Music To The Glory of God

I love playing the mandolin. My new Weber F Gallatin is opening up and sounding better-and-better all the time. Someday it will be a great instrument for one of my grandchildren or someone else who wants to play music to the glory of God.

The last couple months I have learned an old fiddle tune titled Cluck Old Hen, and Sunday afternoon the band I play with is providing the music at our towns 100th Birthday Party.

We had a Christian contemporary music duo in church two Sunday's ago. They call themselves Temple Veil. They did a fantastic arrangement of the hymn Jesus Paid It All which I am trying to learn on the acoustic guitar. Theirs is a masterful arrangement where that old classic hymn is brought to life with contemporary instruments. It is really good.

If you play music and you are a believer in Christ, keep playing. Practice. Don't stop. Pick up your instrument(s) everyday. Make playing them part of your lifestyle. If you are a beginner don't give up. Playing music (at first anyway) is very hard, but don't give up. Keep at it. If you are talented enough to write some songs do that to God's glory. Your songs can even be instrumentals.

Martin Luther, one of my spiritual hero's said, "Next to the Word of God, the noble art of music is the greatest treasure in the world." The only thing that I would ad to that is family and friends (which are tremendous gifts from God as well). But, just imagine the word without music. Now, I can think of a couple genres of music that the world would probably be better off without, but most musical genres at least have some positives qualities.

Luther also said, "Next to theology I give to music the highest place and honor. And we see how David and all the saints have wrought their godly thoughts into verse, rhyme, and song." Music played to the glory of God is a glorious thing. The German reformer thought so highly of music that he said, "The devil does not stay where music is." Now I am sure that he was talking about the hymns and Christian music of his day and his culture. Songs with biblical lyrics, even today, surely would run the devil off the same way that a quoted Bible verse does the same ( Matthew 4:11).

So play, write, sing, and listen to music that is beautiful and magnifies the Lord. I confess I listen to secular music (oldies, classical, old country, bluegrass, music from the 30s, 40s, and early 50s) and yes I switch it off when the lyrics are immoral or are not God honoring. But I'm always drawn back to songs and music that are God-centered and Christ-honoring.

(photo is of Martin Luther playing music in his home with family and friends.)

Christmas Season Songs

Last Saturday evening I had the opportunity to spend two hours watching one of my "musical hero's" sing and play his greatest hits. I've been listening to Gordon Lightfoot for forty years. Over seventy years old now, his voice a slight bit slurred and also raspy from cigarettes (he admitted during the concert), he still put on an amazing show.

His was the first and only concert I remember attending where the sound was near perfect. We could hear every word, every instrument, and every key change. Sitting there I wondered how many times he's sang some of his hits in a concert setting and as we listened to The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald it seemed like Lightfoot had the three-thousand of us in the palm of his hand. Nobody moved. We were focused on him and his band on the stage.

But as I thought about it on the drive home, I thought how sad it was that the concert was mostly Godless. Yes, he asks the question in the Edmund Fitzgerald song, "Does anyone know where the love of God goes when the waves turn the minutes to hours," and it's a good question and is mainly, I think, what the biblical Book of Job is about. But if I remember correctly none of the other songs contained references to God.

And then I remembered something I thought about during last years Christmas Season while I was listening to Frank Sinatra sing a Christmas Carol. What came to mind last year was how empty the Christmas Carols sounded from Frank, Dean, and Bing, James Taylor, or George Strait. The same songs sung by Fernando Ortega, Michael W. Smith, Stephen Curtis Chapman, Chris Tomlin, and Casting Crowns sound different somehow and I think I know why. It's because of the joy of the Lord in those artist's lives. It's the reality of Christ in that individual's life.

Joy is one of the fruit of the Spirit (Galatians 5:22). Part of Psalm 16:11 says, "In Your [God's] presence is fullness of joy." Let Psalm 33:1-3 sink deeply into you being, "Sing for joy in the LORD , O you righteous ones; praise is becoming to the upright. Give thanks to the LORD with the lyre; sing praises to Him with a harp of ten strings. Sing to Him a new song; play skillfully with a shout of joy."

I believe that joy in the Lord is the difference. And when Christian artists sing Christmas Carols the reality of Christ, and the inward joy of knowing they are His, comes through in their voices.

You know what, I love and listen to all sorts of different music including all of the singers I've mentioned including Gordon Lightfoot. But this Christmas Season I'm going to purpose to sing and play all of the well-known Christmas songs with the joy of the Lord bubbling over in my life because I'm one of His. I'm going to listen to Christian radio and cd's hearing the joy of the Lord coming through loud and clear.

You too?

Dan