The other is the person who says that they only want to glorify God, and be on a label like Forefront, and sing and write songs about God and testify about God where everyone can see and hear. Much of what is in the Christian industry now is music like this, music about topics Christians can identify with. This is primarily to follow Colossians 3:16.

The Repression
According to Charlie Peacock,

"When the church believes artists should only spend time writing� some version of the gospel� it assumes that artists are the best communicators of things didactic and spiritual. �It creates a false dualistic view of life with a sharp distinction between that which belongs to God and that which doesn't� between the sacred and the secular. It teaches the average person that there are things beyond the gaze of God. That's a horrible lie to teach to God's people."

For a person who doesn't know better, this distinction will cause them to think that being a Christian only involves our religious or devotional practices. People will think that certain topics like romance ("Kiss Me" by Sixpence None the Richer), suicide, AIDS, prostitution, teenage pregnancy, murder, rape and incest (are you flinching yet?) are among those things "beyond the gaze of God." This of course is not true. The Bible discusses these things often, and sometimes in explicit detail. Consider, for instance, the story of Ehud in the third chapter of Judges. He murdered King Eglon, and the scripture says, "Ehud did not pull the sword out, and the fat closed in over it (v.22)." Now that is gruesome detail. Would a song describing this event make it to Christian Radio? It likely would not. But it's directly from the Bible!

What this does is make evident that in practice, we really do compartmentalize our spiritual and everyday lives, and try to keep the two from meeting. What is the cause of this schizophrenia?. We who consume it! Businesses practice business in ways that the consumer will accept. The problem is the lack of investment in the material by the consumer. Christians, who are to "test the spirits to see whether they are from God (1 John 4:1)," have a responsibility to approach Christian music on more than a superficial level. You may have thought or said that you listen to Christian music because it's better than secular music. You have probably said that you listen to it because the message is good, and you want to put good things into your mind. Both are very good reasons.

However, the audience is one that is easily drawn by the use of Christian language, or terms that we are familiar with in our Christian upbringing and theological persuasions. The responsibility of Christians is to determine whether or not what they are listening to agrees with the historic Christian faith. Again, Peacock has said,

"�I want to encourage people� to think Christianly about life. Thinking with a Christian world and life view, rather than just using the inculturated buzzwords so that you as a listener can immediately recognize, "Oh, that's a Christian song." You see, a lot of times the ability to immediately recognize something causes you to write it off. You don't really invest in, "What are they saying? Is this really congruent with my belief system?"

The Depression

Terry Mattingly wrote a column for Gospelcom.net saying,

"Contemporary Christian musicians know they have to use explicitly Christian images and code words or their core fans will revolt. They also know they have to avoid many controversial, gripping, soul-wracking issues that are fair game for secular performers. This makes it hard for CCM artists to write openly and honestly about the pains and joys in their real lives."

Sadly, most Christians seem to demand that Christian artists write only music that is overtly "Christian" in it's presentation, and immediately identifiable as "Christian" music. The only problem with this is when an artist writes a song that does not refer to Jesus, God, or the church in particular, they are barred from Dove award consideration or even banned from Christian radio airplay.

This is when an artist is labeled as "crossing over." This is an automatic assumption that an artist is no longer composing music for God, and now doing it for whatever other reason there might be. This is also known more harshly as "Selling out."

When artists like Bob Dylan and Johnny Cash, who had just found Jesus, wanted to remain where they were, and reach out to the lost in their mainstream circles, they were driven away by people who wanted them to come out of the secular scene. Mark Joseph, author of The Rock and Roll Rebellion, described it this way:

"Had the CCM market simply diverted emerging young artists from the popular music culture, the situation would have been bad enough. But the "Christian" labels added insult to injury by also dragging away from the primary culture the few successful artists who had become Christians. Soon after their conversions, many rock musicians were coaxed into the backwater of CCM by the pseudospiritual entreaty to "sing for the Lord."

According to Joseph, the industry's most fatal choice was "advancing contemporary Christian music as a separate genre of music" instead of "advancing artists who were Christians and the ideas embodied in their work into each of the various styles of music." This obviously reduces the opportunity of Christian music to flourish everywhere and in everything.

This is where the responsibility of the consumer comes in. We must pay attention to and analyze exactly what the artist is doing. We must test the spirit of it and see if it is of God. We must also see if it matches a pattern of scripture. The book of Esther does not mention God expressly, but it is a grand story of God's grace, mercy, and providence when examined in context of the whole of scripture. Music by Christians must be examined in context of the whole of this Christian life.

Read "Evangelism is not Coincidental" for more on this topic.

� 2001 Jim Perry