It's Not About You

When I was younger, my dad used bad Christian songs to teach me and my sister about theology. Although the people who wrote the popular radio tunes were surely well-meaning, the lyrics were often full of errors, and I am very thankful that I had parents who paid attention to this and used the mistakes as teaching moments. Although I could often sense that something was amiss, I rarely could articulate why I did not like a song or why I thought it was not Biblical, and thinking through the lyrics with my dad taught me a lot about discernment.

At the end of last year, Dad came back from a conference where he had a conversation about this with another dad. He had blanked on the specific Michael W. Smith song which served as an example, and asked me if I remembered what it was. I did, and told him that "Above All" was the song that had man-centered theology.

"Crucified, laid behind a stone

You lived to die, rejected and alone

Like a rose, trampled on the ground

You took the fall, and thought of me... above all," runs the chorus.

When this song got a lot of airtime one Easter, Dad pointed out to me and my sister that the chorus got it all wrong. The rest of the song was solid, talking about how Christ was above all created things and was there before the world began, but it went wrong as soon as it stated that it was all about me. Yes, God loves us and chose to redeem us from our sin, but ultimately, it was about His glory and His redemptive plan. When Jesus Christ was hanging on the cross, He was not thinking about me, but was thinking about how He was fulfilling the mission for which He was sent. It was about God, and His redemptive story. I eternally benefit from the substitutionary death on the cross, and that was all part of the plan, but it was not about me.

So many well-meaning, "uplifting" Christian tunes fall short when they do not recognize this properly. There may be elements of truth to the lyrics, but without a firm foundation on the gospel, it is meaningless. If the gospel is focused on me, all of its transforming power is taken away, and I am left with nice, secular ideas packaged in church language. If I need to know that I am forgiven and loved, just telling me that God loves me and that I can receive grace is not going to fix the problem. The statements may be true, but to have impact, they must be founded upon the truth of what Christ has done for me. Although a Christian with a solid theological perspective could take such a song as the next step of what they already know, there are far too many people who do not really understand the gospel as presented in Scripture, and songs like these only contribute to the problem.

Before there can be no condemnation, there has to be justice. Many songs tell you that you are loved, have great worth, and have the power to overcome your problems and live life to the fullest, but the problem with this is that anyone who seriously examines themselves can see that they are awful, sinful people. For me, these messages always rang false, because I knew full well that I was not a great person. The glorious truth is that it is not about me at all. The whole world, and the story of the gospel, centers on the only one who deserves that glory. God is the whole point, and it is His grace which gives me innate value regardless of my failures. It is the death of His son which crucifies my old self, and it His resurrection from the dead which gives me the ability to live anew. Only when our songs are grounded in this truth will they rightly glorify God and have true impact on people's lives. 

I am not loved and valuable because God ignores my sin, but because His wrath was fully satisfied in Christ. I am free to live for righteousness not because I have any goodness deep inside me, but because Christ transforms me. It may not sound nice and uplifting to talk about the consequences of our sin, but without that, one cannot properly recognize just how meaningful freedom is. I can only truly understand my identity in Christ when I grasp that it is not about me at all.

I have not listened to CCM radio on my own in years, but have great appreciation for selective groups that create truly God-centered songs with great quality and meaningful messages. Tenth Avenue North has been my favorite Christian band for years now, and their song "You are More" helps to illustrate the alternative to the type of message I have criticized here. I would like to finish with some lyrics from that:

You are more than the choices that you've made,

You are more than the sum of your past mistakes,

You are more than the problems you create,

You've been remade.

'Cause this is not about what you've done,

But what's been done for you.

This is not about where you've been,

But where your brokenness brings you to

This is not about what you feel,

But what He felt to forgive you,

And what He felt to make you loved.