MUSIC -Only His ear knows for sure!

THROWING OUT THE BABY AND THE WATER! [Mark 11:29-34a; controversy]

Some of the religious people of Jesus’ day were challenging His authority for doing His miraculous works; He responded by asking a question concerning a minister who was extremely popular with the people.

The dialogue was, in part, as follows:

And Jesus said to them, "I will ask you one question, and you answer Me, and then I will tell you by what authority I do these things. Was the baptism of John from heaven, or from men? Answer Me."

And they began reasoning among themselves, saying, "If we say, 'From heaven,' He will say, 'Then why did you not believe him?' But shall we say, 'From men''?" --they were afraid of the multitude, for all considered John to have been a prophet indeed. And answering Jesus, they said, "We do not know."

Since before I became a believer in 1980, God’s children have been locked in heated debate over the issue of praise or contemporary music as opposed to traditional hymnology.

Let me ask those of you who are opposed to this musical genre, “Is it from heaven, or from men? Answer me.”

I fear many of you will reason as the chief priests, and scribes, and elders, saying, “If we say, ‘From heaven,’ he will ask, ‘Then why do you carp about it?’ But if we say, ‘From men,’ we will have to contend with the multitudes all over the world who consider this music anointed and holy.” I fear even more that your answer will ultimately be, “We do not know!”

How, I ask, can a composition such as Michael W. Smith’s Agnus Dei or Maranatha’s As the Deer Panteth be anything but from God?

I must admit some of what passes as Christian music is not of heaven or men but right out of the pit of hell … but this has been a problem as old as Eden.