The death of pop star Whitney Houston has increased the
wildfire surrounding the shady functioning of the music and movie industries,
as well as what some might call their blatant disregard for human souls. Houston
was not the first to fall to the music industry’s subculture of drugs that so
often gets the attention of the mainstream media, but she is one of the most
recent as of this writing. Many have spoken up on her behalf saying that she
was not a person who wanted to be living an immoral lifestyle, but that she was
a Christian woman desiring to know God on a deeper level who was trying to get
delivered from the grip of drug addiction.
R&B superstar Chaka Khan had a close friendship with Huston, and according to CBN, accused the music industry of being downright “demonic” shortly after the news about Houston’s death went public.
Gospel music singer Helen Baylor is also boldly speaking out about the darkness of the music industry, and she isn’t stopping with the secular music industry. Baylor has been willing to be rather vulnerable about her own struggles in relation to the influence of the music industry and drug addiction in her life, even as she admonishes that the Gospel music industry isn’t very far behind the secular in terms of where it’s headed. She claims that the focus has become misdirected over the years in the sense that Gospel music has become a form of entertainment rather than a means of ministering to people. The mindset of using Christian music as a tool to help people focus on drawing closer to God through passionate worship music has given way to a market-driven mentality of appealing to the approval of the masses.
Even back in the 1990s, Christian music that was played on many radio stations was more rooted in the Word than much of what is being played today. This also gave people a chance to be more familiar with what the Word actually said and have more of a moral compass to guide them in their daily living. But as praise and worship music became more commercialized for the masses, the concept of Word-based lyrics became less of a focus. That being said, it seems that much of today’s church struggles with understanding why praise and worship is important, and there is a growing sentiment that it’s only people who are musicians and singers who really experience the presence of God through that venue anyway.
However, if that were truly the case, there wouldn’t be passages like 2 Chronicles chapter 5 verses 13-14 in which the praise and worship music was so rich with the presence of God that the priests couldn’t continue ministering because the glory of the Lord was so powerful in the temple. There was a visible cloud representing the presence of the Lord that filled that place, and it wasn’t just the singers and musicians who saw it. Everyone saw it.
When David wrote all the Psalms that he wrote, it wasn’t all about him and it wasn’t to provide entertainment for the Israelites. He wrote those with the intent that they would be used in passionate worship to the God of Israel by the Israelites when they gathered to worship God on the Sabbath.
The church needs to realize that we are being called to return to a focus of using praise and worship as a means to worship God, and to do so in Spirit and in truth. In the Gospel of John chapter 4 verses 21-24, Jesus states that the Father is “seeking” out people who will worship Him in spirit and in truth. When the word seeking is taken back to its original Greek meaning (the New Testament was originally written in Greek) it could also be translated as to go hard after because of being strongly desired. Talk about a life that’s blessed! God chases after, or pursues us when we worship Him in Spirit and in truth! And there’s nothing there about such a wonderful blessing being reserved for only musicians and singers. It’s directed at anyone who is willing to worship Him in Spirit and in truth, that is, spontaneously from a passionate heart for who He is.
R&B superstar Chaka Khan had a close friendship with Huston, and according to CBN, accused the music industry of being downright “demonic” shortly after the news about Houston’s death went public.
Gospel music singer Helen Baylor is also boldly speaking out about the darkness of the music industry, and she isn’t stopping with the secular music industry. Baylor has been willing to be rather vulnerable about her own struggles in relation to the influence of the music industry and drug addiction in her life, even as she admonishes that the Gospel music industry isn’t very far behind the secular in terms of where it’s headed. She claims that the focus has become misdirected over the years in the sense that Gospel music has become a form of entertainment rather than a means of ministering to people. The mindset of using Christian music as a tool to help people focus on drawing closer to God through passionate worship music has given way to a market-driven mentality of appealing to the approval of the masses.
Even back in the 1990s, Christian music that was played on many radio stations was more rooted in the Word than much of what is being played today. This also gave people a chance to be more familiar with what the Word actually said and have more of a moral compass to guide them in their daily living. But as praise and worship music became more commercialized for the masses, the concept of Word-based lyrics became less of a focus. That being said, it seems that much of today’s church struggles with understanding why praise and worship is important, and there is a growing sentiment that it’s only people who are musicians and singers who really experience the presence of God through that venue anyway.
However, if that were truly the case, there wouldn’t be passages like 2 Chronicles chapter 5 verses 13-14 in which the praise and worship music was so rich with the presence of God that the priests couldn’t continue ministering because the glory of the Lord was so powerful in the temple. There was a visible cloud representing the presence of the Lord that filled that place, and it wasn’t just the singers and musicians who saw it. Everyone saw it.
When David wrote all the Psalms that he wrote, it wasn’t all about him and it wasn’t to provide entertainment for the Israelites. He wrote those with the intent that they would be used in passionate worship to the God of Israel by the Israelites when they gathered to worship God on the Sabbath.
The church needs to realize that we are being called to return to a focus of using praise and worship as a means to worship God, and to do so in Spirit and in truth. In the Gospel of John chapter 4 verses 21-24, Jesus states that the Father is “seeking” out people who will worship Him in spirit and in truth. When the word seeking is taken back to its original Greek meaning (the New Testament was originally written in Greek) it could also be translated as to go hard after because of being strongly desired. Talk about a life that’s blessed! God chases after, or pursues us when we worship Him in Spirit and in truth! And there’s nothing there about such a wonderful blessing being reserved for only musicians and singers. It’s directed at anyone who is willing to worship Him in Spirit and in truth, that is, spontaneously from a passionate heart for who He is.
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