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Post by John on Oct 10, 2019 11:01:32 GMT -5
If you are looking for gospel songs with minor mistakes that the song writer should have known better, there are songs like "Blind Bartimaeus" where one of the lines says, "In my God's Bible, in the book of James, Christ goes healing the sick and the lame." Then there is the song, "I Believe He's Coming Back," with the line, "High upon a mountain, called Transfiguration, an angel of the Lord, declared that it would be. Don't stand here grieving, for the Lord that you see leaving, In like manner he'll come back for you and me." There are tons of songs with silly mistakes like that.
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Post by John on Oct 10, 2019 11:02:27 GMT -5
Ya reading it carefully I can see this. Thanks for the example. Is this song considered to be in one of the hymn books? That was a southern gospel Top 10 Hit. If you are looking strictly for songs in the hymn book, I will have to think about that.
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Post by Giller on Oct 10, 2019 11:11:22 GMT -5
I am not looking for a big list, just a few examples, so it can bring awareness, and that people start to think a bit more upon what they sing.
That is all.
Then I will get into another area of this subject.
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Post by John on Oct 10, 2019 11:15:52 GMT -5
I am not looking for a big list, just a few examples, so it can bring awareness, and that people start to think a bit more upon what they sing. That is all. Then I will get into another area of this subject. In church, we didn't use the whole hymn book, and I know that the songs we used were all Biblical. I have some hymn books at home. If I can find time, I will thumb through them.
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Post by John on Oct 10, 2019 11:28:08 GMT -5
A lot of songs you hear by Christian singers are really secular or were Christianized. "Up Where We Belong," a huge hit for Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes was changed from saying, "Love lift us up where we belong," to "Lord lift us up where we belong." It was a love song from the movie, "An Officer And A Gentleman." "You Light Up My Life" by Debbie Boone was a secular love song.
I was listening to Joy FM and heard the Gaither Homecoming singers doing "Back Home Again," a secular song by John Denver, and Gold City took a country song called "What Children Believe" and got a gospel hit from it. Another group charted the Anne Murray song, "A Little Good News." Everything is getting secularized. Bill Gaither was promoting a secular album of Statler Brothers country hits. It is all about money.
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Post by Giller on Oct 10, 2019 12:59:53 GMT -5
A lot of songs you hear by Christian singers are really secular or were Christianized. "Up Where We Belong," a huge hit for Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes was changed from saying, "Love lift us up where we belong," to "Lord lift us up where we belong." It was a love song from the movie, "An Officer And A Gentleman." "You Light Up My Life" by Debbie Boone was a secular love song.
I was listening to Joy FM and heard the Gaither Homecoming singers doing "Back Home Again," a secular song by John Denver, and Gold City took a country song called "What Children Believe" and got a gospel hit from it. Another group charted the Anne Murray song, "A Little Good News." Everything is getting secularized. Bill Gaither was promoting a secular album of Statler Brothers country hits. It is all about money.
That is sad to see, yes it is about money and we are not suppose to Christianize secular music and make it Christian, even if we change the words, it is not biblical to do.
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Post by Giller on Oct 16, 2019 13:41:16 GMT -5
I am getting almost ready to post an old hymn that is unbiblical. I had found some in what is called "Christmas" songs that are unblblical, but did not want to focus on those ones.
I have even read of how some of the Calvinist preachers are changing the words of popular hymns, and conforming them to once saved always theology.
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Post by John on Oct 17, 2019 8:52:25 GMT -5
A lot of songs you hear by Christian singers are really secular or were Christianized. "Up Where We Belong," a huge hit for Joe Cocker and Jennifer Warnes was changed from saying, "Love lift us up where we belong," to "Lord lift us up where we belong." It was a love song from the movie, "An Officer And A Gentleman." "You Light Up My Life" by Debbie Boone was a secular love song.
I was listening to Joy FM and heard the Gaither Homecoming singers doing "Back Home Again," a secular song by John Denver, and Gold City took a country song called "What Children Believe" and got a gospel hit from it. Another group charted the Anne Murray song, "A Little Good News." Everything is getting secularized. Bill Gaither was promoting a secular album of Statler Brothers country hits. It is all about money.
That is sad to see, yes it is about money and we are not suppose to Christianize secular music and make it Christian, even if we change the words, it is not biblical to do. I never really thought about it being unbiblical so much as showing that it is about money and entertainment, not ministry. The Christian artists do listen to secular music, and it gives them ideas for new songs and sometimes they simply try to Christianize the secular songs. One of the members of the Kingsmen had the idea to change the words to "Stand Up," a secular song by country singer Mel McDaniel. The original song was telling people to stand up and testify about similar experiences in a bar, whereas the new southern gospel song was talking about standing up and testifying about things Jesus did for them. The Kingsmen southern gospel song went all the way to number one. Another example was a family group that had their biggest southern gospel hit with "Jesus Can Heal Your Ache Breaky Heart," which was a makeover of the Billy Rae Cyrus country song, "Achy Breaky Heart." Those didn't bother me as much as the ones where they never even bothered to change the words, but just sang a secular song, like how one Christian artist took the country song, "Only Here For A Little While" and released it as gospel, or how another artist did it with the Glen Campbell country song, "Try A Little Kindness." When I tune into the Christian station, I want to hear Christian music. I can tune into a secular station if I want to here secular songs, and the artists are usually better. I don't like this trend.
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Post by John on Oct 17, 2019 9:00:48 GMT -5
I am getting almost ready to post an old hymn that is unbiblical. I had found some in what is called "Christmas" songs that are unblblical, but did not want to focus on those ones. I have even read of how some of the Calvinist preachers are changing the words of popular hymns, and conforming them to once saved always theology. There was a southern gospel song called, "I'll See You In The Rapture," originally done by Jerry & The Goffs. There was a line that said, "If to God we have been true, and we live above all sin, then for us there'll be a meeting..." When an OSAS type did a cover of the song, they changed that line from "live above all sin" to "have been forgiven of all sin." They do make subtle changes in the lyrics at times. Now they can make changes to correct mistakes, and that is a good thing, like the one I mentioned in "Blind Bartimaeus." Instead of "In my God's Bible in the Book of James, Christ goes healing the sick and the lame," one person changed it to say "In my God's Bible the Word proclaims, Christ goes healing the sick and the lame." That is for the good.
Gospel songs are often preaching a message, and many OSAS artists are writing songs to promote their false doctrine. They chart these songs, and those listening are being deceived, just as much as if they were listening to a false preacher giving a sermon promoting the OSAS heresy. That is one reason why I find it hard to promote gospel music anymore. These things are becoming more noticeable. Now if I was going to start up a new southern gospel station, I would have to personally listen to the lyrics of every song before including it in the playlist, and I would have to leave songs off the playlist, even if they were big hits. That brings up another can of worms of what is wrong with Christian music today.
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PG4Him
Senior Member
Essay Moderator
Posts: 3,570
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Post by PG4Him on Oct 17, 2019 9:02:53 GMT -5
Yeah, I’ve had that moment before, when you’re listening to a hot new worship song, and suddenly you find yourself humming the secular song it was based on. Kinda hard to believe the Holy Spirit needed help from Boy George to ”inspire” a worship song. You can call it pretty music, you can say it’s vaguely Christian, but don’t bother pretending it’s inspired worship.
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Post by John on Oct 17, 2019 9:15:57 GMT -5
I was first exposed to southern gospel music and Christian music in general back in 1982, while working in radio. There is a magazine called "Singing News," and it promotes all things southern gospel. It was started around 1970 I think, and the founder felt like that in order to increase the popularity of southern gospel music, the industry needed an official chart, just like secular artists have Billboard Magazine, and did have Cashbox and Radio & Records. These charts serve to show what is popular around the nation. The stations playing southern gospel were to fill out a Top 20, and send them in to the magazine, who would then look at the data and create a chart. While this is a helpful tool for radio stations, it also has negatives. It causes stations to program by a chart, rather than by the words of the songs and the gifts and talents of the singers. What was meant for good, was really a problem. Instead of ministry being the priority, success on a chart was what everyone strove for. This was the difference in success or failure, and meant a lot of money when it came to what the groups would receive for appearances. Having a song in the Top 40 was a big deal.
As the one who made up the chart, I would have promoters calling me regularly to pump up their artists and songs. I will never forget one time where a man from Trail Records called me up and told me on the phone how he cried when he saw that I hadn't charted any of their artists that month, as we were in a very important market. I explained that we were playing their songs, but we could only list the top 20, and none happened to be there at that time. I had a woman promoting a new singer, that I was playing, talking about how disappointed she was that her artist hadn't made it onto the Singing News Chart yet, but she understood that new singers must "pay their dues." That particular singer never did make it. Everything has become about charts. This includes more than just the songs, but the record companies will even package the products to be appealing to the public today. It used to be that southern gospel artists dressed nice on the record or cd covers, but to fit in with the casual looks of the day, now you will see them dressed in ways that would make me not want to promote their music. Daywind is one of the worst for trying to have their singers look trendy.
We have to decide, are we into gospel music as a ministry or a business? Is it using our talents for God or are we entertainers? Does the message matter or are we more concerned with airplay and charts? How about programmers? I used to be caught up in the charts and programming by the Top 40. If it made the Top 40, I had to play it. That is what the public wanted to hear. If I was doing it today, I would go by the message in the songs, and be willing to play artists that were not charting if they were able to sing and sincerely following Jesus.
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Post by John on Oct 17, 2019 9:20:37 GMT -5
Yeah, I’ve had that moment before, when you’re listening to a hot new worship song, and suddenly you find yourself humming the secular song it was based on. Kinda hard to believe the Holy Spirit needed help from Boy George to ”inspire” a worship song. You can call it pretty music, you can say it’s vaguely Christian, but don’t bother pretending it’s inspired worship. It is an easy and lazy way to write songs. I could easily take secular songs, change the words, and promote them as gospel. The songs have good melodies, which is why they were secular hits. They would almost certainly have appeal to Christians who could now listen to secular songs without their conscience bothering them. The song writers are now making more money because they are reaching a new audience with songs that originally had nothing to do with God. I think it was Bob McDill that wrote "Stand Up." Mel McDaniel took the secular song to the Top 10 on the Billboard Country Chart, and the Kingsmen took the new version to number 1 on the Singing News Chart, and he gets royalties off of both as they receive airplay.
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Post by Giller on Oct 17, 2019 9:46:04 GMT -5
Yeah, I’ve had that moment before, when you’re listening to a hot new worship song, and suddenly you find yourself humming the secular song it was based on. Kinda hard to believe the Holy Spirit needed help from Boy George to ”inspire” a worship song. You can call it pretty music, you can say it’s vaguely Christian, but don’t bother pretending it’s inspired worship. It is an easy and lazy way to write songs. I could easily take secular songs, change the words, and promote them as gospel. The songs have good melodies, which is why they were secular hits. They would almost certainly have appeal to Christians who could now listen to secular songs without their conscience bothering them. The song writers are now making more money because they are reaching a new audience with songs that originally had nothing to do with God. I think it was Bob McDill that wrote "Stand Up." Mel McDaniel took the secular song to the Top 10 on the Billboard Country Chart, and the Kingsmen took the new version to number 1 on the Singing News Chart, and he gets royalties off of both as they receive airplay.
I think we should not copy from the world, but get the words and tune from God. I think of the word purity, which means without mixture, and if I would hear a song with Christian words in it, and knew it was a worldly tune, and say it was a worldly tune I use to listen to, when I was in the world, I would most likely be thinking of that worldly song. I think the right way, is without mixture, I do not care if it has a nice tune to it, I want it all to be from God.
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Post by Giller on Oct 17, 2019 9:49:31 GMT -5
King David got his words and tune from God, and I think that is the example we are to follow.
He did not seek the world for any of it.
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Post by John on Oct 17, 2019 9:53:37 GMT -5
I forgot to mention this example. There is a small network of stations called the Oasis Network in Oklahoma run by David Ingles, a southern gospel singer and song writer who had a couple of small hits in the 70s. He did "There's A Whole Lot of People Going Home," and "Oasis of Love." When I would drive through Oklahoma in my truck, I would listen to his station, and I heard them play the Carpenters song, "Sing." There is nothing wrong with that song in the way of bad content. It is a nice and positive song, but it is 100 percent secular. It has nothing to do with Jesus or the gospel. The people that are in the gospel music industry clearly enjoy secular music, and they are itching to play it when they can. Sandy Patty once said that Karen Carpenter was one of her favorite singers. What you need to know when you turn on K Love or The Fish or that local southern gospel station is you are getting entertained, not ministered to. It is a business. The people involved in that Christian Station are pals with those at the secular stations. The gospel artists are working along side fellow musicians who are secular.
When I was running a southern gospel internet station, there was a new group that was all excited about their new recording, because as they told me, "It was possum good." They were referring to the "Ole Possum," country legend George Jones. They were friends with him, and he agreed to sing on their latest single. The song didn't make it on the Singing News Chart, and they were dumbfounded. I was talking to a member of that group, and I told him that the reason why having George Jones on their recording didn't work was because his voice didn't blend with the group. That was one problem, but the other was while George Jones was big in country, he wasn't in southern gospel. It is kind of like when a country singer was bragging about how they were singing a song by legendary pop singer and song writer Barry Gibb, and clearly, nobody cared. People who were into pop music love Barry Gibb, but most in country didn't recognize him as part of the Bee Gees. I advised the man to stick with well known southern gospel artists if he wanted to do well with a southern gospel audience. I have never been involved as a musician, but I know a lot about how the music industry works from my radio days.
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