What is your point? Do you honestly believe that today's modern rockers are Christ like? The country western genre has most certainly moved toward the rock music genre. Hard to tell them apart except for the lyrics most of the time.It just seems a bit strange though,you hardly ever hear the same people talk about Country Western music. For some reason I find that stuff is some of the most depressing music around. That stuff is no better. It's not the music itself,it's a matter of what is already in the heart. Music gives voice to what is there in the heart. The heart of the matter in any of this is understanding how this affects you. If one thinks this doesn't happen with people who have listened to country,classical or any other style of music you are sadly mistaken. Do we honestly think it was country or rock music that they used during the Third Reich or did they use Wagner?
What is your point? Do you honestly believe that today's modern rockers are Christ like? The country western genre has most certainly moved toward the rock music genre. Hard to tell them apart except for the lyrics most of the time.
I fear the music is the greatest threat to the spiritual well-being of the church today. I would rather attend a small store front church with no instruments where the old hymns of the faith are sung than a mega-church where thousands are gathered to be entertained. I do not attend church to be entertained by the music. I attend to be fed from the preaching of God's word. I'll take Fanny Crosby over Amy Grant any and every day of the week.
For the cause of Christ
Roger
It just seems a bit strange though,you hardly ever hear the same people talk about Country Western music. For some reason I find that stuff is some of the most depressing music around. That stuff is no better. It's not the music itself,it's a matter of what is already in the heart. Music gives voice to what is there in the heart. The heart of the matter in any of this is understanding how this affects you. If one thinks this doesn't happen with people who have listened to country,classical or any other style of music you are sadly mistaken. Do we honestly think it was country or rock music that they used during the Third Reich or did they use Wagner?
How about this song? Are the lyrics clear? Is the message very clear?
Creed - Petra[video=youtube;hT9QxwZA5gk]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hT9QxwZA5gk[/video]
I believe in God the Father, maker of heaven and earth.
And in Jesus Christ His only son, I believe in the virgin birth.
I believe in the Man of Sorrows, bruised for iniquities.
I believe in the lamb who was crucified, and hung between two thieves.
I believe in the resurrection, on the third and glorious day
I believe in the empty tomb, and the stone that the angel rolled away
He descended and set the captives free
And now He sits at God's right hand and prepares a place for me
This is my creed
The witness I have heard
The faith that has endured
This truth is assured
Through the darkest ages past
Though persecuted it will last
And I will hold steadfast
To this creed
I believe He sent His spirit, to comfort and to reveal
To lead us into truth and light, to baptize and to seal
I believe He will come back, the way He went away and..
Receive us all unto Himself but no man know that day
This is my creed
The witness I have heard
The faith that has endured
This truth is assured
Through the darkest ages past
Though persecuted it will last
And I will hold steadfast
To this creed
I believe He is the judge, of all things small and great
The resurrected souls of men, receive from Him their fate
Some to death and some to life, some to their reward
Some to sing eternal praise, forever to the Lord
And through the darkest ages past
Though persecuted it will last
And I will hold steadfast
To this creed
You are quite correct that it requires discernment. The problem is that we must establish the frame of reference to make the discernment. I do not see this issue as a matter of musical taste. I consider emotion far too fickle to be relied upon. Yet I find rock music to be very emotional by it's nature. We can trace rock music's roots back through Haitian immigrants and their voo-doo cultism. The rock culture of the sixties coined the phrase if it feels good do it. The rock music embraced the philosophy and built upon it. Now we bring that into the church where it is blended into our worship? The church looks to hedonism for it's discernment instead of the purity and holiness of it's Savior. I am saying this in the abstract and not toward any specific individual. If we lose sight of the holiness and purity of Christ we cannot make holy and pure judgments. Perhaps we should consider the possibility of silent worship resulting in greater joy than anything man can produce. Paul exhorts Timothy to be instant to preach the word. 2 Tim 4:2The whole point goes into who are they pointing to? It calls for testing and discernment. Always has. Not all that say they are Christian are. Has been that way since the church first started.
Non Christians rockers of course not. They never were.
The country western never was any better. (Know that for a fact because my father listened to that all the time,if you think Hank Williams,and all the old time country was all that great HAH) Add to that a lot of them would be singing about cheating,drinking and living a hard life and then turning around with a few gospels songs thrown in.
Where did I say that I go to church to be entertained? Sorry I go to an LCMS not really big on entertainment.
Where did I say I listen to Amy Grant? Her stuff to me is cheap,shallow and feeble.
That's great that you like Fanny Crosby. But I find I range from the times of quiet reflection of who God is to the times I just want to shout at top of my lungs with every ounce of energy that is within me to praise my heavenly Father. Is that wrong?
Or is that a personal freedom that is given to us by God that is neither right nor wrong?
The whole thing goes back to one thing are you doing this to honor Him or yourself?
But it has been shown, that Rock music exalts the flesh because it is mainly bass and rhythm. Do an experiment sometime, listen to a rock song for a couple of minutes and see how it elevates your flesh. And then listen to sone nice classical music like Beethoven and you'll the difference.
Well Sarah, petra sure does have a lot of the right words, except where he said that Jesus was God's only Son. That is a contradiction in the Scriptures. Because when we get saved, we become the sons of God.
1 John 3:1-3 KJV
Behold, what manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should be called the sons of God: therefore the world knoweth us not, because it knew him not. [2] Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is. [3] And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure.
Now if he would have said that Jesus was God's only Begotten Son, well then that would have been right & correct. Other than that, he had a lot of the right words. So the lyrics for the most part were good except where he made that contradiction. And again, does he have a lot of the right lyrics? Sure, for the most part. But still Sarah, he is using the wrong kind of music. I listened through that whole music video, and I am telling you Petra sounded just like the world, you wouldn't be able to tell the difference, the only difference is the lyrics.
Plus at the last half of the song, at certain points I could barely make out what he was saying due to all the screaming and shouting along with the high sounding rock music.
You know years ago, before I got right with the Lord, the music I used to be into was Reggae, Soca, and Calypso. As well as Zouk, Kompa, and a little bit of African music ( High Life, Soukous, Makossa, etc). And long before I had gotten into the various forms of Island and Caribbean Music, I had gotten into Techno and Trance. But again, I had to realize that listening to Reggae or Calypso or any of the other types of wordly music was not bringing glory to the Lord. It was not Spiritual music like the Hymns were.
So I also used to be big into all kinds of music as you can obviously tell from a little bit of my testimony, but the bottom line Sarah is that God calls us out of the world's system and to be separate from it. And that includes the world's music. The music of the world.
And yea; I understand that a lot of people do overlook the evils of Country Western. Truth of the matter be told, it is just as bad as rock & roll and hip hop. It's just country western has a softer beat. So people think to themselves, "oh it must not be too bad" because it has a nice and soft beat to it." But a lot of Country music these days have worldly and carnal lyrics, so yea it is no better than rock & roll.