Mike Rimmer and Tony Cummings investigate the pop song lyric and how they have the capacity to do us good or harm.

Carman

One of the most commonly held misconceptions about Christian music is that, apart from music specifically designed for worship, or music with lyrics containing an unflinching evangelistic message, Christian music has no particular spiritual function. But, in reality, a careful examination of the lyrics of any random selection of CCM CDs would reveal that it's neither worship nor evangelism which constitutes the main lyrical direction of most albums. Instead, it is songs which strive to impart some spiritual insight or to exhort believers to keep going in their faith which are in the preponderance. In other words, it is the spiritual gifts of teaching and encouragement rather than those of worship and evangelism which are most commonly exercised through contemporary Christian music.

This is perfectly valid. Those who criticise Christian music for "preaching to the converted" simply fail to grasp that alongside its role in the aesthetic realm to be enjoyable art, the primary spiritual function for contemporary Christian music in hundreds of thousands of Christians' lives is to be the means of keeping minds set on the spiritual realm. Encouragement of believers is one of the most neglected gifts in the modern Church. Through the vehicle of the album and live concerts, contemporary musicians have addressed this need for ever increasing numbers of church goers. Sadly, in Britain today many young Christians do not avail themselves of CCM, preferring another spiritual food.

You are what you eat goes the old adage so what music are we consuming? It's an important question since the Bible exhorts us, "Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable, if anything is excellent or praiseworthy - think about such things." (Phil 4:8 NIV)

Such clear biblical guidance seems ignored by many Christian teens and young adults. Rather, it would seem that given 15 quid, the average Christian would head down to HMV rather than CLC. This is especially shocking when you consider that the music snobbery of a few years ago which dissed the quality of Christian music no longer applies since Christendom is capable of making music which is every bit as creatively valid and aesthetically pleasing as the mainstream.

Whatever our individual tastes in musical styles, the issue of lyric content needs to be addressed. If we're not listening to Christian music, what is the spiritual content of the music we are consuming? Is it fulfilling the scriptural exhortation or is it at best a neutral listening experience rather than something that provokes our soul to love God more?

In my church we recently had a drug addict who, after becoming a Christian, managed to kick his habit. He became part of the church but his listening habits remained mainly unchanged - hardcore rap and dance including songs with a violent and misogynistic message. When challenged he claimed the songs had no influence on him. Sadly after spending three years in the church, his enthusiasm for God waned and he backslid. Am I saying that if he'd changed his listening habits he would have stayed close to God? Obviously there are other factors but at least listening to positive, uplifting, spirit-inspired music would have helped encourage him in his struggles.

Would you eat a crap sandwich? A shocking question, but it needs to be put to everyone who recently bought the number one best selling album, 'The Marshall Mathers LP' by Eminem. It contains songs that advocate the brutal sodomising of his mother and gang rape of his sister, violence against his wife, sex with dead animals not to mention songs promoting drug and alcohol use. On "Criminal", he even goes as far as saying, "If it's not a rapper that I make it as, (I'll) be a f***ing rapist."

Leaving aside Eminem's proficiency as a rapper, to listen to this music is the spiritual/musical equivalent of eating that unsavoury sandwich. Extraordinarily, there are Christians around who claim that Eminem is just tongue-in-cheek and the music doesn't affect their lives or thinking.

However, take a glance at the life of Marshall Mathers and you discover that the music isn't so far removed from the man who is currently facing a number of court appearances for alleged violence. After recording a couple of songs about murdering his wife, we find that Mrs Kimberley Mathers is reported to have attempted to take her own life in the Detroit home they share.

If Eminem is an extreme example of the lyric as moral and spiritual pollutant, what are we to make of the majority of popular song lyrics? Back in 1993 Tony Cummings created considerable controversy at Greenbelt when he gave a seminar, subsequently reported in some newspapers, suggesting that some records, then in the Top Ten, contained lyrics that made them unacceptable listening for Christians. Since then lyrics have, if anything, deteriorated even further. Today there are plenty of songs played on our radio airwaves full of images of sexual crudity, nihilism and violence. And even the staple diet of pop radio, the love song, is far less innocent than at first appears. Says Tony Cummings about pop song lyrics, "Most come in one of three types and all fly in the face of a biblical world view. One lyrical approach to romantic love has been around since Cole Porter and George Gershwin and is still prevalent in many of the boy bands and teeny pop singers today. It projects romantic love as the answer to all our needs, an emotional and spiritual panacea which will heal every hurt and complete us as human beings. It projects onto a man or woman a set of qualities only God has. It is profoundly dishonest but encourages millions to buy the lie that they'll find ultimate fulfilment once they find that illusive partner.

Eminem

"The second kind of 'love' lyric is one which portrays love as some kind of mysterious force which ensnares helpless victims through its sheer, irresistible power. While the Bible teaches that romantic love contains some act of the will, the pop song writers of this type portray love as an uncontrollable emotional disease, which may take you to the heights of ecstasy but in the process may well ravage wives, children and other suitors caught in its trail.

"The third kind of love lyric is not really a love lyric at all, but a lust lyric. The love word is used when the images and appetites portrayed in the song clearly demonstrate not an emotion and spiritual communion of two people who know and respect each other but an animalistic coupling of strangers."

With so many popular songs failing to reflect a biblical world view it would be tempting for committed Christians to perceive the whole of non-Christian popular music as unhelpful or even harmful in the believer's efforts to grow into Christian maturity. But such a blinkered attitude should not be encouraged. Not only are there large numbers of examples of compositional and performance brilliance by non-Christians in the millions of songs brought to the public since the birth of the gramophone record, but there are undoubtedly many lyrics too which are both excellent examples of the lyric writer's craft and bring many insights on the human condition and the world around us. As has often been observed, Christians do not have a monopoly on truth. Lyric writers as diverse as Bob Dylan, with his scalpel-like incisions of social injustice, to Smokey Robinson with his bitter-sweet invocations of romantic innocence, and hundreds more, have produced much which could enrich all our spirits. There have even been examples, such as Janis lan's towering "What About The Love", where non-believers can powerfully critique the Church. Dismissing all non-Christian music as unacceptable would be a grievous mistake, one the Church has sadly made in the past. Said Midlands pastor John Hart, "In the early 20th century the Church fell into a form of legalism. It felt it could promote holiness of life by telling Christians that going to a cinema, or wearing makeup, or attending a dance, were sinful activities. These teachings have, thankfully, now been exposed as error."

Sadly, though, as Rev Hart pinpoints, the theological pendulum is in danger of swinging back too far. "There is a heresy which has been around since St Paul's time called antinomenism which takes the freedom we have in Christ and distorts it into license. "Let us sin so that grace may abound," they say. Tragically, we can see traces of this attitude today. In many churches you'll find Christians who will happily watch a sexually explicit or gratuitously violent film, or young people who'll listen to gangsta rap records strewn with "f" words and misogynistic statements, and fail to identify the profound spiritual harm these things will do to those who partake of them."

There will of course always be a "grey area" in what is harmful in popular culture. The Pharisees skewed off into error by attempting to draw up ever more complex rules and regulations to define religious acceptability in the minutiae of their culture.

Similarly, trying to draw up precise rules as to what is or is not acceptable to Christian teaching and lifestyle in the vast sweep of modern culture is thwart with problems, particularly to a Church that is still in denial over areas of human experience (for instance, eroticism - check out the Song Of Solomon). All that can be definitely stated for the time being is that Christians, young and old, need to demonstrate great discernment in their cultural diets. Feeding on the vicious brutality of Eminem, or the sweeping xenophobia of the tabloids, or the personality gossip of Hello, or hundreds more examples, will drip feed poison into the partaker's life.

The issue is vital because this generation desperately needs an uncompromising approach to faith where .we throw everything we are into fulfilling our God-given destiny. If we are what we consume, then surely it's time to prayerfully and carefully examine our listening habits. The fact that you're reading this magazine makes us think that you already have more than a transitory interest in Christian music. Let us encourage you to be adventurous and check out the wealth of music in our review pages. Take a risk and order an independently released album or perhaps buy an album for a friend to encourage them.

The Church will only make an impact on our society when we choose to become more radical in our faith. That will only happen when as an individual you decide to follow Christ more passionately. Prayer, worship, Bible study, fellowship - all of these play their part. We at Cross Rhythms firmly believe that Christian music has a part to play in feeding your soul with the inspiring food that will provoke you to love Jesus more.

Music birthed in Heaven is available here on earth to draw us closer to God. So why waste your time on music that expresses anything else? On the oldie "Radically Saved", CCM veteran Carman sang, "I've a cassette in my Walkman pumping Gospel to my brain," making the suggestion that feeding your spirit with God music could only have one result - a more radical walk with Christ.

We leave the final word to Cross Rhythms reader Stuart Blackburn from Manchester. "The reason why I listen to Christian music is because I trust Christians to create something that is actually good for me."