As I mentioned in my previous post, I had the opportunity to see Scottish post-rock band Mogwai in Atlanta on Monday. It was my first experience of this band live since I started listening to them at the suggestion of my friend ,Rob Bupp, exactly ten years ago.
They were quite good at moments and quite boring at others. Being a loyal fan of their work, I am tempted be less honest, but the fact remains that they had their less-than-stellar moments. But where they were good, they absolutely soared. They truly are the current 'kings of dynamic' and simple melodic patterns. The tunes they play might be something that you would hum to yourself while walking in a forest or looking out over some vast, desolate place, or standing and staring at traffic whir past in a blur. At times, they are the sound of buildings collapsing, at others they are the sound of waves lapping quietly.
It is a curious fact to me that so many Christian kids seem to like these sorts of bands (instrumental bands), in particular. Is it that, because they have no offensive words, they are safe from mom and dad's critique? Is it because they allow room for one to quote-unquote-worship as one sees fit? Is it simply that Christian kids are starting to see that there is a whole world of art outside of the narrow, and at times blasphemous, Christian Contemporary music/art world? Who knows, and I'm not sure that this all that important to anyone other than the blood-sucking Christian music and art industry.
I am a musician who feels like he's finally reached the bottom of a well that has run dry. I love to write and play music, and I find value and enjoyment in that creativity, but it is so inward-looking and self-oriented that I am having a hard time finding any justification for playing the role of the rock star guy. What I know is that if all I can do is talk about my struggles, interests, problems, joys, ideas etc. from only the perspective of the inward-looking eye, then I will be doing no one any good, especially myself. And I'm not sure that there is much room, if any, in rock music for someone who does the opposite without compromising the very nature of rock music.
Does rock music ever move people outside of themselves toward God in a radical abandonment of self? I really want to know if this is possible. I think that it, like so much else in this imperfect, but wonderful, world feeds our passions and desires and distracts us from silence. It is such an excellent substitute for that silence, filling our every moment with a noise that allows us to ignore an opportunity for transcendent inner prayer. Of course I am saying all this while wearing my iPod and listening to a mix ("Ageless Beauty" by Stars was first up).
It frightens me...literally, it frightens me...that in a very few short years rock bands have become totally normal in evangelical circles as leaders of worship. Within a church service, no less. What's more, the transition was so simple, so natural that it took no more than a decade to make the switch. A rock band stands in front of people in order to receive adulation for their art. At least in a best-case scenario. The fact that this fits so naturally into a church setting is a statement about the nature of things in evangelical circles.
The Church, in evangelical circles, must follow culture, be submissive to culture in order to maintain contact with the people in that culture. But just like the boy who follows the tide out in order to stay in the water, evangelical church groups are moving further and further away from where they started, in a hopeless effort to keep people attracted to the Church. It would not be so much of a problem if the Church could call people back to where we started, but in trying to change the "non-essentials" (worship) these groups are slowly, but most assuredly, compromising belief, doctrine and knowledge of the Church itself, cutting themselves of from "the deposit of faith". How we worship should inform what we believe to be true. That is the way the Church works (or at least how it should work). We are so shocked to see fellow Christian groups become deluded into ordaining openly gay men and women. But why? These groups are only staying contextually relevant to the culture. Somewhere we have to draw a line, and unfortunately many evangelical groups have forgotten what a line looks like and how to draw.
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