there is no such thing as a  
secular-Christian dichotomy",  click your heels together 3 times and you'll 
be home.
 
Kevin (didn't think I had the energy for another Christian music thread -- 
can't believe I made it through)!


"how monotonous the sounds of the forest would be if the music came only from 
the top ten birds"-- sign in producer Marc Phillips office

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