John & GXV on Music & Spirituality

[sue d.]

Interesting piece by both John & Greg Volz on the topic "The Spiritual Significance of Music."

http://www.xtrememusic.org/christian/petra.pdf

[Edward]

Greg said it best. Man was created a tuned instrument for the environment. Our bodies use light and sound waves to function. Doctors and scientists use light and sound waves to test, heal and control humans.

Sue, do you know if the context for "spirituality" was the new-age movement or Christianity? If it was Christianity, John hit it on the head. Nobody needs music for spiritual health per se. But it may be indicative of ones' condition. No music may equate to no praise, thanks, joy, contentness. Just a thought. There ARE people who I consider godly, and they have no place for music. I know a man that hates it, and his music is a music teacher and church pianist. (Can you tell that they were not a match on Harmony.com?)

Some decuced, by the incorrect translation of scripture, that the devil created music while he was the praise team leader in heaven. Just as Greg said, the bible is full of hints that light, sound and our perceptions were all from God.

Where I part ways with John is on the topic of application of music. John subscribes to the thought that Christians should only sing about God and sing about God to people who believe in God. I referenced multiple audio, video and print interviews for verification. That is his rightful preference. It probably insulates him from temptations. But there are other reasons for art. If we substituted music for preaching, witnessing or performing other types of artisitc expression, and limited it to the church, how many others would be saved?

[sue d.]

In this particular version, it was Christianity.

Here's the full project: http://www.xtrememusic.org/

All kinds of interviews in all kinds of arenas. Interesting stuff.

[Edward]

I knew this guy is shallow. He is using spirituality in the secular form:
“Spirituality is universal; it speaks to everyone... I would go as far as to say it is the only truly significant element in music.â€

[epdc]

We would need to analyze what is "bad". If I write a poem about Jesus is good, but if I write a poem about how much I love my boyfriend it is not bad. If I write about the spring it is not bad. There are negative things in this world but not all things are bad.

If John thinks that music should be use to only minister to God, then we gotta apply that same rule to literature, painting, sculpture, dance and other arts. God gave us creativity and creativity has no limits, just imagine that it were a rule in the world about "write, paint, make sculptures, dance, sing, play music but only if it`s a biblical topic, if the topic of your art is God."

I dont think God gets offended after all, we would be making art about His amazing creation, art is made to express something and everything was created by God so hehe we would be making art of something (the whole universe) created by Him, I would see it as an mmmmm what is the word? ya know when you created something (a CD for example) to honor someone else (another singer).

[p-freak]

I believe that creativity is a gift from God to everyone. So if someone is creating a beautiful piece of art (including music), he is bringing glory to God, even when he doesn't believe in God. It's something like the idea of general revelation, which also works through human creativity.

I do disagree with John here, cause he seems to think that all music that is not intended by the artist to glorify God is bad. I've heard him speak about U2 once and he strongly disagreed with their way of communicating their christianity in their music.

Views like this only lead to the current shallowness of the christian music 'industry'. I'd rather have creativity be the leading principle in glorifying God than the amounts of Jesus's in your lyrics. And in the end this means that humans are able to praise God just through using their god-given creativity, without actually realising where it comes from.

[sue d.]

John subscribes to the thought that Christians should only sing about God and sing about God to people who believe in God

I just want to clarify this a bit and since John doesn't frequent chat boards, I'll speak for him a minute.

The picture you painted is rather broad, Eddie. It's more like this: if you call yourself a CHRISTIAN artist and are working in the Christian industry, then be Christian in your music and lyrics and do not use the platform as a stepping stone to the mainstream. That's one thing that really bugs him.

He does not feel that you can ONLY sing about God to believers.... that would be silly. It's more like: If you call yourself a Christian artist and you're in the Christian 'industry,' the main focus of your music and lyrics should be done in a way that there's no question about your Christianity.

Yes, he used to rag on U2 and artists like that. That was a while ago. He's since backed off, having felt that God was telling him He didn't need him as his policeman (there's a quote saying that somewhere... I remember writing it; probably on the old website under "Asked & Answered.").

I do disagree with John here, cause he seems to think that all music that is not intended by the artist to glorify God is bad

No... I don't read that in this quote. He said you can USE music for good or bad purposes.

[gman]

He does not feel that you can ONLY sing about God to believers.... that would be silly. It's more like: If you call yourself a Christian artist and you're in the Christian 'industry,' the main focus of your music and lyrics should be done in a way that there's no question about your Christianity.

Here we go again. I do agree with this point. If you call yourself a Christian and your music is good and will sell a lot of CDs, some company in the Christian industry will take you on regardless of what's in your lyrics. If I go to your show or listen to your CDs and I don't find anything that really tells me that your are a Christian, that says something about you. At least to me it does.

[sue d.]

I KNEW someone was gonna say that!

Hey... I'm not defending, I'm CLARIFYING!

[sue d.]

The online version is now coming out in book form, so if you're interested in pre-orders go here:

http://www.musicandspirituality.com/preorder.html