There is a need for a more expansive consideration of that problem which has arisen to distress devout believers within the Free Presbyterian Church and vex the unity of God’s people.
I do not have any ‘musical skill or technical knowledge’, but such is not needed to draw a right conclusion regarding the new style of praise that some are anxious to have embraced. A consideration of its origins and the settings in which these ‘praises’ are often sung — one day in a church assembly and also in what can only be termed a ‘religious disco’ — indicates that such are not suitable for the true and holy worship of God! Rev David DiCanio’s video vividly exposed this evil sham. Discovering this truth will surely aid the discerning Christian in coming to a right conclusion in this matter.
This is a CCM ‘hymn’ being sung in a ’religious nightclub’ setting. Who is it will say that the use of such material is in keeping with the teaching of Holy Scripture?
Here are the words of a hymn by Keith & Kristyn Getty, leading exponants of ‘Contemporary Christian Music’, which has been sung in at least one of our churches. It has terms and phrases and words that are definitely linked to the gospel message and might easily be embraced and accepted.
What is our hope in life and death?
Christ alone, Christ alone
What is our only confidence?
That our souls to Him belong
Who holds our days within His hand?
What comes, apart from His command
And what will keep us to the end?
The love of Christ in which we stand
Oh, sing hallelujah
Our hope springs eternal
Oh, sing hallelujah
Now and ever we confess
Christ, our hope in life and death
What truth can calm the troubled soul?
God is good, God is good
Where is His grace and goodness known?
In our great Redeemer’s blood
Who holds our faith when fears arise?
Who stands above the stormy trial?
Who sends the waves that bring us nigh
Unto the shore? The rock of Christ
Oh, sing hallelujah
Our hope springs eternal
Oh, sing hallelujah
Now and ever we confess
Christ, our hope in life and death
Unto the grave, what will we sing?
“Christ, He lives, Christ, He lives!”
And what reward will Heaven bring?
Everlasting life with Him
There we will rise to meet the Lord
Then sin and death will be destroyed
And we will feast in endless joy
When Christ is ours forevermore (forevermore)
Oh, sing hallelujah
Our hope springs eternal
Oh, sing hallelujah
Now and ever we confess
Christ, our hope in life and death (oh, sing)
Oh, sing hallelujah
Our hope springs eternal
Oh, sing hallelujah
Now and ever we confess
Christ, our hope in life and death
Now and ever we confess
Christ, our hope in life and death
However, compare its words with this well known hymn by Augustus Toplady.
Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee;
Let the water and the blood,
From Thy wounded side which flowed,
Be of sin the double cure;
Cleanse me from its guilt and power.
Not the labours of my hands
Can fulfil Thy law’s demands;
Could my zeal no respite know,
Could my tears forever flow,
All for sin could not atone;
Thou must save, and Thou alone.
Nothing in my hand I bring,
Simply to Thy cross I cling;
Naked, come to Thee for dress;
Helpless, look to Thee for grace;
Foul, I to the fountain fly;
Wash me, Saviour, or I die.
While I draw this fleeting breath,
When my eyelids close in death,
When I soar through tracts unknown,
See Thee on Thy judgment throne,
Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
Let me hide myself in Thee.
Or this hymn by Charles Wesley.
And can it be that I should gain
An int’rest in the Saviour’s blood?
Died He for me, who caused His pain?
For me, who Him to death pursued?
Amazing love! how can it be
That Thou, my God, should’st die for me?
Amazing love! how can it be
That Thou, my God, should’st die for me?
’Tis mystery all! The Immortal dies!
Who can explore His strange design?
In vain the firstborn seraph tries
To sound the depths of love Divine!
’Tis mercy all! let earth adore,
Let angel minds inquire no more.
’Tis mercy all! let earth adore,
Let angel minds inquire no more.
He left His Father’s throne above,
So free, so infinite His grace;
Emptied Himself in matchless love,
And bled for Adam’s helpless race:
’Tis mercy all, immense and free;
For, O my God, it found out me.
’Tis mercy all, immense and free;
For, O my God, it found out me.
Long my imprisoned spirit lay
Fast bound in sin and nature’s night;
Thine eye diffused a quickening ray,
I woke, the dungeon flamed with light;
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.
My chains fell off, my heart was free,
I rose, went forth, and followed Thee.
No condemnation now I dread;
Jesus, and all in Him, is mine!
Alive in Him, my living Head,
And clothed in righteousness Divine,
Bold I approach the eternal throne,
And claim the crown, through Christ my own.
Bold I approach the eternal throne,
And claim the crown, through Christ my own.
I suggest to you that the Getty ‘religious song’ DOES NOT set forth the gospel message with the plainness, the clarity or the reverence of either the Toplady or the Wesley hymns!
I could add hundreds of the old hymns from our own hymnbook, honoured by the Lord in bygone days of revival, which likewise differ in substance from the Getty CCM ‘hymn’ in that there is a sweet and blessed simplicity, allied with a deep, reverent and meaningful setting forth of the great truths of the gospel. There are echoes of the holy, heavenly inspired words of the Bible in the old hymns which I feel are not to be found in the CCM ‘hymns’!
Music of the world
Furthermore, the CCM ‘religious songs’ are usually set to music that is but an echo of the music the world delights in. CCM stands for music that is in step with the musical desire of the world today! It is ‘contemporary’!
Of course, not all CCM items are blatantly ‘in your face’ music of the world. There is the ‘vanilla’ variety which, like a sucking bottle to a baby, gently starts a person down the road to a greater and greater embibing of such music. As the path to heresy begins with very gentle and apparently innocent departures from God’s Word, so it is with the replacing of the God-honouring and God-honoured hymns of the past.
Repetitions
It is the case with much of CCM that the words are highly repetitious. The Saviour warned against the use of mindless repetition in our prayers. “But when ye pray, use not vain repetitions, as the heathen do,” Matthew 6:7. I believe the same principle applies to our praise. Such repetitions indicate that the writers are using carnal means to stir the hearers’ minds, rather than seeing hearts stirred by sound doctrine.
It was the Saviour’s words which stirred the hearts of the two on the road to Emmaus! They left this testimony for us to consider. “Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures?” Luke 24:32.
Effeminacy
There is also evidence of effeminacy in many of the songs, in which male singers adopt a breathy, soft and seductive tone, more like that of a female! There are to found such abominable phrases used within in the world of CCM ‘hymnology’ as ‘Jesus is my boyfriend’!
That is horrible perversion of the old time, holy expression, ‘Jesus, lover of my soul’!
Foolish Christians believe that the adoption of such music will attract young people into church. It may do just that but it will certainly cause the presence of the Lord to depart from any church that adopts CCM. The Lord has set His seal upon those glorious old hymns that have been handed down to us from days of mighty spiritual awakenings. Embracing CCM religious songs amounts to a rejecting of the hymns that the Lord has manifested His delight in! It is a disparaging the Lord’s ‘taste in music’!
I recall an American brother, at a conference in Edinburgh many years ago, saying that a ‘hymn’ that reaches your feet but has no impact on your heart is not of God!
He was right! CCM items will set hands clapping and arms waving and feet tapping but it will not move and melt the heart and bring it in adoration to the feet of Christ the Saviour!
Kinship with modern Bible versions
Of course, I can well believe that some CCM has about it a solemn, reverent air. But the words fall far short of the wonderfully Christ-exalting words of the ‘old hymns’. It should ever be remembered that, irrespective of the actual music the words are set to, they emanate from that modernistic and liberal theological school of thought that has produced the ‘modern perversions of Holy Scriptures’! To endorse any one of the compositions from the CCM camp is to endorse that musical genre!
Even if there was some semblance of a holy setting forth of the truth of God in a CCM ‘song’, introducing it into the worship of a church is like inviting an ‘evangelical preacher’, who professes faith in Christ and who appears to speak the truth BUT who refuses to separate himself from the modernistic and liberal denomination to which he belongs!
That would be an act that is contrary to the command of God to keep ourselves “unspotted from the world,” James 1:27. The Lord asks us a series of rhetorical questions in 2 Corinthians 6:14-16. “For what fellowship hath righteousness with unrighteousness? and what communion hath light with darkness? And what concord hath Christ with Belial? or what part hath he that believeth with an infidel? And what agreement hath the temple of God with idols?” The answer of course is NONE!
HISTORY
The history of CCM reveals its perverted beginnings. This is what is to be found in ‘Wikipedia’.
“Contemporary Christian music (CCM), also known as Christian pop, and occasionally inspirational music, is a genre of modern popular music, and an aspect of Christian media, which is lyrically focused on matters related to the Christian faith and stylistically rooted in Christian music. Originating in the United States, it was formed by those affected by the 1960s Jesus movement revival who began to express themselves in other styles of popular music, beyond the church music of hymns, gospel and Southern gospel music that was prevalent in the church at the time. Initially referred to as Jesus music, today, the term is typically used to refer to pop, but also includes rock, alternative rock, hip hop, metal, contemporary worship, punk, hardcore punk, Latin, electronic dance music, R&B-influenced gospel, and country styles.
After originating in the US, it has since become a globally recognised style of popular music. It has representation on several music charts, including Billboard’s Christian Albums, Christian Songs, Hot Christian AC (Adult Contemporary), Christian CHR, Soft AC/Inspirational, and Christian Digital Songs as well as the UK’s Official Christian & Gospel Albums Chart. Top-selling CCM artists will also appear on the Billboard 200. In the iTunes Store, the genre is represented as part of the Christian and gospel genre[notes 1] while the Google Play Music system labels it as Christian/Gospel.”
That is what some have introduced into the Free Presbyterian Church and who have conspired to have deposed from the gospel ministry our brother Rev David DiCanio because he exposed what it was they were doing and such an exposure angered them and caused them to set about having brother DiCanio removed.
I CHALLENGE ANY PRESBYTERY OFFICER, MINISTER OR ELDER TO PUBLICLY DEFEND THE INTRODUCTION OF CCM ‘COMPOSITIONS’ AND THE REPLACING OF THE TIME HONOURED HYMNS THAT HAVE BEEN A BLESSING TO MILLIONS.
IF THERE ARE NONE TO STAND UP FOR CCM, PERHAPS THERE IS SOMEONE WHO WILL EXPLAIN WHY REV. DAVID DICANIO WAS DEPOSED FOR CHALLENGING THE USE OF CCM?
Happily, the only King and Head of the Church is the final arbitrator in such disputes. He will have His say in this controversy. We await patiently His verdict!
Rev Ivan Foster (Rtd)
19th December, 2024