Music Destroyed Me

MUSIC DESTROYED ME … AND SAVED ME

So today I’m going to talk about, music.

Yeah, I know a lot of you won’t want to hear about it because music is awesome right? I love music! I grew up in a musical family, and I was always listening to it, even as a baby my Mom would put music on to help me fall asleep. Well I like to call this “ Music DESTROYED me.” But then, Music saved me. How can music destroy you? What does that mean? Well, when I was about 13 I started to get really interested in listening to the radio and looking up new songs and artists on Youtube, and I became just, I guess the right word would be “ Obsessed” with music. I would constantly think about it, listen to it, spend all my time just watching celebrities and just obsessing. I really liked Taylor Swift, and I loved John Mayer. Yeah, I still do, but I now have a healthier perspective on music. So why is music bad? Well, it depends on what kind of music you are listening to. I know that I would listen to a song and if it had swear word in it I would just over look it and not care. But I would listen to that song more than once, and if a song is talking about something inappropriate, my excuse would be “ I just like the beat, I don’t know the words.” Yeah, okay. No I knew the words, they were bad. And when you get that song stuck in your head, that’s all you hear and you meditate on it! I knew that what I was doing was wrong, I hid it from my parents, I even used it against God. The level of obsession was bad. I know some of you will go “ Oh well that’s not me, I don’t always think about that when I listen to music, I’m not convicted to stop.” etc. There are a lot of excuses, and I know because I’ve used them all. Music shouldn’t be bad.

“Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.” Colossians 3:16

Music is a beautiful thing, and God loves it. But do you think he likes it when people are using it to glorify themselves? Glorifying evil? Not pointing to the one who created you?

The love of God is what you need in music.

According to http://itstheskittlee.hubpages.com/hub/Music-and-the-Influence-on-Society  “The media and parents want blame music for the way kids act. They blame it for the gang violence, murders and suicides. They believe the music kids listen to changes their perspective about life. Then they start blaming the artist for singing about such vulgar, melancholy, morbid music. Along with that, kids start judging each other by the music they listen to; they stereotype each other into certain cliques and they laugh at them because of it. If kids took the time to notice and listen to others, they might find out that there will be a couple common songs between them. When kids are grouped into certain cliques they might feel like they only belong in that group. When did the music go bad? Music use to have a meaning, it use to symbolize a feeling and have heart filled messages being sent out. Now all you hear music talk about is drinking, guns, murder, drugs, rape, and suicide. I’m not just talking about rap music, it’s in rock and metal too.”

So music has a powerful influence on us. Music went bad the moment you took God out of it, the one who deserves our praise, our all, our music is supposed to be for him.

“Now if you are ready when you hear the sound of the horn, pipe, lyre, trigon, harp, bagpipe, and every kind of music, to fall down and worship the image that I have made, well and good. But if you do not worship, you shall immediately be cast into a burning fiery furnace. And who is the God who will deliver you out of my hands?” Daniel 3:15

It says to fall down and worship the image that I have made. When you listen to other artists and go to concerts, they become idols. You worship that person, I know that sounds extreme but you do. By putting your focus on the person above God, then that is wrong. He says “ Thou shall not have any other gods before me” but we are breaking one of the commandments.

An awesome worship leader named Kim Walker once said, “Without the love of God, it’s like we are  up here just making a bunch of noise, but the love of God changes us and we are never the same after we encounter the love of God.”

So what are famous people doing? They are just making a bunch of noise. Noise that God does not enjoy, I’m sure it’s like a little kid banging on pots and pans, screaming.

That’s how music destroyed me. Music, changed my understanding in two different ways, It made me question Gods existence, and it taught me things that I didn’t need to know.

While I was listening to that type of music I fought with my parents a lot! They didn’t like what I was listening too, and I would get irritated because I liked it and I wanted to do what I wanted to do. That’s not Gods way. I would start to ignore my dad’s teachings at synagogue; I would put my ear buds in while in the car when my Dad had worship music playing. I didn’t even worship, I’d just say the words. They weren’t coming from my heart. Little by little I was growing further and further from God. And the sad part was, I didn’t even care or notice. That’s pretty crazy that music had that much power over me. My Dad would tell me to stop putting in my ear phones on, or he would turn the worship music up so loud that I couldn’t even hear my music so I would just turn it off. And when I would hear the words from that music, a different feeling overtook me, not like that satisfying feeling my soul would feel, but my spirit was being fed.

At that time I didn’t read my Bible either. My spirit was hungry, but my soul was so full, it would overtake my whole being. When I heard the words of my King, I began to change, my heart was full of pride for my music, but it was melting. One night, I was in the car with my family and I didn’t have my ear buds in because the worship music was too loud. So I gave up, then I heard this song, It was a Jesus Culture song and I looked up and I really liked it, then I said, “Can you turn it up?” I’m sure my Dad was a little surprised! I really liked it, and the message was amazing! I went home and took the laptop and looked it up and listened to it for about a week. I just played it over and over. I also still listened to secular music, but I was starting to like worship a lot.

I played guitar and sang mostly Taylor Swift and attempted to learn some John Mayer songs, and I would write “ Love songs” but I didn’t know much about that anyway, only what I learned from other song, another example of what music was teaching me, that wasn’t the right understanding of love. God’s love, is the love we need to have for each other.

But anyways, I played those types of songs still. I played on our worship teams sometimes, but my heart still wasn’t there. I started praying more, but still not enough. I needed God. I started to get convicted I guess you could say. I started to feel guilty while listening to that music. I didn’t fully stop until beginning of this year. I deleted all my secular music; I just couldn’t listen to it anymore. God just hit me hard, and I’m so incredibly thankful that he did. Music destroyed me, but then music SAVED me. But God saved me through the message of worship music, and teaching me to let go of my obsession. Sometimes I still have a hard time with music that someone else has on, but I am able to stay strong because “I can do all things through him who strengthens me.”  Ephesians 6:10