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Turn to and read Romans 12:1-2
In these verses, particularly vs. 2, Paul warns us of a battle.
It is a battle of conformity.
The world, under the control of Satan, desires to conform you into a particular image.
That is exactly the battle that Daniel and the three Hebrew children faced in Babylon.
Those in charge in Babylon even went so far as to give them new names, names designed to help them begin to accept the religion of the Babylonians.
We face the same battle - the battle of conformity - today, in 2019!
Digital screens, and the algorithms that orchestrate their flickering pixels, know you better than you know yourself.
Actually, the marketers behind the algorithms know who they would like you to be so they can sell you things.
Almost everything we buy carries a latent message: the people who purchase such-and-such are [fill in the blank].
The next time you pick up a consumer catalog or watch a YouTube before-the-video ad, pause to think, What is the identity being sold here?
Kinnaman, David.
Faith for Exiles (p.
46).
Baker Publishing Group.
Kindle Edition.
Satan knows us better than we know ourselves.
Satan knows what he would like us to be.
He uses objects in the physical world to feed our hearts with the spirit of error.
So, the next time you watch a movie, or begin listening to that music, or reading that book, ask yourself, “What is the identity being sold here?”
Last week we began looking at the powerful voice of Music as a tool that our enemy successfully uses to corrupt hearts with the spirit of error.
Again, we must remember that ultimately, Satan’s desire is to completely destroy our spiritual purpose and significance.
What Music Produces in the Heart
I feel reluctant to give into the seduction of music created by so disturbed a mind and so dangerous (or impenetrably hard) a heart as his, for fear that I might develop some of the same ugly thoughts.
When I listen to the music of a great composer I feel that I am, in some sense, becoming one with him, or letting a part of him inside me.
I also find this disturbing with popular music, because surely some of the purveyors of pop are crude, sexist, racist, or all three.
Levitin, Daniel J.. This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession (p.
243).
Penguin Publishing Group.
Kindle Edition.
Turn to and read Exodus 19:7-8.
Notice the decision that the Israelites made:
Turn to and read Exodus 32:1-2, 7-8, 17-19, 25.
In these passages of Scripture we see the “moral slide” that Israel experienced.
They went from being a people who said, “All that the Lord hat spoken we will do,” in Exodus 19:8 to being a people described in Exodus 32:25
And right along with it, you could say, was the Israelites choice in music.
Now, you might argue that the music was a product, not the cause of Israel’s problems.
But I will contend, as I did last week, that the music was a type of fuel that further inflamed the spiritual mess that the Israelites found themselves in.
Consider...
A person’s lifestyle will always in part be the product of their music.
You cannot immerse yourself into a musical style without being shaped by that style.
Carnal music enlarges and feeds the problems of the flesh until they are consuming.
So, as Christians, what must we do?
Submitting Our Heart to God’s Voice
We live in a society that sees very few connections in many areas.
The Bible contradicts the way most people, even Christians, live by proclaiming connections between our view of God and every other area of life.
Music is included in the connections, but it may very well be the least examined area of a Christian’s life.
Believers desperately need to realize that God’s Word demands us to make wise choices even in our entertainment.
How dare we think music is exempt from examination?
Everson, Dana.
Sound Roots: Steps to Building a Biblical Philosophy of Music (Kindle Locations 215-218). .
Kindle Edition.
God’s Word is relatively silent on musical styles - especially those that exist today.
Therefore, we must rely on biblical principles to guide us.
Godly music assists the work of the Holy Spirit.
Our music should reflect a new song after salvation.
When you came to Christ, He made you a new creature.
Old things are passed away!
You are no longer your own - you belong to God and everything in your life should be at God’s discretion and for His glory.
Our music should be different from the world’s music.
Most contemporary “Christian” musicians are following, conforming in close step with the world when it come to musical style and delivery.
“...With “This Is The Kingdom,” Skillet (a “Christian” rock band) pounds out the beatitudes with a heavy, Imagine Dragons-esque percussive groove.”
(Imagine Dragons is the name of a alternate rock band.)
https://www.ccmmagazine.com/reviews/skillet-victorious-review/
Rather than being a “peculiar people” who are different from the world, we appear to actually envy the world - so much so that we are working overtime to make our Christianity just like it.
Our music should be songs, hymns, and spiritual songs.
Again, I point back to Ephesians 5:19
and Colossians 3:16
Spiritual songs speak to the heart about God, both in words and in styles.
Every son without words has three distinct parts: melody, harmony, and rhythm.
Most of the world’s music speaks to the flesh with rhythms that vulgarize our human existence with sensuality.
Hal Zeiger, one of the first promoters of rock entertainment in the 1950’s, was quoted in 1968 in Life magazine:
“I knew that there was a big thing here that was basic, that was big, that had to get bigger.
I realized that this [rock] music got through to the youngsters because the big beat matched the great rhythms of the human body.
I understood that.
I knew it and I knew there was nothing that anyone could do to knock that out of them.
And I further knew that they would carry this with them the rest of their lives."
Putting Christian words to these rhythms doesn’t change the spiritually carnal message of the rhythms themselves.
These rhythms stir up anger, bitterness, hatred, despair, depression, sensuality, or lust.
The spiritual songs that the Scriptures speak of would never take your heart or your body in such a direction.
yet, most of our popular music today - even that which claims to be Christian - does exactly that.
Our music should be joyful.
We must die to self and submit to God in our musical choices.
Many people think that music is a personal choice based upon what the individual likes or dislikes.
As one preacher said, “Since when did what we like become our method of determining what is right?!”
Some are unwilling to submit to God’s Word, considering it too restrictive on their lifestyle.
They essentially live for self during the week, doing what pleases them even if that means disobeying the Lord.
Gary Reimers, “The Glory Due His Name: What God Says about Worship”
So, I end this message in the same way as I did last week; by asking you this question:
Do you value the spiritual condition of your heart more than you value the entertainment of the world’s voices?
Submit to God and apply Biblical principles to your music choices.
Purify your heart by getting rid of wrong music.
Ask God for discernment to listen to His voice; to listen to the spirit of truth
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