___________

Over the past 10-20 years many formerly fundamental Baptist churches have converted to New Evangelical rock & roll entertainment centers, and the adoption of CCM has been at the very heart and soul of these transformations.

Consider Highland Park Baptist Church of Chattanooga, Tennessee. It came out of the Southern Baptist Convention in the 1940s. In the 1970s, when I was a student of the church’s Bible School, it was an old-fashioned independent Baptist church with glorious sacred music and high standards. It regularly ran several thousand on Sunday mornings. The church had a grand missions vision, giving half of its income to missions and hosting annual conferences featuring 100 missionaries. It was the home of Tennessee Temple, which had 5,000 students in the 1970s. There was not a hint of contemporary Christian music at Highland Park in the 1970s and 1980s.

In 1989, Jerry Huffman reported that Tennessee Temple groups used “soft rock” at the Southwide Baptist Fellowship that year (Calvary Contender, Oct. 15, 1989).

By 2005 Highland Park was rocking out, no holds barred. In April of that year the church and school hosted a Christian rock concert featuring Bebo Norman, Fernando Ortega, and Sara Groves. It was held in Highland Park’s main auditorium. All three of these mainstream CCM musicians are ecumenical. Ortega, for example, is an Episcopalian who has appeared at Billy Graham Crusades and Promise Keepers conferences. Bebo Norman has toured with Amy Grant.

Marty Tate, pastor of Peaceful Valley Baptist Church in Rising Fawn, Georgia, and two other preachers (one a TTU alumnus of the late ‘60s) stood on the sidewalk and preached against rock music and handed out tracts exposing the dangers of CCM. He told me that many of the people they encountered “were very haughty and condemning of us, all the while accusing us of being judgmental, legalistic, and all the usual stuff.”

This was a dramatic change from the philosophy and attitude that prevailed in this same place just 20 years earlier. The “new” Temple crowd criticized the “old” Temple crowd, but of course the new crowd still alleged that it “haven’t changed.”

The October 29, 2005, issue of the Chattanooga Times Free Press featured a picture of Tennessee Temple University students “worshipping” to contemporary rock music during a Wednesday evening service. The accompanying article said:

“Beneath the 90-year-old stained glass at St. Andrews Center, rock music blares as worshippers in jeans and T-shirts fill the sanctuary. The weekly Wednesday night church service has all the markings of traditional worship--music, preaching and praying. But the choir and organ have been replaced with drums and an electric guitar. ‘Each generation has different styles of music, and what churches have to realize is that we’ve got to meet those younger generations’ needs,’ said Dr. Danny Lovett, who preaches at the service and is president of Tennessee Temple University.”

In April 2006, the school’s College Days, when prospective students visit the campus, featured two Christian rockers, Toddiefunk and the Electric Church and Warren Barfield. Toddiefunk is the bass player for Toby Mac, formerly with DC Talk. Electric Church’s album Ready or Not featured “Holy Ghost Thang,” “Dance Floor,” “Naked,” and “Crazay.”

Temple was one of the sponsors of the “Winter Jam Tour 2007,” which featured Christian rockers such as Jeremy Camp, Steven Curtis Chapman, Sanctus Real, and Hawk Nelson. Sanctus Real lead guitarist Chris Rohman says: “On the tours we’ve been lucky to be part of, the kids are really into the rockin’ songs ... every night on that tour kids were just screaming along to every word of every song.”

Can you imagine the apostle Paul promoting this type of worldly thing?

Matt Hammitt of Sanctus Real participated in the 2003 tour of the !Hero rock opera, which depicts Jesus as a cool black man. In !Hero, the Last Supper is a barbecue party and ‘Jesus’ is crucified on a city street sign. Sanctus Real and Steven Curtis Chapman played a concert in 2003 at St. Mary Seminary sponsored by the Roman Catholic Diocese of Cleveland, Ohio. Retired Catholic bishop Anthony Pilla celebrated the Mass at the event. Chapman told the Cleveland Plain Dealer that it’s “a good thing” that “the Catholic Church is showing a greater openness to contemporary Christian music” (Plain Dealer, Aug. 7, 2006).

By 2008, Highland Park Baptist Church had joined the Southern Baptist Convention and began contributing to the SBC Cooperative Program.

In 2012, Highland Park changed its name to Church of the Highlands to reflect a location change as well as its new generic contemporary flavor. Jeremy Roberts, Highland Park’s 28-year-old pastor, says, “It’ll be the funnest church around” (“Chattanooga’s Iconic Highland Park,” Chattanooga Times Free Press, Sept. 10, 2012). Roberts is a graduate of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and previously served on staff at the Southern Baptists of Texas Convention and the Southern Baptist Conservatives of Virginia (“Tennessee Temple Univ. Strengthens SBC Ties,” Baptist Press, Apr. 19, 2012).

Numbers-wise, the church was a mere shadow of what it once was. By 2012, the church had only 300 members (“Tennessee Temple Carries on,” Times Free Press, Chattanooga, Sep. 17, 2012).

In 2015, Tennessee Temple announced that it was closing its doors and merging with Piedmont International University of Winston-Salem, NC, thus reaching the end of the long and sad death spiral it had been on since the 1990s.

A large number of churches formerly affiliated with Highland Park and Southwide Baptist Fellowship have gone down this path.

By no means is contemporary music the only force at work in these transformations. I am convinced that CCM enters a church because of spiritual lukewarmness and carnality and weak leadership, but the music acts within that atmosphere as a powerful transformative agent to carry the church far from its original principles and vision.

THE CCM CROWD KNOWS THE TRANSFORMATIVE POWER OF THEIR MUSIC

The CCM movers and shakers know that their music is transformative. In an interview with Christianity Today, Don Moen of Integrity Music said:

“I’ve discovered that worship [music] is transdenominational, transcultural. IT BRIDGES ANY DENOMINATION. Twenty years ago there were many huge divisions between denominations. Today I think the walls are coming down. In any concert that I do, I will have 30-50 different churches represented.”

Some of the CCM musicians are actually targeting “old-fashioned” churches to move them into the “broader church.”

There are TRANSITION SONGS and BRIDGE SONGS designed to move traditional churches along the contemporary path toward Christian rock. From the perspective of the CCM artists involved in this, they aren’t doing anything sinister. They are simply and sincerely trying to “feed” the “broader church.” But from a fundamentalist, Bible-believing position, the effect is to draw “old-fashioned” Bible churches into the contemporary orb, and that is most sinister.

Bridge songs include “How Deep the Father's Love for Us” by Stuart Townend and “In Christ Alone” by Townend and Keith Getty.

These message of the songs is doctrinally sound and the music is more hymn-like than out-and-out rock & roll, so such songs are considered “safe” by many traditional churches. But by using this music, a church is brought into association with the contemporary world that Townend/Getty represent.

Townend is an out-and-out Christian rocker. He is charismatic in theology and radically ecumenical in philosophy, supporting the Alpha program which bridges charismatic, Protestant, and Roman Catholic churches. He is a member of the charismatic Church of Christ the King in Brighton, U.K. and supports the “extraordinary manifestations of the Spirit,” which refers to the demonic/fleshly charismatic mysticism such as ecstatic tongues, spirit slaying, holy laughter, and shaking.

Townend is holding hands with the “broader church” in all of its facets and heresies and end-time apostasies, and Townend’s objective in writing “hymn-like” contemporary songs is ecumenism. Consider the following statement:

“‘How Deep the Father’s Love’ was the first hymn-like song I had written; before that point I had only written modern worship songs in a more contemporary style. ... This melody just kinda popped out of my head one day. ... It’s quite useful not only in the more modern contemporary churches, but in traditional churches as well because of the style. And I’m kind of exited about that; I am excited about the fact that you can write something that actually feeds the broader church...” (Stuart Townend, “Mission: Worship, The Story Behind the Song”).

In his blog Townend said, “I don’t go home at the end of a busy day and put on a hymns album! So I don’t think of hymns as where I’m at musically at all!” (http://blog.stuarttownend.co.uk/2010/05/how-deep-fathers-love.html).

Townend is a rock & roller, pure and simple. He wants to use the soft CCM to bring together the “broader church.”

What he does not say is that the contemporary churches aren’t very interested in soft CCM hymns. It is largely the “traditional” churches that are interested in “soft” CCM, and by using it they are the ones that are in danger of being influenced and changed. When “traditional” churches borrow Townend’s “soft” CCM, the contemporary churches are in no danger of being “traditionalized,” but the traditional churches are most definitely in danger of being contemporarized.

WHEREIN LIES THE TRANSFORMATIVE POWER OF CCM?

What is it about CCM that gives it such transformative power?

There are two fundamental elements: There is the transformational power of the philosophy, and there is the transformational power of the music.

1. THE TRANSFORMATIVE POWER OF THE CCM PHILOSOPHY

Contemporary Christian music is not just music; it is a philosophy of Christian living. And the power of the CCM philosophy lies in its promised liberty.

It preaches a doctrine of license under the guise of a more relaxed approach to Christian living and doctrine.

Consider some elements of the CCM philosophy:

The following elements are all inter-related.

According to the CCM philosophy, grace teaches us to relax and enjoy life without being judgmental and critical. In questionable things we should come down on the side of the broader, lest strict; we should always come down on the path of greater liberty.

Under this philosophy, those who are strict are considered legalists and Pharisees who kill grace and joy. The “strict” ones are not only wrong, they are dangerous.

Chuck Swindoll holds this popular philosophy and has been at the forefront of promoting it: “There was a time ... when I had a position that life was so rigid I would fight for every jot and tittle. I mean, I couldn’t list enough things that I’d die for. The older I get, the shorter that list gets, frankly. ... More than ever we need grace-awakened ministers who free rather than bind” (Grace Awakening).

I truly doubt that Swindoll was ever that strict and strong for the details of God’s Word, but be that as it may, Paul gave Timothy a solemn charge to keep the New Testament commandments “without spot, unrebukeable,” which would refer to the details (1 Tim. 6:13-14). The command to earnestly contend for the faith once delivered to the saints would encompass every part of the faith as we have it in the New Testament Scripture (Jude 3). The command to “preach the Word, reprove, rebuke, exhort” would encompass all of the Word (2 Tim. 4:1-2). There is not a hint anywhere in the New Testament that would suggest that Swindoll’s position is right. Grace does not mean laxity in contending for all of God’s Word. To the contrary, Paul taught that the grace of God of teaches us to be exceedingly strict in our stand for godliness and against ungodliness (Titus 2:11-14). Words could not be plainer.

According to the CCM philosophy, the pop culture is to be embraced and redeemed, and isolating from the pop culture destroys the church’s influence.

The book Roaring Lambs: A Gentle Plan to Radically Change Your World by Bob Briner, which is very popular with CCM artists, says, “Instead of just hanging around the fringes of our culture, we need to be right smack dab in the middle of it.”

Emerging church pastor Mark Driscoll says, “I am theologically conservative and culturally liberal.”

Biblically speaking, this is impossible. To be theologically conservative is to believe and obey the Bible, which commands us to separate in a very strict way from the world (e.g., Romans 12:2; Ephesians 5:11; James 4:4; 1 John 2:15-17)!

Yet it is the “culturally liberal” philosophy that most definitely permeates Contemporary Christian Music.

According to the CCM philosophy, God should be worshiped experientially and sensually through the emotions and the body.

The CCM music itself promotes this, as we will see. But the lyrics also promote this experiential approach because it is largely written by charismatics and it reflects their doctrine both overtly and subtly.

Consider “Word of God Speak” by MercyMe, a group whose music is often “adapted” by fundamentalist churches:

“Word of God speak, would you pour down like rain, washing my eyes to see your majesty. To be still and know that you’re in this place, please let me stay and rest in your holiness. ... Finding myself in the midst of you, beyond the music, beyond the noise. All that I need is to be with you and in the quiet I hear your voice.”

This is charismatic mysticism. The “Word of God” here is not the Bible; it is a mystical feeling, a direct revelation. It is found in the “quiet,” “beyond the noise.” It is an experience of the “presence” of God. It is the same thing that is taught by the contemplative prayer movement that was borrowed from Rome’s dark monastic past and that is currently sweeping through evangelicalism. The same mystical experience is sought both through rock music and through “silence.” The devil has many paths to the same place!

This CCM “open yourself to the flow of the Spirit” is a philosophy of Christian living that eventually permeates everything. It lends itself to not testing everything carefully by Scripture, so it is exactly the opposite of the Biblicist approach.

According to the CCM philosophy, it is alright to follow one’s heart because the believer has been redeemed and set at liberty.

This philosophy ignores the warning about the deceptiveness of the human heart and the fact that the “old man” or fallen nature is not removed at salvation. The old man must be denied and continually put off. This philosophy also ignores the many biblical warnings about proving all things, being sober and vigilant, being on guard against the wiles of the devil, the duplicity of false teachers, etc.

The “follow your heart” philosophy is actually a path to apostasy.

According to the CCM philosophy, it is alright to pursue one’s happiness as long as you are pursuing God.

This is the heart of John Piper’s “Christian Hedonism” doctrine which is so very influential and which is even growing quickly in influence among some fundamental Baptists. This is the doctrine that man’s highest calling is to pursue his own happiness by pursuing God. Piper defines it as follows:

“God is most glorified in us when we are most satisfied in him. ... I found in myself an overwhelming longing to be happy, a tremendously powerful impulse to seek pleasure, yet at every point of moral decision I said to myself that this impulse should have no influence ... Then I was converted to Christian Hedonism. In a matter of weeks I came to see that it is unbiblical and arrogant to try to worship God for any other reason than the pleasure to be had in Him (Desiring God, Introduction).

Piper is quick to say that Christian Hedonism “does not mean God becomes a means to help us get worldly pleasures.” But the fact is that Christian hedonism has played right into the hands of the Christian rock movement with its “don’t let anyone tell you how to live” philosophy; and, indeed, has been very influential within this movement.

According to the CCM philosophy, love is more important than strictness in doctrine and living.

A recent graduate of an independent Baptist Bible college wrote to me as follows: “Last I checked, the Lord Jesus Christ was more concerned about our love than He was about our music or anything else.”

In fact, if we define love by the Bible we find that it is never set in contrast to godly judging and holy living. Paul said godly love does not behave itself unseemly, thinketh no evil, and rejoices not in iniquity but rejoices in the truth (1 Cor. 13). John said that godly love purifies the saints and is a matter of keeping God's commandments (1 John 3:1-3; 5:1-3). This is true Christian love, not the feel-good, rock & roll-driven mysticism of the contemporary movement that preaches a world-loving license and broadminded tolerance.

According to the CCM philosophy, Jesus was a rebel and it is not wrong to follow his example.

From its inception in the Jesus People movement of the 1960s, Christian rock has always thought of Jesus as a rebel, sort of a proto-hippie. Mark Stuart of Audio Adrenaline says, “Jesus Christ is the biggest rebel to ever walk the face of the earth” (Pensacola News Journal, Pensacola, Fla., March 1, 1998, pp. 1, 6E). Sonny of P.O.D. says, “We believe that Jesus was the first rebel; the first punk rocker” (www.shoutweb.com/interviews/pod0700.phtml).

In fact, this is blasphemy. The Bible says rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft (1 Sam. 15:23). A rebel is a lawbreaker, but Christ was the lawgiver who He came to earth to fulfill the requirements of His own law (Mat. 5:17-19). Christ was not crucified for rebellion; He was crucified for testifying that He is God (John 10:33).

Perhaps it is the “Jesus as a rebel” doctrine that encourages the CCM crowd to thumb the nose at “traditionalists.” From long experience in communicating with CCM lovers, I have learned that usually they don’t care whom they offend. The typical attitude is, “Who cares if we offend a bunch of old-foggy legalists.” But this attitude is contrary to the Bible’s command to avoid offense and to show honor to one’s elders.

According to the CCM philosophy, music is nothing in itself; it’s only the words that matter.

At the very heart of CCM is the philosophy that music itself is neutral, that God loves all kinds of music and so can I.

“There is no such thing as ‘gospel music.’ Every style and form of music can become gospel, whether it’s jazz, pop, rock ‘n’ roll, or rap” (Don Butler, Gospel Music Association).

“I believe music in itself is a neutral force” (Keith Green).

“No particular style of music is ‘sacred’” (Rick Warren).

“God speaks through all different kinds of musical styles” (Bill Gaither).

Many popular books preach the CCM philosophy.

Donald Miller’s Blue Like Jazz is a harsh rant against traditional Christianity with its “judgmentalism” and dogmatism. The reference to jazz, which is a non-resolving, relativistic, sensual type of music, refers to a less strict, more tolerant, non-dogmatic type of Christian faith.

David Foster’s A Renegade’s Guide to God says, “We won’t be ‘told’ what to do or ‘commanded’ how to behave.”

Donald McCullough’s If Grace Is So Amazing Why Don’t We Live Like It? rejects the type of preaching that says “... don’t do that, curb your appetites, reign in desire, discipline and sacrifice yourself.”

It is not difficult to see that the CCM philosophy is diametrically opposed to an “old-fashioned” Biblicist church. It is indeed “transformative,” and those who associate with CCM pick up its philosophy.

The CCM philosophy is extremely attractive to those who want more “liberty” than that which is offered in “old-fashioned” Biblicist churches and that which is promised in God’s Word.

Consider Zach Lind, drummer for the rock band Jimmy Eat World, who we interviewed at the National Pastors Conference in San Diego in 2009. He told us that he grew up in a “very conservative” Baptist church that preached against rock & roll and promoted separatism, but he secretly loved rock and didn’t like the strict Bible preaching. He left church and started the band, but in recent years he has learned from the emerging church that he can be a Christian and love rock, too, and that he doesn’t have to be so strict about how he lives. He said that this message from “resonated” with him. Now he is happy in the “church.”

In light of the inherent rebellion of the natural human heart and the “old man” that still dwells even in the born again believer, it is not difficult to see how enticing the CCM philosophy is.

On top of that, we are living in the days prophesied by Paul in 2 Timothy 4:3-4, in which multitudes will trade the old faith for a new one of living according to one’s own lusts.

“For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears; and they shall turn away their ears from the truth, and shall be turned unto fables.”

There is no doubt that the CCM philosophy is transformative, but how is it communicated within a “traditional” church?

First, the CCM philosophy is communicated through the music’s lyrics which are often vague and man-centered.

Vague lyrics feed the non-dogmatic philosophy and lifestyle.

Man-centered lyrics do the same thing. Overall, contemporary Christianity is as much about me as it is about God, but it is presented under the guise of being all about God! And the human heart is so deceptive that it buys into this, believing that it is acting and worshiping in a God-centered way even when it is actually living for self. The aforementioned Christian hedonism doctrine plays right into this and encourages it.

Second, the CCM philosophy is communicated through the rockin’ music itself which feeds the flesh and encourages a feeling of looser living and seems to stir up animosity toward biblical “strictness.”

Third, the CCM philosophy is also communicated through affiliation with CCM artists and their supporters through web sites, social media, blogs, etc.

This affiliation is a natural product of the “adaptation” of CCM. When church members see that CCM is “adapted” in their services, at least some of them will doubtless obtain the full-blown stuff to listen to in private and begin to communicate directly with the broader CCM world.

When they visit Christian bookstores and browse the music section they will see the same songs that they hear on Sunday and they will buy the stuff and they will see that real Christian rock is more fun, more powerful, more enticing than “adapted,” toned-down Christian rock, and they will be drawn into ever closer communication with it.

More likely, these days they will go home and do a Google search for the titles of the adapted CCM songs they hear at church, perhaps some Hillsong numbers and Townend-Getty, and the top returns will be “real” Christian rock and they will be drawn farther and farther into the CCM world.

One lady left the following comment at a YouTube clip featuring the CCM song “We Will Remember” by Tommy Walker.

“I fell in love with this song when it was sang in our church today. I then got home to find the lyrics on the Internet. It’s a wonderful song.”

You can be sure that she found more than the mere “lyrics.”

In this way the appetite for the “real” CCM spreads throughout the church, and this type of thing doesn’t happen slowly.

When Lancaster Baptist Church, home of West Coast Baptist College, performed “Shout to the Lord” in a Sunday service in 2011, Cary Schmidt, one of the leaders, said, “Most of you have heard this song or know the words to this song.” He knew that many of the church members were familiar with Hillsong and their music, and I do not believe that they listen only to the toned down soft rock versions played in church.

Not only did Cary Schmidt know that many of the church members were familiar with Hillsong and their music, he said not say one word to discourage such a strange thing. No contemporary praise group is more radically charismatic, more rapidly ecumenical, more obviously apostate than Hillsong.

The leaders of Lancaster and West Coast speak in generalities about the dangers of CCM, but the warnings aren’t specific enough to protect the people.

Thus, even when a church is carefully “adapting” CCM by trying to take the rock out of Christian rock and by choosing only songs with at least some semblance of biblical lyrics, the influence and philosophy is present and begins to leaven the body. The members get the message that the CCM artists who write the music that the church is adapting are safe, and this establishes connections to the broader CCM world. It is not long before people are listening to the “real stuff.”

This is a very slippery slope.

2. THE TRANSFORMATIVE POWER OF THE CCM MUSIC ITSELF

The transformative power of CCM also lies in its very sound.

Every element of contemporary praise music is designed to create a sensual emotional experience. This is stated objective of contemporary worship.

Integrity Worship Ministries was formed to help “Christian leaders worldwide EXPERIENCE GOD’S PRESENCE.”

Graham Kendrick said, “The old way of preaching and singing “began to give way to an expectation that ... God would visit us, and WE’D EXPERIENCE HIS PRESENCE IN A TANGIBLE SORT OF WAY” (interview June 11, 2002 with Chris Davidson of Integrity Music).

“In club-culture worship, music surrounds the worshipers ... ONE FEELS IMMERSED IN GOD’S PRESENCE” (Emerging Churches, edited by Eddie Gibbs and Ryan Belger, p. 81).

"I just started attending church a few months back and really felt drawn to the presence of God, ESPECIALLY THROUGH THE TIMES OF PRAISE AND WORSHIP ... [I CAN] FEEL THE TANGIBLE PRESENCE" (City Harvest Church magazine, Jul.-Dec. 2002)

In pursuit of this tangible worship experience, the CCM crowd gives itself over to the music. The most passionate worshipers allow the music to take control.

Some major musical elements of that create this experience are as follows:

Syncopated dance rhythm
Unresolving chords
Sensual vocal techniques
Repetition

SYNCOPATED DANCE RHYTHM

It is no accident that contemporary worship music, from its very inception, has used the heavily syncopated dance rhythms of modern pop music, such as the back beat and beat anticipation and the break beat. This type of music has great transformative power in its own right.

Rock & roll historian Robert Palmer observed, “The transformative power of rock inheres ... in the music itself--in THE SOUND, and above all, in THE BEAT” (Rock & Roll an Unruly History, p. 12).

Sam Phillips, founder of Sun Records where Elvis’ first hit was recorded in 1954, described the sensual addictive power of rock and the reason why it literally transformed Western society. He said that it is the “INFECTIOUS BEAT” that made young people “FEEL GOOD” (“Sam Phillips, 80, Producer who Discovered Elvis Presley, Dies,” Associated Press, July 31, 2003).

Huey Lewis and the News sang that the “old backbeat rhythm really, really drives ‘em wild” (“The Heart of Rock & Roll”).

Elvis Presley said, “It’s the beat that gets to you. If you like it and you feel it, you can’t help but move to it. That’s what happens to me. I can’t help it” (cited by Steve Turner, Hungry for Heaven, p. 36).

The back beat and other forms of dance syncopation create a physical response because the body is enticed to move into the musical gaps.

Whether rock is soft or hard, quiet or loud is irrelevant. It moves the body; makes you want to dance. The Rhythm Bible: “There are over 1,000 examples of rhythmic figures common in jazz, rock, Latin, blues, funk, and other styles -- rhythms that make contemporary sounds so exciting.”

Rocker Richie Havens describes the effect of the music: “If your foot starts moving and you can’t stop, then you’re dancing. Take it, and do it.”

It is the heavy syncopation that makes pop music so physical. Social scientists and rock & rollers even identify it as sexual.

“... it is the beat that commands a directly physical response. ... We respond to the materiality of rock’s sounds, and the rock experience is essentially erotic” (Simon Frith, Sound Effects, 1981).

“The great strength of rock & roll lies in its beat. It is a music which is basically sexual, unpuritan...” (Irwin Silber, Sing Out, May 1965, p. 63).

“There is a great deal of powerful, albeit subliminal, sexual stimulation implicit in both the rhythm and [the] lyrics of rock music” (Dr. David Elkind, The Hurried Child, 1981, p. 89; Elkind was chairman of the Eliot-Pearson Department of Child Study at Tufts University in Massachusetts).

“Rock music is sex. The big beat matches the body’s rhythms” (Frank Zappa, Life, June 28, 1968).

“The throbbing beat of rock provides a vital sexual release for adolescent audiences” (Jan Berry, cited from Ken Blanchard, Pop Goes the Gospel).

“That’s what rock is all about--sex with a 100 megaton bomb, the beat” (Gene Simmons of KISS, Entertainment Tonight, ABC, Dec. 10, 1987).

“Perhaps my music is sexy ... but what music with a BIG BEAT isn’t?” (Jimi Hendrix, cited from David Henderson, ‘Scuse Me While I Kiss the Sky: The Life of Jimi Hendrix. p. 117).

“The sex is definitely in the music, and sex is in all aspects in the music” (Luke Campbell, 2 Live Crew).
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Janis Joplin, who died young from the rock & roll lifestyle, describes her first big concert in these words: “I couldn’t believe it, all that rhythm and power. I got stoned just feeling it, like IT WAS THE BEST DOPE IN THE WORLD. It was SO SENSUAL, so vibrant, loud, crazy” (Joel Dreyfuss, “Janis Joplin Followed the Script,” Wichita Eagle, Oct. 6, 1970, p. 7A).

I can concur with the truth of these testimonies to the transformative power of rock & roll. Rock & roll reached into the Christian home and church in which I grew up and absolutely captivated my heart and soul when I was a young teen, and it taught me the path of rebellion and godlessness. It was highly transformative. Thousands upon thousands have the same testimony.

Are you pastors who are letting your churches dabble with “adapted” CCM and its soft rock willing to take the chance that your carelessness in the matter of music will cause some young people to offend and go the way of the world, the flesh, and the devil?

Is it not better and wiser to err on the side of safety?

Rock can be hard or soft, fast or slow, loud or quiet, and it is still rock because it still has a sensual, heavily syncopated swing rhythm that moves the body, and it is still “infectious” and it still makes people “feel good.”

And the heavily syncopated rhythm is a major part of the “experience” that contemporary worshipers are seeking. They are convinced that they are worshiping God when in reality they are being sensually moved by powerful music.

Let’s return to the previous quotation from a member of the largest church in Singapore, City Harvest. This charismatic church hosts loud rock & roll worship services in its massive auditorium. A new church member was quoted as follows in the church magazine:

"I just started attending church a few months back and really felt drawn to the presence of God, ESPECIALLY THROUGH THE TIMES OF PRAISE AND WORSHIP. Yet, each time when I try to meet God in the same way during my personal quiet time AND 'FEEL' THE TANGIBLE PRESENCE that I always sense during church services, I always fail. Is this because there's something that I'm not doing right? Am I not worshipping in the correct way?" (City Harvest Church magazine, July-Dec. 2002).

This young lady experienced “the tangible presence of God” during the rock & roll worship services, but she couldn’t duplicate that experience while quietly reading the Bible. She wondered whether she was doing something wrong. The fact is that it was the music itself that was creating the “tangible worship” experience and it had nothing to do with God.

Secular rock & rollers have the same type of experiences!!!!!

Rock & rollers have long described their music in glowing spiritual and religious terms, but the spiritual fervor described in the following quotes does not pertain to the Spirit of God; it pertains to the “god of this world” who masquerades as an angel of light (2 Corinthians 4:4; 11:14).

Rock historian Michael Moynihan says: “In spiritual terms MUSIC IS A MAGICAL OPERATION, A VEHICLE FOR MAN TO COMMUNICATE WITH THE GODS” (Lords of Chaos: The Bloody Rise of the Satanic Metal Underground, p. 1).

Craig Chaquico of the Jefferson Airplane says, “Rock concerts are the churches of today. Music puts them on a spiritual plane. All music is God” (Dan and Steve Peters, Why Knock Rock? p. 96).

Jimi Hendrix understood the power of rock & roll as mysticism:

“Rock music is more than music, IT’S LIKE CHURCH” (Jimi Hendrix, The Dick Cavett Show, July 21, 1969).

“We’re making the music into ELECTRIC CHURCH MUSIC, A NEW KIND OF BIBLE you can carry in your hearts” (Hendrix, quoted in Crosstown Traffic by Charles Murray, p. 161).

“The ATMOSPHERES ARE GOING TO COME THROUGH MUSIC, because the music is a spiritual thing of its own ... you hypnotize people to where they go right back to their natural state ... [It is a] NATURAL HIGH” (Hendrix, Life, Oct. 3, 1969, p. 74).

Bruce Springsteen used to open his concerts with these words: “WELCOME TO THE FIRST CHURCH OF THE ROCK, BROTHERS AND SISTERS” and has stated that he was dead until rock and roll changed his life (USA Today, July 19, 1999, p. 9D).

Robbie Kreiger, guitarist for the Doors, said the band members were “revivalists and WANTED OUR AUDIENCE TO UNDERGO A RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE” (Break on Through: The Life and Death of Jim Morrison, p. 190).

Remembering Bob Marley’s rock concerts, Judy Mowatt, one of his backup singers said: “ON TOUR THE SHOWS WERE LIKE CHURCH; Bob delivering the sermon. There were mixed emotions in the audience: you see people literally crying, people in a frenzy, on A SPIRITUAL HIGH ... These concerts were powerful and HIGHLY SPIRITUAL. There was A POWER THAT PULLED YOU there. It was a clean feeling ... For months and maybe years it stays with you” (Sean Dolan, Bob Marley, p. 95).

Grateful Dead concerts have been described as “A PLACE TO WORSHIP.” “The band was the high priest, the audience the congregation, the songs the liturgy, and the dancing the prayer” (Gary Greenberg, Not Fade Away: The Online World Remembers Jerry Garcia, p. 42).

A music reviewer described a Backstreet Boys concert as “WORSHIP” (Express Writer, August 16, 1998).

Jim Morrison of the Doors said, “I FEEL SPIRITUAL UP THERE PERFORMING” (Newsweek, Nov. 6, 1967, p. 101).

Michael Jackson said, “On many an occasion WHEN I AM DANCING, I HAVE FELT TOUCHED BY SOMETHING SACRED. In those moments, I felt my spirit soar, and become one with everything that exists” (Steve Turner, Hungry for Heaven, p. 12).

George Harrison said, “Through the music you reach the spiritual. MUSIC IS VERY INVOLVED WITH THE SPIRITUAL, as we know from the Hare Krishna mantra” (Turner, p. 71).

Brian Eno says that WHEN HE DISCOVERED ROCK AND ROLL, IT WAS “A SPIRITUAL EXPERIENCE” to him and IT OCCUPIED THE RELIGIOUS PART OF HIS LIFE (Turner, Hungry for Heaven, p. 150).

Sting, of the rock band Police, said, “The pure essence of music is very spiritual” (Musician, Feb. 1987, p. 41). He says: “MY RELIGION WOULD BE MUSIC, AND I HAD JUST RECEIVED MY FIRST SACRAMENT [WHEN HE FIRST HEARD THE BEATLES AT AGE 11]” (USA Today, Jan. 27, 1984, p. 2D).

Dancing at raves “may be construed as the method by which ravers WORSHIP THE GOD OF ALTERED CONSCIOUSNESS” (Russell Newcombe, The Guardian, Jul. 22, 1995).

What is it about rock & roll that has produced such spiritual fervor? What is the mysticism in rock?

It is a combination of the heavy sensual syncopation and the “me first” philosophy.

The sensual syncopation produces a similar experience for contemporary Christian worshipers.

Thus, the transformative power of Contemporary Christian Music lies first of all in its syncopated dance rhythms. And this is why it can transform an “old-fashioned” Biblicist church into a contemporary rock & roll church, often in a matter of a few short years.

UNRESOLVING CHORDS

Another major element of the sensual contemporary worship “experience” is the unresolving chords.

Unresolving cadence is a type of chord progression that doesn’t resolve, and it is a major element of CCM.

Contemporary worship music tends to use a chord cadence other than the “perfect” or “authentic” cadence, which resolves back to the first tone. A “weak cadence” or an “imperfect cadence” does not resolve in this way. It is always more “feely.”

We aren’t saying that using an unresolving cadence from time to time is wrong in itself. The problem is that this is a predominant characteristic of CCM. The solidarity of the resolutions is not there. This is not something that happens once in a while, but it is a major characteristic of CCM.

One discerning musician says:

“What we were noticing in all of these songs -- Awesome God, Here I Am to Worship, Lord I Lift Your Name on High -- which are not the hard CCM but they are light CCM--all of them use the non-resolving cadence. They go to the 4 instead of the 1 and you are left feeling restless. It builds you up and leaves you feeling restless, uneasy.”

This has the precise effect of helping create the sensual experience that contemporary worshipers are seeking.

Pastor Tim Kelly of Maine has taught music theory for almost 25 years and was previously deeply involved in the pop, rock, new country, rock, rap, R&B music culture. He says:

“When you have the chord progression of I-V-IV, that is not a cadence. It doesn’t resolve. Praise and worship music takes a progression like this and repeats it over and over and over. This unresolved progression repeated so much is hypnotic. It is like a drug or drum rhythm. You do not even need a rhythm. Ending on the IV chord creates a purely emotional experience which many cults use to open up the human soul, like a drug or drum rhythm. New Age, witchcraft, Celtic pagan worship, contemplative worship, etc., all use weak chord progressions to create an emotional experience to ‘open up the human soul to the spirit world.’ It is about a mystical experience” (Tim Kelly)

Mickey Hart, drummer for the Grateful Dead, is a world-class expert on drumming. He says, “Everywhere you look on the planet people are using drums to alter consciousness. ... There have been many times when I’ve felt as if the drum has carried me to an open door into another world” (Drumming at the Edge of Magic).

Another discerning musician says:

“The unresolving cadence is charismatic in effect. It builds you up and you want to say it again and you want to say it again and it gets you into this emotional frenzy where that you feel that you are really worshiping God.”

Thus, a major element of the experience of contemporary praise music is the unresolving chords, and this is a part of its transformative power.

SENSUAL VOCAL TECHNIQUES

Another major element of the contemporary worship experience is the sensual vocal techniques that have been borrowed from the morally corrupt pop music field.

By breaking every traditional rule of singing, rock & roll has revealed its lawless character even in the very way that it is sung.

There is SCOOPING AND SLIDING. Instead of hitting the note cleanly and directly, there is a slide from above or below its true pitch.

In a 1940 book How to Sing for Money, Charles Henderson said that scooping “is common practice ... as a swing effect” (p. 36).

We see that the scooping vocal technique was created as a part of the dance music scene. It works with the heavily syncopated rhythm to help create the sensual atmosphere that dancers desire. It fits the night club, the bar, the whorehouse, the gambling den.

In his secular study of rock & roll, Charles Brown said that scooping and sliding have been characterized as “sexual utterances” (The Art of Rock & Roll, p. 68).

In another secular study of rock & roll, Walter Everett observed that the reason that rock singers break the traditional rules and scoop and slide and distort through voices and such is because of their lawbreaking philosophy.

“Classical singers traditionally strive for constant beauty of tone, but this is rarely of interest to rock vocalists, who reject the dogma of there being one ‘right’ way to do anything” (Everett “The Foundations of Rock”).

Another major element of rock & roll singing is the purposeful distortion of the voice. This again reflects the relativistic, “law breaker” character of the music.

This clip is an “adaptation” of “In Christ Alone” by Hillsong United. Observe the sliding, scooping, and voice distortion.

These styles are not only sensual but draw attention to the singer, which is another major element of both secular pop and contemporary “Christian” music

Other elements of rock & roll singing are THE DISTORTION OF THE VOICE, MOANING, GROWING, even SCREAMING.

None of this is sacred or spiritual. It is earthy, sensual, even devilish. Can you imagine standing in the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ and moaning and growling and such!

Frank Garlock observes that the rock style of singing reflects the licentious rock philosophy:

“The identical methods employed by the world to make the sound sensual are now being used by many popular contemporary Christian vocalists. These techniques include swaying and dancing, scooping, vocal sliding, flipping below and above the actual written melody, whispery, breathy voice, and delayed vibrato. The style itself reflects and projects a philosophy.”

This clip is an “adaptation” of “In Christ Alone” by Hillsong United. Observe the sliding, scooping, and voice distortion.

These styles are not only sensual but draw attention to the singer, which is another major element of both secular pop and contemporary “Christian” music. Note the following comments that were left on the YouTube clip of the previous rendition of “In Christ Alone.”

“Beautiful voice.” “What a great voice you have.” “You got a great voice!” “You are wonderfully gifted!!!” “Love your voice!!”

The sensual vocal techniques are a major element of the contemporary worship experience and are very addictive. The musical appetite is spoiled, which leads the listener farther and farther into the world of CCM.

REPETITION

Repetition is another major element of the contemporary worship experience.

It has been called 7/11 music -- seven words sung 11 times

“The Family Prayer Song” from the Promise Keeper’s Live Worship album repeats the phrase “we will serve the Lord” 22 times

Repetition is part of the sensual experience which is a primary objective of CCM.

The repetition is part of the package that includes the enticing rock rhythm, the non-resolving chords, the sensual vocal techniques, and the rise and fall of the sound.

By yielding to the music, the CCM crowd is carried along into a tangible worship experience.

CONCLUSION

Biblicist churches that “adapt” CCM are creating a bridge to the ecumenical-charismatic world that many people will cross and the influence will be dramatic. And the influence will gradually permeate the entire church and change its fundamental character.

Every fundamentalist Baptist church that doesn’t take this matter seriously and doesn’t educate itself seriously and doesn’t take a strict stand will be well down the emerging road within a decade.

Contemporary music is that powerful and it is that much at the heart of end-times apostasy.

Pastors must face this issue and make the effort to educate both themselves and the people. To leave it up to a music director is to abdicate responsibility. Materials are available. You don’t have to pursue a master’s degree in sacred music to understand this issue at a fundamental, effectual level.

We must establish godly standards of music and be CONSISTENT!

To condemn “CCM” and use contemporary Southern Gospel is not consistent.

To say you are opposed to CCM while you use soft rock and “adapted” CCM is not consistent.

It is better to err on the side of being too careful and too “strict” than too tolerant. No one will be hurt by too strict, but there is plenty of spiritual danger in being too loose.

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The previous report is the transcript of a free multimedia video that we have published at the Way of Life web site entitled THE TRANSFORMATIONAL POWER OF CONTEMPORARY PRAISE MUSIC.