God's favourite sound?

01Aug06

I've been spending the last month or so thinking a lot about songs. Particularly the songs that I've been working on. It can become a very consuming process. Does it sound cool? Is it a singable melody? Are the lyrics fresh? Will people love it or hate it? Is it better than other songs I've written? Does it capture emotion? They are all good questions and worth thinking about - but recently I realised that there was one key question that I was failing to ask. That is, 'God, what do you think about this song?'

I think God's verdict over our songs has much less to do with musicality and creativity. Rather God looks at the heart behind the song. Reading Amos 5 shatters all our pretences that God is impressed by our new songs and recordings, if our hearts are far from Him and far from the poor.

I hate, I reject your festivals,
I will not stomach your assemblies.
Even though you offer me burnt offerings
and your grain offerings,
I won't accept them;
and the peace offerings of your prize beasts
I won't approve.
Spare me the roar of your songs;
I won't listen to the music of your guitars.
Amos 5:21-23 (Postmodern Bible)

The message of Amos is clear. God is looking for a people for whom social justice is the indispensable expression of true worship. The Lord was enraged to see His people trample the poor and abuse the weak and yet gather together to offer up extravagent gifts of worship. As a result the sound of their songs had become meaningless and detestable in God's sight. God simply refused to listen to the sound of hypocrisy.

It puts song writing into perspective. If I want to please God with the songs I write, then I need to live a life of love. As James says, 'Religion that God our Father accepts as pure and faultless is this: to look after orphans and widows in their distress and to keep oneself from being polluted by the world' (1:27). I've been feeling really challenged in my life about what I place priorities on. God's heart breaks and beats for the poor, the downtrodden, the abused, the fatherless, the lonely, and the hurting. If I am not allowing my heart to feel the same sense of passion for these people then I may write a song that I love, but in God's ears it will be an unpleasant sound. He'll be looking down saying, 'spare me Tim.' I'm trying to learn what it means to love the poor and to be honest at the moment I'm way off. But I'm on a journey - God is gracious, but the call is overwhelmingly clear.

I end with these words from David Ruis, "The fragrance of worship is justice...where there is no justice, there is no fragrance."

Mate- great post! I've been thinking alot about these issues.
I was thinking particularly at Focus, how it's great to meet together and spur each other on to go for it with God but we're in danger of falling into a trap of it being all about our faith with God.
You take a look around you and realise that reality is something else and that quite often we are living in our own little christian world. These lyrics came to mind:
Let's live it and and not just sing it
Let's do it and not just talk about it - that's going deeper with God.
It's our duty to write great songs that talk about this but then spur us to actualey do something about it because they're so powerful. 'God of Justice' is a song that i think does this. First time I heard it was last year at Focus when we did it in Students. It blew me away and got me thinking about how i need to change.
So... keep going mate!

huggy

01Aug06

yeah in worship central i remember about 3 songs into the evening meeting saying to God i wanna go deeper, cos if you want a buzz you can go to any old gig, but God's more than that. thats why the ecclesiastes verse is cool- stand in awe of God. i'm getting bored of empty words, and sometimes the only thing you can do is be there silent with your heavenly dad.
was reading an extract from the screwtape letters, where screwtape says that in hell they luckily dont have to put up with random thoughts cos they get drowned out by the noise. no music or silence, just noise. its awesome satire.

its cool what youve said about the heart tim. but nonetheless happy day is a banging song. happy indeed. and better than mr brightside...

laurence

01Aug06

Tim - hope the recording is going OK. Just thought I'd pass on a comment I read from Eugene Peterson the other day, to the effect that true worship is found in the meeting of Intimacy and Reverence. Too much of the former and it becomes cosy and sentimental, too much of the latter and it is cold and remote. Get it right and it is wonderful - I'll pray that for your writing & recording....

grahamt

02Aug06

Hello Tim,

I have seen you many times at HTB and the worship is great. I can see how you have make sure you keep focus on God and view ourselves as selfless in terms of the worship. I'm currently planning my dissertation on music and worship (Anglican in particular) and it partly relates to the things you blog about. You seem to refer to scripture regularly in terms of worship and it's relation to the Bible; I hadn't come across Amos 5 before but its verses are very helpful.

Take Care...

Richard

03Aug06

Thank you for this - it has been running around in my mind for a few weeks now - this thought of how God views not only our songs, but our church services - is he pleased, or is he frustrated? Is it a fragrant aroma the praise that we lift to Him, or just kind of a smelly cloud of smoke? The verses in Amos make it so clear where God is looking and what He is looking for . . . helping the present day church to understand that and know that worship is EVERYTHING! We live in such an age of consumers and that mentality flows over into the church so much - helping them to open their hearts so that God can minister to them seems to be an ever growing challenge.

tdiller

05Aug06

Amos 5.

It would make a good name for a band.

Fascinating insight into that passage. Awesome to see how you're 'keeping it real'. And James 1:27 is certainly a key verse behind what we do at Care for Children.

Thomas

thomas

06Aug06

Hi Tim,

I've never heard of the 'Postmedern Bible' translation before. Is it good?

jnelso

07Aug06

tim, love the new song "happy day". really enjoyed it in church tonight (last night, by now) and loved listening to it again on worship central. keep at it friend!

actionman

28Aug06

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