When U2 and Amy Grant Rocked My World

By Rev. Tim Pauls

The Question

Max and Robbie and I were stretching out before soccer practice, talking music with the team. Robbie’s definition of "good music" was easy: loud and usually about a girl who didn’t wear much. Typical Robbie.

I had a good way of sorting music between good and bad: if it was Christian, it was good. If not, it was bad. That’s why I only listened to Christian radio. That’s why, in four years of high school, I'd dropped about a thousand dollars into Christian music cassettes. Perversely, all of this encouraged Robbie to sing every nasty song he knew in order to embarrass me.

But my definition was easy to work with: Christian music good, non-Christian music bad. I’d have been a great monk in the Middle Ages, living inside a monastery: within the wall good, outside the wall bad. Simple.

It was Max who got me thinking. Ever the cool keeper, he looked around, spat and said, "I got a tape by a new group called U2." He glanced at me and said, "It’s okay because the band is three-fourths Christian."

"Three-fourths Christian"? I was puzzled. Three in the band believed, one didn’t. What did that do to the music? Was every fourth song secular? Every fourth word? Did one non-Christian de-purify the music? Would one believer make a quartet "Christian"? I pondered these questions through the rest of practice. I thought about them so much that I let Robbie by for an easy goal during the scrimmage. I stopped thinking about them while Max had me doing push-ups in the mud for being such a doof during a game. But I was still wondering: what made music "good"?

A few days later, the debate grew. "Didja hear the news on the radio?" asked Liz at lunch. "Amy Grant’s going secular." This was bigger news than you might think. When I was in high school, there were two kinds of Christian artists: Amy Grant and everyone else. Now Amy was going over the wall, and I wasn’t sure what to think.

"Sell-out," said Jay between bites of his sandwich. "She’s joined the world." Cheryl had a different opinion: "It’s not a sell-out.This way she can reach a whole new audience and tell them about Jesus." The debate went on, and the local opinion seemed to be disappointment in Amy. I was confused. If a secular singer mentioned Jesus in a song, we called it a "courageous witness." If a Christian singer cut a secular album, it was wrong. So what made music good or bad?

So I put the question to you:What makes music good or bad? How about books? Movies? Magazines? Food? Stop for moment before you read on: What makes these things good or bad?

The Answer

To find the answer, consider the following options. Only one of them is a good idea.

1 "Anything called ‘Christian’ is good and blessed by God, and anything secular is bad and of this world."

This means that you should isolate yourself from anything non-Christian. Christian music good, secular music bad. Christian books good, secular books bad. Christian potato chips good, secular potato chips bad. Job at church good, job not at church bad. It’s a bad idea, as illustrated in Martin Luther’s time. A man would say, "Those monks over there are blessed because they’re doing Christian things. Therefore, I’m going to leave the farm and family and become a monk. Once I’ve abandoned my wife and children, then I’ll be more godly!" Huh?

2 A variation of #1 is this: "You must ‘Christianize’ the world before it’s good."

You must fill the whole government with Christians before God can use it. You must convert your mechanic before he’s ready to fix your car.This means that God is powerless to use us if we don’t believe in Him.This gives us entirely too much credit.

3 "It’s all good, and this whole discussion is stupid.

You’re a Christian and you’re in the world, so do Christian things and do worldly things." This means that music that glorifies sin is just as Godpleasing as the liturgy.When this idea wins, the Church always loses. It melts into the world and disappears.

So try this one…

4 You live in the Church and you live in the world, and God created both.

That’s what you say in the Apostles’ Creed. He created the world, including you. He provides you with food, clothing, shelter, all sorts of things; they are to be used for good. While you live in this world, God has also brought you into His Church. Jesus has died to redeem you, and the Holy Spirit gives you that forgiveness in His Word and Sacraments. So, as Luther would say, you live in two kingdoms:You’re a part of the body of Christ, and you’re a part of this world.

All of these are good gifts from God, though sinners will abuse them. My car isn’t good or evil, but my use of it is. If I use it to drive a friend to school, that’s good; if I use it to run down the guy next door, that’s evil. Milk is nutritious, whether or not it comes from a Christian cow. A new worship song needs to be examined; if it teaches false stuff, avoid it. A network may have some good TV shows and some bad. Music and magazines are not all good or all evil; their good is determined by what they say, and this might vary from track to track, from page to page. It’s up to you to listen and watch with discretion, not based on what you think, but on what God’s Word says. "Test all things," writes St. Paul; "hold fast what is good. Abstain from every form of evil" (I Thess. 5:21-22). (By the way, you’ll find an exercise of this each month in the "Pulse" column of Higher Things, where Pastor Andrae courageously takes on the ticklish task of reviewing magazines, videos, etc. Some is good, some is bad; and sorting them out daily is a task of the Christian.)

Option #4 is what we call Luther’s "Two-Kingdom Doctrine." It’s what the Bible teaches. It’s also the only one of the four that works. It’s not as easy to practice as the others, because you can’t just label things without studying them. You’ve got to be on guard all the time. On the other hand, you have the privilege of enjoying all of God’s gifts for you—both in the Church and in the world.

The Rev. Tim Pauls is Associate Pastor/Acting School Administrator at Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Boise, Idaho.