Come as you are . . . oh . . . but please wear a tie.

I had the experience recently of preaching a sermon from which my heart was poured out as I was convinced of the great import of the passage. It was earthy, geared toward both believers in Christ and unbelievers, and authentic. But the hymn following it betrayed the tenor of the message preached. Ouch! What gives? It seems to me . . . now I may be wrong . . . but it seems to me, that if we want to be authentic in our worship and preaching and we want people to be authentic, we ought to be authentic in our musical style. What do I mean?

We have this idea in our head that worship ought to be reverent (and it should) and other-worldly (ought to be different than run-of-the-mill top 40 . . . and it definitely should), yet we ask people from all makes and models to come worship and, in an instant change their 21st century tastes and sensiblities. As if the deep and rich theology isn't enough to grasp, we also expect them to be classical in their musical style. In other words, we come up to Bill Monroe and ask him to play Vivaldi's mandolin concerto and expect him to like it and to enjoy it . . . or else! So often formality betrays the message and the hearers. We ought to have music that is as authentic as the people's lives who sing it and as authentic as Christ's compassion for the people who He saw as sheep without a Shepherd. There is plenty of rich theology being put to authentic tunes out there. Do not ignore the history of hymnody and the music, nor ignore the heart-engaging newer tunes and instrumentation being written to uphold the rich theology. Please do ignore the shallow Christian dung that is so prevalent on the airwaves.

www.igracemusic.com
www.redmountainmusic.org
www.sojournmusic.com
www.gettymusic.com
www.sovereigngracemusic.org