New Rules for a New Year

(so sorry for the delay in posting as blogger.com was holding it hostage for not my mistake in capitalization...carry on)

What I’m about to tell you is a true story. Now, I’ve been known to “spike” a story or two for added flavor but what you are about to read is honest to goodness, uncut, blatant honesty.

Prepare yourself.

I’m serious.

But before I launch headway into this let me set the stage. My church, located 10 minutes from the sandy beaches of the Gulf of Mexico in beautiful Clearwater, Florida, is a completely mixed congregation. White people would call it a black church. Black people would tell their friends it’s a white church. Sprinkle in your Asians, Romanians, Polish Jews, and a splash of Puerto Ricans. We got your young and old, your retired missionaries and your just-got-outta-rehab-yesterday rank sinners (not just sinners, RANK sinners y’all).

We are primarily contemporary gospel, but we mix in the occaisional long-hair stuff, Hillsongs stuff, some Jeremy Camp. Okay, mixed congregation so we mix it up musically to try and appease the various musical appetites. Yes, we have rapped. We’ve sung in Spanish. Tim Spell comes through twice a year. We’ve been known to entertain any one of the McCools. We are all things to all men.

But we have our limits.

As a favor to a dear saint in our church we let his young nephew who, according to unchecked sources, had quite a ministry as a traveling country gospel singer. He played his guitar to his own tracks. He was clean looking and all was fairly good until his second song which went a little something like this:

“LIVIN’ FOR JESUS IS BETTER THAN SMOKIN’ MARA-JUAAAAAAA-NAAAAAA!!!!!”

Uh, yeah. I don’t remember much of the other words to the song and, well, that was mostly the gist of the song. There was wincing, dropped jaws from the platform and to be honest I’ve never seen my pastor’s eyes get that big. People were slapping their neighbors mouthing “did he say what I think?” only to hear it repeated again and again and again. For a mixed group, this sorta rocked our socks.

So, okay, I know that yes indeed living for Jesus IS better than smoking MARA-JUAAAAAAANAAAAA (so I’ve heard). But really, could there possibly be a better way to present it? So I ask you, as musicians, writers, authors, singers, praisers, listeners, and the accidental observer: Does this glorify God? Knowing the hilarious God I serve I can almost imagine it seeing how my left ear is higher than the other and EVERY pair of glasses I try on look hideously crooked. The human anatomy is ridiculous. He created monkeys which, c’mon, who doesn’t laugh at monkeys! But does it glorify?

I think of this when I’ve played that game with some of our music team (another testament to God’s amusement). Remember that old Mark Carrouther’s mid-80’s staple “I’ll Be Up Again.” Here’s a sample in case you’ve forgotten:
(Must sing mournfully and heavy handed)

Down on the bottom
All friends are gone
Down on the botrom
I can’t go on
Enemies surrounding me
Laughing at my calamity
Telling me that there’s no way
To reach up to light of day

Yes, I know the song get’s better and talks about getting back up. But does it GLORIFY?
How about “Royal Telephone” or the one about the speckled bird. Or songs I’ve written myself that aren’t testaments to God’s favor as much as they are to my own self absorption.

I love a variety of music. I listen to nearly everything. I’m not coming down on any one or anything. Not even the former country croonin’ toker turned Jesus fan. I’m only saying that my new gauge for the New Year whether it be for writing, listening or otherwise: Does it GLORIFY.