That we play and so it's necessary for us to understand
how we get to the music that we get to and what the principles
are that we use to determine what we will sing and what we
won't sing. And, and obviously there's
there's really not a double standard that you can have one
thing in the church and and do one thing completely different
at home. These are standards of music
that should be not just in the church, but in your home as
well. So all of these things that
we're going to talk about over the next couple weeks are things
I think that will be a help to us.
Added to that, we're going to add some new things to our
singing in this coming year. I'll talk about that in a, in a
little bit. But one of the things that we're
going to try to do is adding, adding some singing of the
Psalms. And not just we do that
sometimes. Hey, get your Bible out.
Let's sing these verses. But, but, but using a Psalter
like what they used to use in the 1800s and, and into the
early 1900s with Isaac Watts and Charles Wesley and some of these
men who took the entire Psalms and wrote them into a poem form
and then sang them. And they, they match different
meters and they match different tunes.
And, and some of them, most of them are tunes that we are
familiar with. They come from other songs that
we sing to make it easy. So you don't have to memorize
the tune and the words, but you memorize the, you sing it to a
familiar tune and then put those words with it that have the same
meter and everything else. And obviously it's very, very
doctrinal at that point because you're literally singing the,
the, the words right out of the Psalms.
And so we're going to be adding some of those kind of things and
I'll explain that later. But it's important to understand
some of the basic principles of music.
I did a long series on music back in 2022, the series that I
did on what I believe and why. And I'm sure where's my brother
Josh? I'm sure we have that in a, in a
playlist on our church YouTube page.
And you can go back and watch it.
I think I did 15 lessons on music.
So it's very, very extensive. This is not going to be anything
close to that. And, and honestly, this is not
even, I'm not even, I'm not even reteaching what I already gave
you. This is a completely new mini
series, I guess you could call it.
Obviously that many of the principles are going to be
similar because the the principles of music are always
the same. But in an effort to be somewhat
brief, we're not going to take a look at at all of these things
tonight. But the Bible is filled with
music boy, if you start to go back through and I and that's
what I'm saying I wish we had some time to go back.
We would literally spend one whole service just looking at
verses that talk about music in the Bible.
There are hundreds and hundreds of references to music in the
Bible. The Old Testament was filled
with music. The the the largest book in the
Bible is a hymn book. The book of Psalms is all hymns,
all songs that they sang. And so when the Bible says that
Jesus after they a participated in the Last Supper and and they
went out after they had sung in him, right, where do you think
he's saying that him from? Wasn't likely.
It was straight out of the the hymn book that they had, which
was the book of Psalms. And so all the principles in
music that we'll look at tonight come from the hundreds of
references to music. Added to that, singing has
always been a part of the church from from the early church, the
first church to the early church to all the churches throughout
all the ages, they were singing churches and from all of what we
read and what of what everything is going to be like in the
future, we will be singing for all of eternity.
So what better thing to focus on and to pay attention to than the
music that we have in our church.
And not just that, but but when it, when it, when a church
starts to go in the wrong direction, one of the first
things to go is almost always the music.
The music always starts to slide and then everything else follows
closely behind it. That's when you lose your
standards in dress. That's when you lose your
standards in the word of God. And next thing you know, you're
not, you're still preaching from the King James Bible, but you're
using other versions to study from and using other versions,
versions to quote and mention. And the next thing you know,
you're not even using the King James Version of the Bible
anymore. Many times it starts with music
and you think that that's not the case.
I'm, I've been, I've been an independent Baptist for my
entire life, 42 years now. I didn't know what was going on
at 234 years old, but, but about 5 years old when I started
knowing what was going on until today.
I've seen many, many, many churches and I've been in
hundreds of churches myself and seeing exactly what I'm talking
about tonight. The music goes and everything
else follows right behind it. This is not some, well, this is
something that we can do if we want to.
This is something that we can pay attention to if we get the
time. This is something that we
absolutely must pay attention to and we need to understand music
so well that we can test it by the Word of God and test it by
those biblical standards. We have to be able to discern
things like soft rock and honky tonk and dance rhythms and, and
chords that are used in CCM. You can, I can, I can listen to
the 1st 10 seconds of a song and tell you if it's a contemporary
Christian music song or not. Because they use a certain type
of chord, they have a certain type of sound.
And those are things that we have to get to the point where
we can understand those, obviously the, the worldly vocal
styles. And I'll tell you this, the more
you listen to the world's music, the more your sacred music is
going to sound like the world's music because that's who you're
copying, right? And the more you listen to
contemporary Christian music, all of their vocal styles are
very similar to what you find in in rock songs or in light rock
songs or whatever you want to call it, pop music.
When that's what you're listening to, then even if
you're singing a hymn, it's going to sound like a pop song.
It's going to sound like a contemporary Christian music
song because that's what you're emulating and that's what you're
listening to. So it's not enough to just
publish a list of all the songs that we're not going to sing,
right? We don't have a list like that.
And there's, there's a reason why, number one, we're never
going to be able to exhaust all the all the songs that we
shouldn't sing. And #2 there's always going to
be more songs that are being added to it.
So rather than just saying all of these are songs that we don't
sing, and these are the songs that are OK, what we do is let's
look at some biblical principles that will help us to distinguish
between the songs that we won't sing and the songs that we will
sing, the songs that are not pleasing to the Lord and the
songs that are pleasing to the Lord.
And, and, and this is not something that that I'm just
forcing on the church. I'm putting this on myself as
well, right? We, we do everything we can to
listen to the right type of music in our own home.
It's something that obviously, you know, early on in, in our,
in the church, it was something that we didn't pay as close of
attention to, honestly, as we should have paid attention to.
And so now we're going back and, you know, we have a thick, thick
notebook full of all the songs that we've sung as a family or
that I've sung or that my kids have sung.
And, and we were going through some of those songs last night
when we were trying to pick out a song that we were going to
sing for today. Well, maybe it wasn't last
night. It was earlier than that, I
guess, but we were looking through all of these songs and
trying to figure out what we're going to sing.
And it was like, well, that's a song that we used to sing, but
wow, I didn't realize where that came from.
All right, we're not going to sing that one anymore.
All right, I didn't realize where that song came from.
That's not, that's not a song that we can sing.
And we've, we've, we've weeded out a lot of songs that we have
sung in the past that as you start to apply these biblical
principles to, you realize very quickly, these are not songs
that are going to move us in the right direction.
Maybe they're borderline songs that if you were to sing it,
it's not going to, you know, it's not going to push our
church into apostasy. It's not going to push our
church away from the truth of God's word and things like that.
But it's taking us in the wrong direction.
And it's building a bridge to something that we don't want to
be a part of, building a bridge to somewhere that we don't want
to go. And so that's why it's it's very
important when you bring music for approval there.
These are the basic principles that we want to apply to a song
to evaluate it. Sometimes it's not the song
itself, but who wrote the song. Sometimes it's, it's not only
who wrote it, but who sang that song to make it popular.
Let's be honest, with the Internet age that we live in
now, you hear a song that somebody gets up here and sings
and you like it and you want to go listen to it again.
What are you going to do? You're going to go Google it and
you're going to find it on YouTube.
And the first one that comes up, the second one, the third one,
the 4th one that comes up. It matters who sings it.
Because if, if, if I sang a song that I took and toned down and
made it sound OK. And the only thing that you can
hear when you to listen to that song again is somebody rocking
out to whatever song that I just sang.
That's not helpful for you, right?
Which is why when you turn in music, I say, where can I listen
to this song? Tell me, tell me where I can
hear it. And you say, oh, go, go search
it on YouTube and I go listen to it on YouTube.
And the next thing you know, the rocking out together, It's not a
song that's going to be approved because who wrote it is
important, but also who made it popular and who is the popular
ones that are singing it today, right.
You could take, you could theoretically take a song that's
written by something like Hillsong or Elevation or some of
these other really popular contemporary Christian artists
today. And you can, you can tone it
down and take out all the, and drums and you can take out all
the sliding and all the vocal techniques and all of these
things that they use to try to make it sound like a pop song.
And you could sing it the right way, but it's building a bridge
to something else. Because what's going to happen
is number one, this is what I've always found to, to, to bring a
contemporary Christian music song into the church.
You have to be listening to those songs, right?
How did you even find out that it was a song that you could
possibly sing? Somebody's listening to it
somewhere, right? Somebody is jamming out to these
CCM artists in their car and they're like, oh, that's a song
that I can take and tone down and make it sound good for
church. Well, you're fishing in the
wrong pond. That's the problem, right?
There are thousands and thousands and thousands of hymns
that you can sing that that some are not even in print anymore,
that you can find in old song books.
I'm telling you, I just found one, believe it or not, at
Barnes and Noble of all places. Barnes and Noble, an old reprint
of a songbook from 1875. It has 13184 songs in that book.
13184 songs. Well, I can't find any music to
sing. Well, I got 13184 of them that
you can pick from if you want. We don't have to fish in the
contemporary Christian music pond to find songs that are
uplifting and songs that that honor the Lord at the same time.
And so the first thing that a lot of people do when they start
looking for a song is they're just listening to the radio.
Wrong place to start, wrong place to start.
Start in, start in the church. Go, go, go listen to some songs
that you hear from some of the preachers that we have coming
through. Listen to their services, figure
out what, what, what music they're doing in their church.
And if it's a song that, wow, that's a really nice song.
All right, let's evaluate it and see where did they find that
song from Just because it's it's a church that we associate with
or have a pastor that comes through.
Now, I try to be very careful with who comes through, and we
don't have a lot of people that come through because of that
very reason, but just because they have come to our church and
preached and they did this song in their church.
But maybe their standards is a little bit different than ours.
And listen, if that's what they want to do in their church, they
have the freedom and the right to do some of the to have a
little bit of that Christian liberty to play the songs and
sing the songs that they want to sing.
But at the same time, we are going to evaluate it by these
principles and we're going to try to hold our music standard
as high as we can hold it to make sure that our music is as
pleasing to the Lord as it possibly can be.
So I hope you understand the importance of having these
standards and having these this set of principles, if you will,
that we follow for our music. So tonight what I want to do is
give you some of these biblical principles of music.
I'm only going to give you a few of them tonight.
Really, I'm kind of laying the groundwork for some of the
things that we'll talk about the next time.
Next week will be different, but we'll pick it up the week after
that. But obviously these are not
exhaustive by any means. These are not all of the
principles, but they'll give you some things that you can use to
test the music that you sing, the music that you listen to.
OK, Because I know that not everybody in our church sings.
Not everybody in our church is musical.
Not everybody is turning in songs that they're going to sing
for church. But how do you decide what music
you should and should not listen to on your own?
Well, these are the principles that we want to talk about.
Let's pray. Let's, let's ask for God's
blessing on the message, and then we'll jump into a few of
these tonight. Father, again, we thank you so
much for your goodness to us. Thank you for the opportunity
that we have to be here. God, may this be a help to us as
we study your word. Again, we thank you for all that
you do for us in Jesus name, Amen.
Now #1 and these are not necessarily in order of
importance. Some of these are going to kind
of overlap each other. So it might sound like maybe
that one should have gone first, this one should have gone
second, whatever. Some of these are going to
overlap a little bit, and so they're not in necessarily any
particular order. But here's what we have to
understand. First of all #1 music must be
overseen by the pastor. Music must be overseen by the
pastor. You're there in Acts chapter 20.
If you're not, you can turn there.
Acts chapter 20. I'm going to look at a few
verses here. Acts chapter 20 and verse #28
the Bible says, take heed, therefore, unto yourselves.
This is this is to the church there, and to all the flock, and
to all the flock over the which the Holy Ghost hath made you
overseers to feed the Church of God, which he has purchased with
his own blood. Turn over to Hebrews chapter 13.
Hebrews chapter 13. He's made us overseers to feed
the Church of God. It's the responsibility of the
pastor to be an overseer. Hebrews chapter 13 and verse
#17. Obey them that have the rule
over you, and submit yourselves, for they watch for your souls as
they that must give account that they may do it with joy and not
with grief, for that is unprofitable for you.
One more first Peter chapter 5. First Peter chapter 5, verse #2
The Bible says this. Feed the flock of God, which is
among you, taking the oversight thereof, not by constraint, but
willingly. Not for filthy Luker, but of a
ready mind. Pastors are called bishops,
which is an overseer. It's a Superintendent, if you
will. And as God stewards, it's the
responsibility of a pastor to watch over every aspect of the
congregation's life and of the ministry to make sure that
things are done according to God's will.
It is my responsibility to make sure that this church is going
in a direction that is pleasing to God.
They pastors have to know what's happening in order to protect
the flock from the danger that's out there and from the error
that's out there. And so it's my responsibility as
a pastor to study the issue of music and to understand these
principles of music and to know what the worldly music sounds
like and what the godly music sounds like.
And I'm not saying that I'm out here listening to all the
world's music. There's so much of it.
If you, if you know what the, what the, what godly music
sounds like, then the second you hear something that's not godly,
you can tell the difference, right?
Maybe you've heard this before, but there are there are people
in the government whose job it is to pick out counterfeit bills
and make sure that they don't get put into circulation or re
put back into circulation. Many times somebody obviously
makes a forgery and it goes into circulation and it's their job
to pull that out. Some of those counterfeits are
very, very close to the original.
But you think about how many people are out there making
counterfeit bills all the time. I mean, tons and tons and tons
and tons of people. Do you know how hard it would be
for them to find every single counterfeit bill and know where
every little mark on the counterfeit bill is to be able
to tell that it's that it's a counterfeit?
Oh, you know what they do? They study the real bill to the
point where they know every single thing about it.
So that the second they see a counterfeit bill, it sticks out
like a sore thumb to them because they're like, that's not
right, that's not right, that's not right, that's not right.
And they can tell not because they've memorized all of the
wrong bills, but they know so well the right one.
And that's exactly what it what it is when it comes to music.
We should know the principles of godly music so well that the
second we hear something that's not godly, it should really
stick out to us and we'll know this is not a kind of music that
I should listen to. This is not the kind of music
that we'll do in the in church because that's not it's, it's,
it's a counterfeit. So it's my responsibility to be
educated about sacred music and to know how to discern the
various popular sounds of music, the soft rock and all of those
things. And that something that I have
to be constantly learning. But honestly, it's something
that you need to be learning as well.
My job to teach you, but it's your job to learn.
And I'm so blessed that I took music lessons when I was growing
up and I've been playing music and singing my entire life.
And, and so, you know, again, it's, it helps that I grew up in
a place that had good, strong music standards.
And so it's very easy for me to discern between the good and the
bad, But I'm human too. And, and, and the music of the
world will appeal to our flesh often and we like the sound of
it. So just because I'm the pastor
and just because I know what godly music should sound like
doesn't mean that I'm never tempted by those things either.
Listen, it's, it's, it's, it's easy to allow the wrong type of
music in, right? It's very easy because somebody
comes in, they want to sing this song.
All right, go ahead and sing it. And they're all over the place.
And it sounds like, you know, something that they just pulled
off of the, you know, top 100 charts or whatever it happens to
be. And well, I just won't say
anything about it. That's the easy way.
The hard way is to say, no, no, no, I'm sorry, but that's not
the kind of music that we do here.
That's not music that fits in with these biblical principles.
That's hard. It's I don't, I don't want to
tell people no. I don't want to say no.
You can't do that because many times people come with a song
and they're like, oh, this is a really good one.
You're really going to like this.
And I look at it, I'm like, well, the words look all right,
let's go see about it. And only thing that I can find
is somebody that's singing out with, you know, purple lights
and dancing around on the stage and all of these other things.
And it's a bridge to the wrong place.
And so I have to say no. And I don't like doing that.
But if you want to truly understand how to discern the
right type of music, then maybe take a sacred music class.
There's nothing wrong with that. Find a good book.
I've got several good books on music that you could that you
could read if you really want to understand the idea of sacred
music. But it's the pastor's job to
appoint the right people to be in charge of the church's music.
And it's my, it's my job to approve all of the special music
because if, if somebody gets up and sings a song that's not
pleasing to the Lord, I failed, right?
And it may not be me. It may be somebody that I asked
to fill in that place and kind of be the gatekeeper.
But nobody's looking at the gatekeeper and saying, Oh, the
gatekeeper missed that one. They're looking at the pastor
and they're saying, how did you allow that in the church, Right?
It's my responsibility. That's what I'm saying.
I'm the one that's going to answer to God for it.
It's my responsibility. And I do have people in place,
particularly my wife, because she's well aware of our
principles of music and she knows what I'm looking for.
But many times she'll come to me and she'll say, what do you
think about this song? Here's here's what I found out
about it. Here's the author.
Here's the, you know, here's the, this is what it sounds
like. What do you think?
And I have to make a decision. And sometimes it's, well, I
think that'll be fine. There's nothing wrong with that.
Or sometimes it's like, I think that's I think that's going to
take us in the wrong direction. We can't, we can't do that song.
And if I'm the gatekeeper than the wrong music is if I'm not
the gatekeeper, than that wrong music is going to slip in and
it, and it's going to become Levin.
Levin that's going to increase and all of these principles that
we're going to talk about, they can all be true and, and and we
can have them and they can be something that we say we hold in
place. And we can say that these are
principles that that we hold for our church.
And this is the principles that we filter all of our music
through. But if a pastor doesn't take the
responsibility of training and inspecting and teaching and
expecting and overseeing and, and you know, then all of these
principles. They're not going to be taught,
they're not going to be enforced.
And who cares if you have them in place if the music that we're
singing is violating the very principles that we say that we
have. And I'm going to stand before
God someday and answer to him for what happened in this
church. And it's a, it's a great
responsibility on my shoulders. I'm going to answer to God for
what happened. I'm going to answer to God for
the direction of this church. And if I allow the music to come
in and move us away from where we should be, then I'm the one
that's going to answer for that. So of course, I'm going to do
everything that I can to make sure that our music is straight.
And I'm sorry if it offends you that I said no, you couldn't
sing that song. But I'm the one that's going to
answer to God for the church, not you.
Now, maybe God will judge you. I don't know if God's going to
judge you for introducing the wrong kind of music when you
knew that that it was wrong, or maybe you didn't know it was
wrong. But that's why it's my
responsibility. And that's why this first point
is that music must be overseen by the pastor.
Your responsibility as somebody who sings music in this church
is simply to follow the guidelines that we've laid out
to make sure that everything that's done in our church in the
area of music is pleasing to the Lord.
So it is my responsibility to oversee the music.
The pastor has the responsibility to oversee the
music in the church. But here's the second principle
#2 church music must be sung and played by spirit filled Saints
who are in dwelt with God's Word.
Let's turn over to First Peter chapter 2.
See, when you're dealing with the music issue, God always
begins with the spiritual condition of the church and with
the individual singers and those who are playing instruments and
everything else. It's your responsibility as
somebody who is singing music and doing music in the church to
make sure that you are filled with the Spirit of God while
you're singing and doing that music and doing that doing the
playing first first Peter chapter 2 verse 5.
Ye also as lively stones are built up a spiritual house and
holy priesthood to OfferUp spiritual sacrifices acceptable
to God by Jesus Christ sound congregational singing and
that's why this is not just for the people who are singing
specials. It's the entire congregation.
All of us are participate in congregational singing.
Sound congregational singing requires a spiritual house made
of living stones. That's what the Bible says.
And that's referring to born again people who are actively
functioning as holy priests in that priesthood role.
Turn over to Ephesians chapter 5.
We find the definition of spirit filling in the context of
Ephesians chapter 5 and verse #18 Ephesians chapter 5 and
verse #18 and be not drunk with wine, wherein is excess, but be
filled with the Spirit. What that means is, and that's
why we say let's go back a couple verses and look in the
context. It means not controlled by
anything other than the Spirit of God, verse 11 or sorry, verse
18. Not drunk with wine, not the
works of darkness as we read about in verse #11 spirit filled
means not spiritually asleep, not carnal, not lukewarm, right?
Verse 14 Wherefore he saith, awake thou that sleepeth, and
arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.
Listen, it's, it's, it's not for the carnal Christian to get up
and sing in front of the congregation.
You ought to be spirit filled when you get up to sing in front
of the congregation. And, and it's your
responsibility to make sure that you are filled with the Holy
Spirit. Now, most people are not going
to know, right? Most people are not going to
know when you stand up in front of the congregation to sing what
you have going on in your life. They're not going to know what
you have hidden in your heart. They're not going to know
necessarily. If you are filled with the
spirit now, it will become obvious at some point, but it's
your responsibility to be spirit filled when you get up to sing.
What is it that that makes somebody get up and sing and and
emulate the world in the way that they sing?
Even if the words are fine, you can sing a hymn in the wrong
way, right? What is it that makes you want
to emulate the pop stars and all of that stuff, right?
I mean, CCM is, is nothing but pop music with Christian words,
right? And when you're listening to all
of those things, you get up and sing like that.
A lot of it has to do with the fact that you're not filled with
the Spirit. Now these these CCM artists all
want to talk about how they're filled with the God, you know,
they're filled with the Spirit and God's just working through
them and all of these other things.
The second they get the opportunity to crossover and go
into pop, they do it. It's not the spirit filling them
that's giving them the the ability to sing these songs and
do this music and all of that stuff.
It doesn't have anything to do with that in most cases.
I'm sure there's probably exceptions, but you look at the
lives of most of these people who are singing the CCM songs,
they live wicked lifestyle. They're no different than then
people on tour who are, you know, doing drugs and all of
these other kind of things. And, and, and you think that's
far out. It's not far out.
They do that. That's, that's the lifestyle of
many of these people who are in the contemporary Christian music
bands today. Their lifestyle is wicked,
wicked. And then they're going to get up
and, and, and try to give you this emotional experience where
you are meeting with God. And then they go back to their
camper and smoke their drugs again.
That's, that's, that doesn't have anything to do with being
Spirit filled. And that's why it's so important
then that we as musicians or people who are singing in the
congregation, or people who are playing instruments or whatever
it is, are filled with the Spirit.
Because being filled with the Spirit means not careless and
not foolish, but rather walking in God's will.
Look what He says in verse #15 See then that you walk
circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time,
because the days are evil. Wherefore be you not unwise, but
understanding what the will of the Lord is.
And that's when He moves in to verse #18 And be not drunk with
wine, wherein is excess, but be filled with the Spirit.
And why? Speaking to yourselves in psalms
and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in
your heart to the Lord. We get another look into that
idea in Colossians chapter 3. Turn over there with me, if you
will. We're talking about this idea
that church music must be sung and played by people who are
filled with God's Spirit, who are indwelt with the Word of
God. And that's what Colossians
chapter 3 is talking about. Verse #16 Let the word of Christ
dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing
another. Here again in psalms and hymns
and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the
Lord. To let the word of Christ dwell
in you richly is another description of the foundation of
a spiritual song service. How you think about the the word
of Christ is to dwell in you. That word you is plural.
It's to dwell in the entire church body, not just in a few
people. Every member is to be filled
with the Spirit and being filled with the Word of God.
That happens when every member is born again.
That's why it's so important, again, as the pastor, for me to
be the gatekeeper and making sure that we are not letting
people into membership who are not saved.
There ought to be a regenerate church membership.
And when you have a church full of people who are not even
saved, you're going to go in the wrong direction.
You're not filled with the Spirit if you're getting up and
singing and you're not even saved.
You're not filled with the Spirit if you're playing an
instrument and you're not even saved, right?
You can't be filled with the Spirit if you don't know Christ
as your Savior. So it's important that you
understand that to be filled with the Spirit, you have to be
a Christian to make that happen. And it's, it's not only left to
the musicians that are in front of the crowd, It's for all of
us. All of us should be filled with
the Spirit as we sing. That word of God is to dwell
richly. It's to fill our minds and our
hearts. The church must be immersed in
the Scripture. That's why I put such an
emphasis on making sure that we are memorizing God's Word.
How else are you going to be filled with the Scripture unless
you are reading it and studying it and memorizing it?
Those are all things that we should be doing collectively so
that when we sing hymns together, we are spirit filled
and it's actually reaching the ears of God.
Every believer is to let the word of God dwell.
It's a choice. Let the word of God, let the
word of Christ dwell in you richly.
We have a choice. We have a choice on whether or
not we're going to do that. I can fill my life with
Scripture. I can read it.
I can learn how to study it and understand it.
I can delight in it. I can meditate on it day and
night. I can test everything by the
word of God. I can exercise my my spiritual
senses as we read about in Hebrews chapter 5, but the word
of Christ is to dwell in all believers.
The Bible says in all wisdom, the word of God must produce
spiritual wisdom in the lives of God's people.
It's not an intellectual exercise.
It's not a matter of just just reading and and and learning and
memorizing. The word of God must get down
into every part of our lives and then our lives must be conformed
to the will of God to sing, he says with grace in your hearts
to the Lord. That's a description of born
again people who are engaged with the Lord from the heart.
They're abiding in Christ. They're communing with Christ,
they're walking with him, they're walking in the light
with him. They're the people who are
making changes in their lives when those things are exposed by
the preaching of the word of God.
Listen there there's we, we, we, we have a lot of new Christians
in our church, a lot of, a lot of people who have never really
been discipled in their lives. Lots of, lots of you are in that
category. And you're, you hear a lot of
things from God's word that you've never been taught before.
It is important that you respond to those messages and that you
respond to the leading of the Holy Spirit.
That's how you're going to be draw closer to him.
That's how you're going to walk in the Spirit.
That's how that's how the Spirit fills you.
You go with the light that you have right?
You might, you might have claimed ignorance before because
I didn't know. I've never heard that before.
But once you've heard it once, you've seen it from the Word of
God, and we don't, I don't get up here and preach a message
unless it's bathed in Scripture. You know that my messages have
just verse after verse after verse because it's not my ideas,
it's God's ideas. And when I show you these things
from the Word of God, your responsibility is to do what the
Word of God says. Not well.
One day I'll make that decision. One day I'll start doing that.
One day I'll stop doing that. Whatever it happens to be, when
you find out what God's Word says, you have the
responsibility to do what God's Word says.
If you want to be spirit filled, you don't have the choice to
decide. I'll do that later.
You need to do it now because He's showing you these things
now and it, and sometimes I know that it that it's a difficult
decision because, well, I've never done that before or I've
always done this fill in the blank, whatever it happens to
be. God speaks to our hearts about
lots of different things. But if you want to be spirit
filled, then you have to do what God says when you find out what
God is saying. And it's the responsibility of
all of us to do that. It's important to make those
changes. Once we're given those changes
from the word of God. There are people who are saved
by grace or walking in grace. Those are the type of people
that sing with grace in your hearts to the Lord.
No other kind of people can sing in that way.
I'll be honest with you. That's why you know, people come
in from the outside and they say, wow, something, something
about the service was just different than anything I've
ever experienced before. You know why?
Because the Holy Spirit is here. It's hollow when it's empty,
when you're going to these massive mega churches and all
they're doing is just putting on a performance and the people are
up there, you know, making money and they don't care.
They wouldn't be doing it if they weren't getting paid for
it. They're just doing it because
they're performing, because somebody's giving them money to
do it. It doesn't have anything to do
with, I want to draw these people closer to Christ.
I want to make sure I'm filled with the holy.
You can't tell the difference between most of those people and
any other rock band in the world.
They're in fact, they're doing everything they can to look
exactly like the rock bands in the world because they think
they're cool. And then they come in here and
there's a whole church full of people that are filled with the
Spirit singing hymns that are doctrinal and that are based
directly on the Word of God. And all of our hearts are knit
together because it's the same Holy Spirit inside all of us.
And they come in and they say, wow, something's different about
that place. I'll tell you what it is.
The Holy Spirit is here. And that's why it's important
that we all are filled with the Holy Spirit when we sing,
whether you're up here in front of everybody or whether you're
out there and trying to blend in so nobody can hear you sing
because you don't want anybody to hear you sing.
It's all it's, it's the responsibility of all of us to
make sure that we are filled with the Spirit.
How can you expect the song service and the special music to
be spirit filled if the ones who are playing and singing the
music are not? You can't.
You can't and it's not going to be pleasing to the Lord.
We have to desire to be godly in character since we are
ministering godly music. Our example sings the loudest.
And that's why we have you know, we, we have our our our workers
training once a year. And that's why we have a manual
for what we expect you to do and how we expect you to act and how
we expect you to look when you are up here.
You are an example. You are leading the music when
you're up here singing, you are leading the music and you are
leading all the other spirit filled people in praise of the
Lord. You are an example to your
children. You are an example to all the
rest of the children that are in here.
You are an example to the adults and to the to the visitors that
come in. You are an example of all of
those things. Worldliness cannot be sanitized.
God doesn't just accept whatever people offer.
Do you personally listen to bad music?
It's going to affect you. You listen to the music of the
world. It's just country music.
It ain't going to hurt anything. Yes, they're singing about a
tear in their beer and the one night stand that they had and
this person that they left and that person that they picked up,
and it's going to affect you. Music is not immoral.
Music is very moral one way or the other.
How can we pray for God's blessing and at the same time
shake hands with the world? You can't have God's blessing
and do that at the same time you're attracted to or addicted
to worldliness in music. Those are the things that we
have to consider if we're going to be spirit filled.
So it's very important, and that's why I'm saying these are
foundational things. Church music must be sung and
must be played by spirit filled Saints who are indwelt with
God's Word. Turn back over to Colossians
chapter 3. I'm going to give you a third
principle, and this one is very, very important #3 the music must
be sound in doctrine. The music must be sound in
doctrine. Colossians chapter 3, verse 16
that we already read makes that very clear.
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom,
teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and
spiritual songs. How do you teach and admonish
and have the word of Christ dwell in you richly and have a
song that is not sound in doctrine?
Right, Which is why it's important that you know what
doctrine is, that you know what the Bible says, that you study
the Word of God to show yourself approved unto God, right?
You need to know what the Bible says so that you can read a song
and read the music to a song or listen to a song being sung and
know if it's doctrinal or not. And there's a lot of songs that
are not doctrinal, especially when you move over into the CCM
side of things. But the words of the songs must
be theologically sound according to the teaching of the Bible.
A great deal of the contemporary Christian music is unacceptable
because it represents charismatic doctrine or or
presents this vague message and it and it lacks that doctrinal
clarity. You know, it's it's called many
times Jim be music. Jesus is my boyfriend, right?
You singing this song and you can't tell if you're singing
about your boyfriend or if you're singing about Jesus,
right, because it's so vague. The music is so vague and the
message of that song is so vague, you can't even tell who
you're talking about, right? But one of the most, I shouldn't
say popular because I don't even really know what's popular, but
I remember when this happened. There's a song called You Light
Up My Life, and I forget. I, you know, I couldn't really
tell you anything else about it. You light up my life, blah,
blah, blah. It was popular in the 90s,
probably. Next thing you know, they're
singing the song in church about Jesus, You Light Up My life.
It was never written to be a song about Jesus.
It was written to be a song about a boyfriend.
But somebody was like, oh, that could apply to Jesus, and they
started singing it. That's not doctrinally sound
music. Oh, it might sound nice.
Oh, you light up my life. It #1 it's so, so, so shallow,
which is what a lot of the songs that are being written today are
so shallow. There's nothing to it.
If you actually start dissecting, it doesn't even say
anything, right? You light up my life.
What does that even mean, right? Not to mention the fact that it
was never written to be about Jesus anyway.
It was written to be about something totally different.
But just because it has a pleasant tune and people like it
does not mean that it's acceptable.
And, and honestly, just because it's in a song book that is good
does not mean it's acceptable. There are some songs that have
been put in song books that that are not acceptable songs, right?
I'll talk some more about that later.
But we want more than just theological soundness.
We want theological depth at the same time we want the richness
of truth. That's going to edify deeply and
it's going to edify broadly. So we don't want only a diet of
what we would call revivalist songs.
Nothing wrong with them, but they were written for mixed
multitude evangelistic outreach services songs, many of them
written by like Ira Sankey for DL Moody's Evangelistic Crusades
and things like that. Nothing undoctrinal about them,
but when all of your music is all of these evangelistic type
songs, it's theologically sound, but there's no theological depth
to them and there's a difference.
Brother Cloud wrote this. Sankey's songs were simple and
direct, appealing to the heart and leading to a decision.
Examples are tell me the old, old story.
There'll be no dark valley. Throw out the lifeline.
Wonderful words of life. I need the every hour, the
cleansing fountain. Faith is the victory.
Trusting Jesus, he says the sword of the Lord's soul.
String songs and hymns is the Sankey revivalist tradition.
They're all good hymns and they have their place, but there was
also a need for hymns of greater spiritual and doctrinal depth to
challenge the people and better educate them and to build them
up to a higher level. And that's where I say there's
there's a difference between theologically sound and
theologically deep. Theologically deep songs bring
us closer to Christ. Right.
Nothing wrong with telling me the old, old story.
It's it's yeah. Tell me that story again.
That's what I got saved on. Right.
Throw out the lifeline. It's great.
It's a great reminder to be a witness for Christ, but it's
not. It's not drawing us deeper into
our relationship with Christ. But you take a song like, oh,
the bitter pain and sorrow that a time could ever be, when I
proudly said to Jesus, all of self and none of thee.
And the song goes on and it's a little of self and a little of
thee, and then it's less of self and more of thee, and then it's
all none of self and all of thee. 4 verses in that song.
Look it up. Oh, the bitter pain and sorrow.
But it's a great song. It's theologically deep.
It moves us to say, wow, I need to have that deeper relationship
with Christ. It's not about me, it's about
him. And I need less of me and more
of him. Those are the songs that drive
at the heart of where we are as Christians.
Right? Throw out the lifeline.
Yeah, I'm already saved. Right?
Tell me the old, old story. It's great.
There's nothing wrong with them. They're doctrinally sound.
But we need some songs that are doctrinally deep to help drive
us deeper in our relationship with Christ.
So the point is that the church's music people have to be
very careful to choose songs with good theological content,
spiritual depth, rather than just those that are shallow or,
or many times just sentimental. We need more spiritual meat.
One of the things that we're going to be doing in the new
year is singing these Psalms. They're very deep theologically
because they're, they come directly from the Psalms.
And, and, and I think it's going to be something that'll help us,
but it comes from the, you know, the Psal trees that Isaac Watts
wrote and Charles Wesley and some of these others.
Those are the 2 popular ones. I say popular, the two that are
the most that, that did the most with it.
I think Charles Spurgeon did some with it as well.
Just just getting to these songs that are theologically deep
because they come directly from God's Word.
And many of the songs that that that speak to us the most or
that mean the most to us or help us the most in our relationship,
there's phrases in there that come directly from God's Word.
And many times we don't even know it until one day we're
reading and we're like, oh, that's where that song came
from. All right.
And that's, that's what makes it theologically sound and
theologically deep. The point here is that every
song must line up with the Word of God if we're going to sing
it. Let me give you a fourth
principle and turn over to Ephesians chapter 5.
We already looked at this one, but I want to look at it from
this angle, if you will. The music must emphasize melody.
And this is where we get into a little bit more of the meat of
what music is. And those who sing and those who
play music will understand a little bit more of these kind of
things. But the melody is, is the
simplest part of the music. It's the basic tune, Ephesians
chapter 5 and verse #19 says speaking to yourselves, speaking
to yourselves and psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,
singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord.
That's the part of the music that can be sung and hummed and
whistled. You know, those are, that's what
you're, that's what you're whistling during the week or
singing during the week. No one ever cared for me like
Jesus, right? All the songs that that, that
just get in your head and stick there.
I wish I had given him more. Those are the songs that are
theologically deep, that drive our relationship with Christ.
By and by, when I look on his face, I wish I had given him
more. That's going to make you make
decisions today that will help change your life, right?
Those. But that's the melody.
And a good melody reinforces the words and helps God's people
remember the words and edify themselves with those words all
throughout the day. By emphasizing the melody, God's
Word is teaching us to keep the music simple so that it doesn't
distract from the message of the words.
There should be a good singable melody and the rest of the music
should not overwhelm that melody.
And, and, and honestly, the music should never be so
complicated or harmonic or loud that it draw drowns out that
simple melody. I remember this and this was
actually a church in this area. Been 10 years ago, probably now,
maybe close to it, but they invited us to come over for a
service that they were doing on it was a different church night,
so different than a church night.
And so I said, all right, you know what, let's go over there.
They invited us, Let's go see. And so we went to, we went to
the service and I mean, for the most part, the, the songs were
fine and everything else. And they sang out of the hymn
book. The choir got up to sing and
they, they used a soundtrack for the choir.
And I get it sometimes, you know, the, the a church doesn't
have the ability to accompany. And so they'll use something
like that. The music on the soundtrack was
so loud that you couldn't even hear the choir singing.
And about halfway through, the drums came in so loud.
Alex was probably 4 years old and he probably doesn't even
remember this. He was sitting there like this.
And I was like, all right, last time we're ever coming to a
service here. But that's what happens.
You can't concentrate on the words of a song when the music
is so loud that that's all you can think about is men.
They need to turn this music down.
It's so loud. I can't hear anything right.
But honestly, that's, that's what most of CCM is, right?
And, and, and, and it's, it's meant to take you on this
emotional journey, right? Every single contemporary
Christian song sounds exactly the same.
Starts off nice and quiet and then it grows and then it builds
and then it builds and then it builds and then it goes back
down to quiet, and then it grows and grows and grows and builds.
And then that, you know, the, the drums are going crazy and
then it goes back down to quiet. And then maybe if, depending on
how long it is, it goes back up there and does the same thing
again and then it goes back down to quiet and it ends.
And usually it ends on a dissonant chord.
There's no resolution in it. And it sounds like there should
be one more note that they play, but they don't actually play
that note. That's one of the that's one of
the ways that you can tell if a song is a contemporary song or
not. It doesn't resolve, the chords
don't resolve, but it's designed to take you on this emotional
journey, right? And honestly, many times that's
what a movie is doing too, right?
There's a little plot at the beginning.
Everything's happening, happening, happening.
And then the climax and then it ends, right?
And they got all the music in the in the middle of it and to
do all the same things to you and everything else.
And sacred music is very different.
It should be a, a simple musical arrangement that's, that's
superior to an overly complicated one.
If, if you have to concentrate so hard on what you're singing
that you can't think about the words, then the music is too
complicated, right? And you're not getting out of
that music what you should be getting out of it because it's,
it's too complicated, right? It should be simple.
It should be easy to hum the tune later on, right?
That's that. Those are principles of music.
The music should emphasize the melody.
Let me give you this number 5 and we'll end with this one
tonight. Music is not neutral.
It is a language. And the message of the music
much must match the message of the lyrics.
I think as we go through this, you'll understand a little bit
more about what I'm talking about, but the foundational
philosophy of CCM, contemporary Christian music, is the idea
that the music is neutral or a moral, and that any style of
music can be used in God's service as long as it's got
Christian words. The music doesn't matter.
The words are what matters. Music is a moral.
Music does not move you in One Direction or another, right?
Music is not godly or ungodly. That's what we mean by, AH,
moral, right? There's a Christian rocker's
creed, and it says this. We hold these truths to be
self-evident. That all music was created
equal, that no instrument or style of music is in itself
evil. That the diversity of musical
expression which flows forth from man is but one evidence of
the boundless creativity of our Heavenly Father.
In other words, what they're saying is it's not the music,
it's the words. So we can rock out to Jesus
loves me if we want to. The music doesn't have anything
to do with that. It's the words, right?
Harold Best, he's he, he wrote a book, but he said this music is
morally relative. It is essentially neutral in its
ability to express belief, creed, moral and ethic,
exactitudes or even worldview. Don Butler, former head of the
Gospel Music Association, said this every style and form of
music can become gospel, whether it's jazz, pop, rock'n'roll or
rap. Rick Warren, that's probably a
name that you'll recognize. He said there's no such thing as
Christian music. They are just Christian lyrics.
But that's why contemporary Christian music is composed of
every music style out there, right?
They have they have head banging Christian music, they have Hard
Rock Christian music, they have pop Christian music, they have
jazz, they have rap Christian music and Christian is used
very, very loosely. That's what they would call it.
But they're saying the music does not matter.
The music is not what makes it Christian or not.
It's the words that make it Christian or not.
And I'll be honest with you, I've been in places before where
Christian music is being played. Christian music is being played,
and you literally have to stop and really concentrate on what's
being said to determine if they're actually playing
something that they're calling Christian or if it's actually
just a pop song that they've found somewhere.
Because you can't tell the difference unless you hear Jesus
in there sometimes. They usually don't say Jesus.
They will say God, or they'll say love, or they'll say, you
know, whatever else. There's other terms that they
use that kind of give you the indication that it's supposed to
be a Christian song. But the concept that music is
neutral is fundamental to contemporary Christian music.
Music is neutral. If you say anything other than
that, the contemporary Christian music does not work.
So as soon as that's accepted, the battle is lost.
It erases all of the boundaries, and the very concept of sacred
music is completely lost. But no one except the defenders
of contemporary Christian music actually believe that music is
immoral. They would say that.
Now, I don't know if they really believe it or not.
They would say that, but they're the only ones who defend that
anyway. If all musical styles are
neutral, then why does a military March never sound like
a romance ballad, right? Why do you not play a military
March to try to put your baby to sleep at night, right?
Why does the military not March to lullabies, right?
If all music is our moral, then it should all do the same thing
for us, right? I mean just something that
simple proves that that that music is not our moral.
The reason that that music is not is that music is not
neutral. Music itself is a language.
Rock and rollers don't believe that music is neutral.
Tons and tons and tons of quotes.
Timothy Leary, 1960s LSD guru, pop culture hero.
He said this. Don't listen to the words.
It's the music that has its own message.
A rock historian by the name of Robert Palmer wrote a book
called The Illustrated History of Rock'n'roll.
He said the transformative power of rock lies in the music
itself. You think about even even movie,
movie text creators, you know, the sound they create these
soundtracks, they don't believe that music is neutral.
You think about, you know, they know the different styles of
music that create different emotional responses, right?
If, if something is supposed to be creepy, the music changes and
it's got a creepy sound to it, right?
If the music, you know, some, some football team finally made
it to the championship and they're about to win and what
the music is behind, it's not some creepy sound in music, is
it? No, it's this big full
orchestration that's meant to make you feel like, yeah, they
just won the game, right? Why is that?
It's because music is not neutral and they know it.
They're not Christians. They know that music is not
neutral. John Debney, he was one of the
top composers of movie music. He said this.
I think music is the voice of the soul, of the emotional
fabric of the film. Orchestra, composers,
conductors, they don't believe that music is neutral.
Every style of music that's played by an orchestra creates
different feelings and thoughts in the people who are listening
to it. Howard Hanson, he's he directed
the prestigious Eastman School of Music for 40 years.
He said this music can be philosophical or orgiastic.
It has powers for evil as well As for good.
Frank Garlock, maybe it's the name you recognize.
He wrote a book called The Language of Music.
He graduated from the Eastman School of Music and was
underneath this guy and, and obviously it had a big impact on
him. But the Christian rockers Creed
that music that that that no music style is evil, denies the
very fact that man is evil and that he can create evil in his
art or in his music. If if there's no if, if music
itself is not evil, then it's taking out the fact that man can
actually be evil. The first musical instruments
were made by the sons of Cain, and they were in open rebellion
to God in their lives. It's ridiculous to think that
they were using those instruments as anything other
than evil, right? The Christian rockers creed that
no music style is evil denies the existence of Satan as the
God of this world. The devil hates God and and he's
attempted to corrupt everything that God has created.
He's called the God of this world in second Corinthians
chapter 4, The spirit that now worketh in the children of
disobedience. That's what that's what he's
called and he's working through them through music, right?
Why is it that that when people are, are, are getting strung out
on drugs and everything else, they're not listening to some
nice little ballad. They're not listening to
Christian hymns. They're rocking out to hardcore
metal music and you know, the head bang and stuff and all of
that. Why is that?
It's because that music is driving them to, it's demonic,
it's devil music, right? Turn over to 1st Corinthians
chapter 14 coming to a close here.
Music is one of the most powerful influences in society.
To think that the devil has not corrupted music for his own
wicked purposes and for sensual enticement of fallen man is
contrary to everything that the Bible teaches.
So the issue then for for a Christ honoring believer is to
find the devil's fingerprints in music and then reject that
music. The Bible is very plain and
teaching us that music is not neutral.
Different styles of music present different messages and
have different emotional effects.
You think about in Exodus when when Moses came down from the
mountain and there's Aaron with the golden calf and all the
people are dancing around naked, right?
What was it that Moses said? There's the sound of war in the
camp. Certainly didn't sound like
music, right? But if it was the same music
that they had played in the Tabernacle and in the temple and
all of the instruments out there and, and singing praise to the
Lord, do you think they would have been dancing around a
golden calf naked? Probably not, right?
It's the music that drove them to those things, because music
is not neutral, no matter how much you want to claim that it
is. The Bible also talks about music
in First Samuel 16 as being a refreshing sound.
There's all kinds of different sounds of music, and depending
on what sound you're listening to, it's going to turn your
spirit one way or the other. Paul teaches that music is a
language in First Corinthians verse, chapter 14 verse #7 and
even things without life giving sound, whether pipe or harp,
except they give a distinction in the sounds.
How shall it be known what is piped or harp for if the trumpet
give an uncertain sound, who shall prepare himself to battle?
If the people know that they should be preparing themselves
for battle and the trumpeter blows a tune and it's the wake
up tune, what in the world? What is that, right?
They're not going to go get ready for battle because the
trumpets blowing an uncertain sound, right?
Music is a language and in fact it's one of the most powerful
languages in human society. Music, and I don't know exactly
who it was that called this, called it this, but music has
been called the language of the soul and the language of the
emotions. Turn over to one last passage in
First Thessalonians chapter 5. See.
So in Christian music, the message of the music must match
the message of the lyrics, and both of them must be spiritual
in their character. That's the very definition of
sacred music or styles of music that preach a message that's
contrary to God's Word. And those are the things that
should be avoided in the service of a holy God.
So we have to exercise discernment if we are going to
be choosing sacred music. Some of the questions that we
have to ask what, what kind of message is this music
presenting? Same thing in the type of in the
music that you're listening to, right?
What it what would what would Christ say if he was sitting
next to me listening to this song about this topic, right?
Does the message of the music fit the message of the lyrics?
We must do exactly what the Bible says.
First Thessalonians chapter 5 and verse #21 prove all things,
hold fast that which is good, abstain from all appearance of
evil. So since music is a language,
God's people must be very careful and we must very wisely
test the language of every piece of church music and even use
that to test the music that you listen to in your home, in your
car, wherever you happen to be. What is what is the music that
you listen to say about you? What does it say about your
spirituality? Could somebody listen to the
music that you listen to and say this is a person who is
obviously very close to the Lord?
Or does the music that you listen to say this is a person
who might claim to be a Christian because this is not
horrible music, but they're probably just kind of nominal in
their relationship with the Lord?
What you listen to says a lot about where you're at in your
spiritual life. You want to you want to do a
self evaluation. What are you listening to?
What is the predominant message
that you are bringing in through music?
You want to determine how spiritual your home is.
What kind of music are you playing in your home throughout
the day? What kind of music is drifting
into yours and your children's ears?
That'll tell you where you're at spiritually, right?
Because music is not immoral. Music is not neutral.
Music is a language, and the language of the music must match
the message of the lyrics. It matters.
You Can't Sing a Christian song to rock music.
Rock music was designed to be wicked, wicked music, and the
people who created it will tell you that in a heartbeat.
It was designed for that. And then we're going to take
that wicked music and put Christian words to it and expect
that God's going to bless it. God can't bless that.
It's not his music. It's the devil's music, right?
The same thing with all of these other pop music, jazz, I mean,
all of those. Anything other than sacred music
has its roots and something that was not based on the word of
God. So where's your music, right?
These are these are these are the basic principles.
We're going to get into some more specific things when we get
back to this, but these are things that you have to
determine before you even start looking for music, right?
Where are you? Where's your base?
Where are you starting at? Where are you?
Where are you coming from with your music?
You have to understand the basic principles of music if you're
going to understand how to choose music that is honoring
and pleasing to the Lord, right? And that's what we, that's what
we want to do in this church. We want our music to be as, as,
as pleasing to the Lord and as edifying to the people who are
listening to it as possible, right?
So we have to have some tests that we put the music to, to
determine whether this is music that is pleasing to the Lord or
not. These are the basics, right?
These are the, these are the foundational principles.
And we'll talk about some more of those as we move forward over
the next few weeks. All right, let's pray.
Father, again, we thank you so much for your goodness to us.
We thank you for the opportunity that we've had to be here
tonight. Thank you for the fact that your
word is so clear on so many things.
And music is one of those. God, may you help us.
May you help us to play godly music, Christ honoring music in
our homes. May you help us in our church
to, to land on the principles that are going to give us the,
the, the most help through the music services and through the,
through the ministry of music here in this church, God.
And may you use it to help us be what you want us to be.
And may you, may you help us to figure these principles out,
understand these principles so that we can determine for
ourselves what is going to be right and pleasing to you.
And may you help us as a church to always be going up and to the
right. May you help us to be going
forward for the cause of Christ. God, may you help us to get
closer to you in the process. Again, we thank you for all that
you do for us. In Jesus name, Amen.