"God Likes Music of All Kinds"
In his chapter God, My Heart, and Music in the book Worldliness: Resisting the Seduction of a Fallen World, Bob Kauflin writes,
Actually, it seems that God likes music of all kinds. No one style can sufficiently capture his glory or even begin to reflect the vastness of his wisdom, creativity, beauty, and order. That doesn't mean some kinds of music aren't more complex or beautiful than others. It just means no single genre of music is better than the rest in every way.
Tellingly, Kauflin offers no biblical support of his own for these statements.
I believe that wrong claims such as these (by Kauflin and others) about God and His supposedly liking "music of all kinds" is one of the chief reasons that we have the debacle that we have musically in the Church in our day.
- 135 views
The Bible does not state that God likes all kinds of music. True enough.
But it also does not state that God dislikes any form of music. Based on that one of these is true:
- God likes all kinds of music.
- God only likes certain kinds, but chose not to tell us about His preferences.
Since He tells us to use music in worship, not telling us about His preference, if He has one, seems unlikely. That makes the first "seem" very likely. So, with the "seems" caveat, I agree with Kauflin on this point.
But it also does not state that God dislikes any form of music
This simply is not true. Those who want to believe that it is true take anything negative that is stated in Scripture in a passage that mentions music and assert that whatever the problem was, or problems were in the passage that elicited divine judgment, etc., it wasn't and couldn't have been the music itself. In effect, what is said to be true is merely assumed to be true.
- God only likes certain kinds, but chose not to tell us about His preferences.
This manner of addressing the issue assumes that God's only "liking" certain kinds of music could only be a matter of His having "preferences." It begs the question that God does not reject any kinds of music because there are not any intrinsically evil or otherwise unacceptable-to-Him kinds of music that combine musical elements in ways that God never intended were to be combined.
It also begs the question that for any such unacceptable kind or kinds of music to exist, God would certainly have to have told us explicitly and specifically that such unacceptable kinds of music exist.
in that respect, I have proven in another thread that there are musical instruments that wicked humans have made that are intrinsically evil and unacceptable to God even though the Bible never mentions that any such instruments exist. In the same manner, even if there were a lack of mention in Scripture of a kind of music or kinds of music that God does not like, it still would not therefore be true that no such kind or kinds of music exist.
I have a hard time believing that Satan can corrupt all sorts of communication but not music.
In line with Andy’s comment, I also find myself in the uncomfortable middle on the music issue. I also see no specific prohibitions in scripture, but am often considering how to determine in what ways music could be corrupted that could make it unusable, since it makes sense that it could be, and that Satan would certainly attempt it if it’s possible.
Like I suspect is true with most of you (at least those that don’t believe “anything goes”), in light of the fact of the Bible’s relative silence on this issue, I have over the years developed my own standards on what I believe is acceptable for both personal and church use. I have heard sermons, participated in discussions on this topic since at least high school, and I have read many works on this topic, both from the fundamental and conservative evangelical camps (not to mention some completely secular treatises on musical meaning), and I still struggle to see any hard and fast rules I can use. There is far too much “hand waving” in the arguments for me to easily accept them.
It would be much easier if the Bible was more exact on this topic, but clearly that wasn’t God’s intent. That does mean that my standards will not be the same as everyone else’s, and the criteria I use may seem inexact or unconvincing to others, but I have learned to live with that.
Dave Barnhart
Discussion