Songwriting Into Culture

Written by Brenton Brown

Sunday, 23 November 2008

Brenton Brown explores key cultural themes that today's songwriters must write toward. What key theological themes should a worship songwriter keep in mind as we seek to write God-focused worship songs for our generation (and beyond)? My first song came I think at about aged 10. Zoom To The Moon On Monday. Heavily influenced by Duran Duran and with no musical training to stand in our way, I still remember our band beating this tune out on an upturned house bin and my mom's electric organ. We played with as much enthusiasm as anybody could reasonably muster over the idea of 'zooming' to the moon on a Monday - more!! But it was at least another 9 years before my enthusiasm for songwriting turned towards the Lord and I managed to write my first 'God song'. It wasn't that I hadn't tried. There'd been odd moments throughout high-school when I'd attempted to turn a lyric towards God. But it never worked for some reason. Singing about almost anything else was okay - including weekly lunar trips - but the moment I tried to sing about God a hollowness seemed to creep into the enterprise and the song was normally abandoned. It was only after God grabbed me by the scruff of the neck and in His mercy revealed Himself to me that the 'God songs' gradually began to come. The reason I share this little story is because there is something in me that almost questions the validity of suggesting to songwriters that they ought to focus their attention and lyrics on a particular theme and topic. Songs by their nature seem to work best when they are simply honest, albeit crafted, expressions of the heart. I'm not exactly sure how it works, but it seems the moment they loose this connection with the heart - with the passions and beliefs and activity - of a person, they begin to ring hollow. They stop being songs and start being something else, jingles maybe. And I think almost anyone can tell... Having said that, I've been privileged enough to have attended over the last few years a number of songwriters retreats and seminars, where almost consistently a strong message and even warning has rung out to congregational songwriters: people are remembering the lyrics and thoughts of your songs long after they have forgotten the sermons that they hear. In other words, songwriters seem to have at least as much influence on the theology, the way we think about God (and consequently the way we live) as pastors and preachers do. Scary! The implication is that whether we like it or not, as songwriters we have a degree of pastoral responsibility that we need to take seriously, and because of this we need to be looking seriously at the focus and content of our lyrics. They are shaping peoples lives. So how does this work practically? My encouragement and I guess observation, before I suggest and share some of the theological themes I think might be helpful for us to focus on right now, is that if good songs connect with the heart and come from the heart then writing a God-song is not like proofing an advert text. There's a connection with the lyric and who we are that needs to happen for the song to work.That's how good art works I think.  But more importantly it's also how discipleship works. We have a responsibility not only to research and study who God is and what He is like, but we then have a responsibility to live the truth of God as we encounter it (James 1.23-5). God's truth is not just propositional. It's bigger than that. It affects everything we do. Study should really come with a warning shouldn't it?! Well actually it does doesn't it (James again)? Think of some of the songs that God has used to touch the wider church recently. They often seem to come out of an experiential awareness of God's truth, something that has been worked out (often painfully) in their own lives. The song has been lived before it's been sung...Of course it's possible to sing and write truth without living it. But the best songs seem to have been lived as well. Okay. So what should we be writing about? I've been lucky enough to have asked this question to some very cool and mature followers of Jesus who happen to study and teach theology. Within the Vineyard context the answer to this question has tended to go like this. Write songs that connect with some of the older traditions of the church, especially as they are reflected in the church calender. The themes of incarnation and mission as they're reflected in the Christmas. The themes of death, resurrection, redemption, atonement, reconciliation as they are reflected in Easter. We need to add to the theme of intimacy we have enjoyed, an awareness of God's great mission and these calendar days help us do that. We've also been encouraged to return again to the theme of the kingdom and the topics of healing and justice and sovereignty that kingdom brings. On top of that, we've been encouraged to add to our predominantly personal expression of worship songs that reflect the fact that we are invited into relationship with a communal God, a trinitarian God. And that this relationship takes place within the context of the people of God. In other words we need songs, that sing 'we' and not just 'I'.  A further encouragement has been to write songs of intercession and petition, songs that call out to God for help, not only for ourselves, but for the world that we live in. Songs that ask for salvation and mercy on behalf of others. If these suggestions don't stoke your fire of creativity why not try looking for aspects of the Godlife that are missing from the places where you live? This is an approach that preachers often use when preparing their material. And this too is how Jesus used to teach. He met people where they were at and introduced God to them through their own awareness of their need. So what are the needs of the places where you live? As we've done this in our community some of the obvious needs that have emerged have been: • loneliness and disintegration of community versus the inherent community of God as trinity, and the community inherent in his people • fragmentation and transience of our culture vs the constancy of God • universal scepticism and the dismissal of truth as a helpful concept versus truth as identifiable and constant in the person of Jesus • loss of purpose and meaning versus the invitation to join in God's great cosmic story and learn how to die and live by following Jesus • urban dislocation from nature, God's creation and even beauty versus a recognition of nature as part of God's revelation of himself and how amazing He is to us These 'absences of God' provide helpful indicators of the characteristics of God we need to affirm and sing.  But a further way of stoking the fire may also be to look at what aspects of the Godlife are reflected in the culture where you live. Where I live aspects of God's truth emerge in: • Our culture's increasing comfort with the idea of mystery, not incompatible with the sense of mystery that we need when we approach the largeness, Holiness and otherness of the Creator God who chooses to reveal Himself to us • Our community's enjoyment of diversity and variety, a small reflection of God's incredible diversity and variety in creation and salvation • Our culture's concern for the marginalised and outcast, a small reflection of God's mercy and heart for the outcast, alien, widow, and excluded • Our culture's cry for justice and outrage at the pain of this world, a small reflection of God's passionate righteousness and call for justice on the earth Finally and most importantly, as much as we have ever needed to, we need to stay listening to God's Holy Spirit, being sensitive above all to what it is God is saying to the churches! I hope that is helpful. My prayer is that the songs of our generation would be birthed not just through lives dedicated to study and contemplation, but through lives dedicated to the cause of God. That we would live mission and mercy and community and kingdom power as well as sing them!