Confessions of a Failed Worshiper

OK. How's everybody doing? Good. Hope you guys had a great week in the Lord.

we are really, really blessed to have Matthew Smith here this morning, from Indelible Grace, and as you guys have been hearing for a number of weeks now, Matthew's gonna be here during our Sunday school hour, doing a seminar for us, and then he's gonna lead worship at 10:30, and then we're gonna have a pizza lunch and encourage you guys to stick around for that. We'll have a concert at 1:15, about 1:15 to 2:15. And so we're very excited to have Matthew Smith here. He's based in Nashville.

He's a songwriter and a performer, part of Idelible Grace. I know a lot of you guys are familiar with Indelible Grace., we're influenced here at Cornerstone by a lot of different people, a lot of churches, enjoy Chris Tomlin, Paul Beloche, Matt Redman, great, worship leaders. Probably 3 of my biggest influences and our biggest influences here at Cornerstone are Keith and Kristen Getty, Sovereign Grace and Indelible Grace. those are, just really big influences on our music here.

so we're really excited to have Matthew. He's, I think the chief vocalist on most of the, or male vocalists on most of the Idelible Grace albums. And we've got a, a table out in the lobby if you want to check out some of the music. I'd really encourage you guys to do that.

you can purchase albums out there, but let's go ahead and just give Matthew Smith a warm cornerstone welcome. Thank you. Thanks, Mike. All right.

Good morning, everybody. I'm, on my 2nd cup of coffee. So, it'll kick in soon. basically, during this hour, what I wanna do is I'm going to, I'm gonna tell my story and then make a few points about hymns and then talk about whatever you guys wanna talk about.

We'll, I'll take questions. So, if you have any questions, if you can just hold them until the question time, cause I'm very easily distracted. So if you interrupt me and ask a question, it, it, things will go south pretty quick. so, let me, let me open this in a word of prayer.

Oh Lord, to you, all hearts are open, all desires are known. And from you, no secrets are hid. Cleanse the thoughts of our hearts by the inspiration of your Holy Spirit that we may more perfectly love you and worthily magnify your holy name. Amen.

all right. So, my story begins in, when I was a, I grew up in a Christian home. I always loved music. In fact, my only broken bone injury was music related.

When I was 2 years old, I was sitting on the arm of my parents' couch, listening to an album, a record album, and holding the cover. Right? Fractured my little collarbone. So that should tell you everything you need to know about my sports career.

so, as I got older, I got more and more into music. I particularly enjoyed singing. And so, when I was 16 years old, I decided to learn how to play guitar so that I could accompany myself as I sang. I bought a used acoustic guitar for my buddy John for 100 bucks.

He taught me a few chords. I immediately started writing my own songs, which might sound impressive until you realize that if you're new at an instrument or bad at an instrument, it's actually a lot easier to write your own songs than it is to learn how to play other people's songs. Cause if you play somebody else's song at that point, people are gonna go, No, man, that's not how that goes. But if you wrote it, it might not be any good, but that is how it goes, OK?

And so, I, I, soon after that started leading the music for my youth group on Wednesday nights. and I really love doing that. I really love the idea of leading people in worship. but as time went on, I began to feel, like a failure as a worshiper.

And what by that is that I had this idea about what worship was. I don't know where I got it cause it's not in the Bible. But, but I had this idea that somehow if I were, committed enough or sold out enough or on fire enough for God or worshiping hard enough that the world around me would fade away, and I would have to have this worship experience, and that never really happened. and so I felt like I was not enough somehow, like I was, I was not doing it right or not enough or not, not spiritual enough, not holy enough.

so fast forward a couple of years, I went off to college, I went to Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee, and there I stumbled into a Bible study called RUF Reformed University Fellowship. And they were singing hymns. Now, I had not grown up singing that many hymns. The church I did a lot of growing up in sang a lot of praise songs and early 20th century gospel songs, as well as some Gaither type stuff, and a few, a few old hymns.

we did Holy Holy Holy and Amazing Grace, the hits, right? but not that many old hymns. And so this was pretty new for me, and they were being led from acoustic guitar by a guy up front. Some of them with traditional melodies, many of them with brand new melodies that he and other people had written to these old hymn texts, and I was captivated by these hymns.

I thought they were so beautiful in the ways that they talked about Jesus and who he is. And what he's done and continues to do for us. And I was also struck by how honest they were, how real their description of the Christian life felt to me. they felt very, very genuine and honest and real.

And so as the semester went along, I, I, I was singing these hymns, I also got a lot of great Bible teaching. I began to realize that in some ways, I was, I was beginning to worship God for the first time. and it didn't look anything like I thought it would in high school. The world around me did not fade away.

In fact, I would say the world around me came into sharper focus as I began to see how the life and death and resurrection of Jesus applies to all of life, and that God actually does want to meet me where I am, and and know me and love me where I am. So the guy who was in charge, who, who's leading the music, his name is Kevin Twitt. Unfortunately, not the founder of Twitter. What a missed opportunity.

Don't you, don't you feel that, that it just slipped through his fingers? he, he decided he wanted to put together an album of these, these hymns that he had written melodies for. And, Kevin is an amazing preacher, a, a great guitar player, fantastic songwriter, and a terrible singer. So, but it's OK cause he knows that.

He's OK with it. it's only a problem if you go to record a CD and you don't know that you're a terrible singer. So, so he, he enlisted the help of, of those of us who enjoyed singing. He also invited us to, to, to try our hand at writing melodies for these old hymn lyrics.

And so, we put together this album just totally independently, no record label, no distribution, to stores or anything like that. and And this was the year 2000, so almost a century ago, where, and this was before iTunes, this was before, social media, all we had was a website, and you couldn't actually buy the CD on the website. You had to go to the website, print out an order form, and mail it in with a check. What?

Explain, please, I won't take the time now, but please explain to the younger people later what a check is, OK? Please do that for me. So, Now, with most independent projects like that, you, you check the, you check the mail that first week and, and, and, you open the mail, mailbox and it's like, thanks, mom, right?, but usually, after, after that first week or so, the sales drop off completely after all your, after you've exhausted all your friends and family, and, and then you end up with 950 CDs in your basement.

But, but, but that's not what happened.

We got that initial support, of course, but, but it seemed like, the CDs steadily started selling more and more, not like this, but just steadily more and more, and people were ordering it from all over the country, all over the world, places that our moms didn't know anybody. And we, we were really encouraged by the response, and it was, and it was a, a, the people who were ordering the CD seemed to not just be college students, seemed to be all ages, all denominations. we were just really encouraged by the response.

So the next year we recorded a second album.

The first album was called Indelible Grace. That was just the name of the album, but we decided to take that name on as the name for our community, our collective. And so, after that second album came out, I just looked around and I thought, I love these hymns more than I love any other songs I've ever tried to write. And so I should put, I should like go on tour both with the band and solo, and play concerts of these hymns at churches and colleges around the country, and nobody told me no.

So I've been doing that ever since. I've played over 700 concerts and events. and my main job is still to introduce people to these hymns. I would say most people who come to my concerts are not familiar with these hymns.

and so I, I love being able to introduce people to these hymns, but I've been doing it long enough that I've been able to hear stories from people who say, 3 years ago, 5 years ago, 10 years ago, God used this hymn in my life in a, in a very specific way. and, and I get to see my own experience of coming alive to the gospel. reflected in, in the lives of other people, and that brings me so much joy, because ultimately I sing these hymns because I need to sing them for my own sanity.

I, it's very secondary that I'm singing them for you guys.

Sorry, don't take it personally. I, I sing them, I sing them because I need to stay sane. I need to be centered on reality, and to see that God uses these hymns in that way in other people's lives is a tremendous encouragement. So that's my story.

I'll tell you a little bit more about it, in, in a second, but I want to make a few points about hymns. now, when I say, when I say hymns, good hymns. There's, there's good hymns and bad hymns, just like there's good praise songs and bad praise songs, OK? Just cause it's a hymn doesn't make it holy or something.

But, hymns have, have a way of engaging our imagination, our intellect, our will, and our emotions all at the same time. they engage our imagination, not in, not just in the poetic language that they use, but their whole approach. So that when you sing a hymn, like, Oh Love that will not let me go. When you sing a hymn like Oh Love That Will Not let me go, it has a verse that says, Oh joy that seekest me through pain, I cannot close my heart to thee.

I trace the rainbow through the rain and feel the promise is not vain that morn shall tearless be. What's happening there? You're being asked to imagine, Noah and the ark and the rainbow that God placed in the sky to symbolize his promise. You're, you, you're remembering that.

You're being asked to imagine, What it might be like to trust God to keep His promises, even if you have a, feel like you have a very weak faith, you can barely trace the rainbow through the rain. Of, of whatever you're going through, and you're being invited to imagine what it might, there might possibly be a day coming where there will be no more tears. so I would say the general theme of that verse is God keeps His promises and you should trust in Him, right? Now, I could just sing, God keeps His promises, God keeps His promises, God keeps His promises, trust in Him, trust in Him.

Right? I just made that up. It's not a real song, OK? Not a real song.

but you could, that says the same thing, right? it's not heretical, right? that's doctrinally accurate, but what's the difference? it doesn't engage your imagination at all.

It just tells you what to believe. And I've found That, or what I believe about the nature of, of sin, which is what I think the Bible teaches, is that sin is, is ever present with us, and even, even the good things that we do, sin is right there with us. And when we, For somebody like me, the way that can play out, I'm a, quote unquote, good churchgoing Christian person, right? I'm, I'm even one of those strange people who cares about theology, like, read books about that and stuff.

but, so like I take it seriously, I'm all, all in with that stuff. but what my sin can do is that it actually can create a barrier. so, God keeps His promises and you should trust in Him. Of course, I believe that.

Right? Every Bible believing Christian believes that, right? And I just intellectually assent to that without that truth ever really reaching my heart. And what these hymns have, have done is that they can do an end run around those barriers, those blockades that I put up.

And they can go around them and say, do you, do you really believe this? What might it, it, they're inviting me to, to, to say, what might it be like to believe this more deeply, more beautifully. and, and they do that through my imagination, because God made your imagination. It is a gift from Him.

that we should be so thankful for, and he uses our imagination, in order to reach us in a deeper way and reach our hearts in that way. And so these hymns engage our imagination in such a beautiful way. they also engage our intellect. the, the typical structure of a, of a hymn is, verse, verse, verse, verse, right?

and that allows for a storytelling structure. Where each verse can build on the last, and, and it takes you on a journey, takes you through a story that you kinda have to pay attention to. I like to say that these hymns make you lean, lean in rather than lean back and check out. it's hard to go on autopilot when you're, when you're singing different words every, every time.

and so you have to engage your mind. And what, scientists who have, who've studied the brain have found is that there's a part of your brain that's basically like a radar that's always scanning for story. and that's why when you get bored, you daydream, OK? Cause your mind is, is looking for a story and what you're engaged in is not.

there's no story there, and so you start to daydream. So your, your, your brain is always looking for a story. The same scientists, when they've scanned the brains of people who are, watching a movie or reading a novel, they're engaged in a story, it's like that radar stops. It's locked in on what it's looking for.

God designed us for story. God designed our minds for story, and these hymns, ask us to, to lean in and to engage our minds, not check out. and some of the, some of the things we sing, we might not even understand the first time that we sing them., we might need to learn something, but that's OK because there's a story that God is inviting us into, through these hymns that requires our minds to be engaged, and through that, he is in the process of renewing our minds. And so it's important these hymns engage our intellect in that way.

These hymns also engage our will. They can help change what we want. and this was so important in my story. So, I'm gonna ask you to imagine that I'm on the floor here and, and that there's a big thick climbing rope.

those heavy climbing ropes, right? Now, imagine it from here all the way out the door into the lobby, just on the ground, flat, flat in a straight line. Now, imagine I was squatting down, down here on the floor and saying, 123. And try to push that rope as hard as I could in order to try to get that rope out of the door.

OK. It would ball up right around here. Maybe, maybe if I had a good breakfast around the 2nd row, I might be able to get that far, right? No, don't flatter yourself, Matthew.

You won't get that far. so, and that was my approach to worship in high school. It was like I was saying, I wanna worship you. I wanna praise you.

I was trying to make worship happen by the force of my will. I thought it was up to me to make it happen, that I had to be spiritual enough, and I'd had to work hard at being spiritual enough in order to make that happen. But when I got to college and started singing these hymns, which were not primarily about me and what I wanted to do, they were primarily about Jesus and what he has done. It was as if that rope was being pulled from the other end, and my heart was being drawn along with it.

and, and the reason why that is. is that God designed your heart to respond to beauty. And what you find beautiful is what you will worship. It is what you will ascribe worth to, and that is not something you can make happen by the force of your will.

It is a response. And when we see Christ and Him crucified, our hearts are drawn along. To worship him in response. That is what makes our heart really say, I want to worship you.

I want to praise you. Our, our will is even transformed. There's a hymn that we sang in college called Love Constraining to Obedience that said, to see the law by Christ fulfilled, to hear his pardoning voice. Changes a slave into a child and duty into choice.

And that, that was my story. I was living a life of religious duty. Now don't get me wrong, I was a believer, OK? I, I wasn't just like some crazy legalist who didn't even believe.

I wasn't something extreme like that. I was a pretty normal Christian. And But I thought I was living a life of religious duty, where I thought it was somehow up to me to generate worship in my heart. But when I saw that Christ had fulfilled the law for me, and when I heard his pardoning voice in a real deep, profound way, it changed me from a slave into a child, and changed all my duty into freely choosing him.

That same hymn says, now freely chosen in the Son, I freely choose his ways. Christ has come to set us free. and he can set our will free even in that way by opening our hearts to respond to his beauty. the author of Hebrews understood this when he said, fix your eyes on Jesus, the author and perfecter of your faith.

He understood that the motivation and the power of living the Christian life and running the, running the race. is not our own spiritual efforts. It is worship, and he understood that worship is actually seeing Jesus as the one who authored your faith and the one who will perfect your faith. It is his work.

And we simply respond to what he has done. It's not something we generate within ourselves. So these hymns can help change what we want, can help change our will. these hymns also engage our emotions.

I find them to be very, very emotional without being emotionalism or emotional manipulation. And this is so important. I, I believe that it's so vital that we be emotionally honest in worship. tell God what we are really feeling and going through in worship.

unfortunately, what, unfortunately, what has happened, over the course of time in our culture in that, is that, certain emotions are considered to be acceptable for worship. So, right, celebration, praise, thanksgiving, OK? But what about all these other emotions that we feel? What about, what about grief and lament?

What about anger? What about all these things that we feel? We feel a, a wide spectrum of emotions, but so often we only sing about a very narrow spectrum of emotions. and that, that presents a lot of difficulties.

Kevin, who still does college ministry, he, he, he has told me that he meets with college students, one on one over coffee and, And we'll talk to them, and, and a lot of them, grew up in Christian homes and, and, and grew up going to church, and they'll tell him, Kevin, I've always, I've always believed or believed since I was a little kid, and, but now I'm going through these things, I'm, I'm feeling these different things, and I don't know if I'm a Christian anymore. And he says, OK, tell me more about that.

And so they tell him, And he said so often he hears them and his response is, That sounds like the normal Christian life to me. What, what, what you're feeling, what you're going through, that sounds like the normal Christian life to me.

That doesn't sound like that, but they don't know that because they've grown up in church environments where the only emotions that are allowed to be expressed are celebration, praise, thanksgiving, right? And so when they feel something other than those things, they think they must not be a Christian or must be a bad Christian, because this is presented to them as this is what the Christian life looks like. This is what the Christian life feels like. This is what good Christians feel.

Well, let me tell you, if you want to talk about what good Christians feel, let's talk about what Jesus felt, because he felt that entire spectrum of emotion. He felt deep grief and lament and anger. He felt all of those things, yet without sin, he felt them. And what more, he had a book of songs that he could sing when he was feeling those things, and that's called the Psalms.

It's in the, it's in your Bible. you've got it too, and you can sing them too. And, and, and, and these, the, the psalms have that whole range of human emotion from the highest highs to the lowest lows. You've got incredible songs of celebration and praise.

And you've also got Psalms of lament, even, even, Psalm 88, which ends, the darkness is my closest friend. And, I, I, I, I think most churches would be really uncomfortable singing a song that ended the darkness is my closest friend. I feel like somebody, would, would just like In the back would just go, mm, the sun will come out tomorrow, fetch your bottom dollar that tomorrow. We feel this, this need to resolve the tension in what we are singing, to put a, a, a happy ending and a smiley face at the end of every sentence.

But the Bible doesn't do that. and I guarantee you that there is someone in your church who feels like the darkness is their closest friend. That they're going through their own dark night of the soul. Right now and to be able to express that to God.

is so sorely needed. I had a church one time tell me that they, somebody tried to introduce one of my hymns, to the church and the leadership shot it down. OK. So let me quote you the lyrics that they objected to.

this is the first half of the first verse. It says, I need thee, precious Jesus, for I am full of sin. My soul is dark and guilty. My heart is dead within.

OK? So the leadership looked at that and they said, we're not full of sin, we've been forgiven. We're, our souls are not dark and guilty, our heart is not dead within. We've been made alive in Christ.

OK Yeah, but does it always feel that way? I don't wake up feeling that way most days. Maybe you do, and if you do, God bless you. that.

God bless you. He has given you a gift. But I would argue that there are people who are feeling that. In our churches.

Feeling that often that they're, that they are full of sin, their souls are dark and guilty, and their hearts are dead within. And unless we sing words like that, we will not be able to give them the comfort of what the next lines say. I need the cleansing fountain where I can always flee. The blood of Christ most precious, the sinner's perfect plea.

See how that doesn't, that doesn't resolve it? That doesn't say, but now I'm happy. It says, I need a place where I can always go to. Because I feel this way often enough, and I need to be able to go to the place where I know that it is not what I'm feeling that is defining me before God the Father.

It is actually God the Son standing before the Father, pleading not my feelings, not my works, pleading the merits of his own blood. And that is my only hope. That is my only comfort in life and in death. And we need to be able to sing that.

We are broken people, and if we pretend otherwise, we are liars. So these hymns need, we need to be emotionally honest when we sing. We need to tell the truth about what's really going on. And these hymns do that much like the psalms do.

this, this morning we're gonna be singing some hymns and also a hymn that's based on, on a psalm, where we get to say from the depths of woe, I raise to thee the voice of lamentation. Lord, turn a gracious ear to me and hear my supplication. And we need to be able to do that. It is so vital for us to do that, cause if we don't get a chance to do that, people will either leave or almost worse, They will stay and slap on a smile.

And pretend like they're OK, that being a part of the community is so important to them. They don't want to lose that. By telling the people around them how much they are hurting, how much they are doubting. And how much pain they are in, cause they feel like that pain is not something that they should feel as Christians.

That's not what the Bible teaches. The Bible teaches that we have that pain and that we have a place to take it, and that it is a continual process. It is not something where we arrive. So, anyway, I can talk more about that later.

I will, if, if you guys have any questions, but I will move on. I could talk about that all morning. so hymns, a good hymn should be true. It should have good theology, OK?

It should accurately reflect what the Bible teaches about who God is and who we are. that's the minimum standard, you guys, OK? Having, having good doctrine should be, that's not like a bonus in a worship song. That's the minimum standard.

So like, I flew out here, I flew out west on Southwest Airlines, which is my favorite airline. A couple of years ago on their website, I noticed they had a little banner that said, Southwest Airlines, the airline that treats you like a person. What? That's a selling point That's, that's where the industry is right now.

We're just treating it, Imagine going into a restaurant and being like, hi, we're gonna treat you like a person. What else were you planning on doing? And so having good theology in a song, that's a minimum requirement. If it doesn't agree with what the Bible teaches, do not sing it, please.

and it's not, but it's not just the, the letter of the doctrine that you should pay attention to. It is the spirit of it. What vision of the Christian life is the song presenting? Is it telling the truth?

Is it emotionally honest? Is it presenting a rose-colored idealized version of the Christian life, or is it telling it really like it is? and so we need to, to, to guard the doctrine of our, our, of our hymns, both in the letter of them and in the spirit of them. Hymns are also beautiful art.

they are, these were written by men and women who lived their lives and looked at the world and, and, and told you what they saw, and they need to be treated as such. And too often though, we as Christians, we will end up, Evaluating The value of art by its usefulness rather than by its beauty. So if this movie claims to be a Christian movie and we think that we can use it for evangelism, well, then it's acceptable, even though it might be terribly directed and poorly written and really not good at all.

so the, the, and, and that, so, so many different forms of art get, get a pass cause they're, they're, they're, oh, that, this is Christian art.

But really, it's not, it's not great art at all. Does anybody know the name for art that's made for the explicit purpose of getting of trying to manipulate someone into feeling or thinking a certain way? Propaganda, right. OK.

And, and, and I don't believe that Christians should support or engage in or create propaganda because we're not trying to manipulate people into the kingdom of God. Only God can change someone's heart. They cannot be manipulated into it. And so we need to be able to just tell the truth in the most beautiful way we can.

And by the way, by the way, when I say beauty, I don't mean pretty. It doesn't have to be pretty cause it's an ugly world. If you're telling the truth about it, you're gonna tell some ugly truth. But we got, we have to, to, to speak of Jesus in the most beautiful, true, honest way that we can.

And His Holy Spirit will do the work in people's hearts. So finally, some, and then I'll get to your questions. sometimes people ask me, OK, so, OK. These are a lot of, a lot of thoughts, they're not very organized, Matthew.

I know, sorry. how do we apply this? Like, how do we, how do we think through what we sing and evaluate what we sing? I'll give you this example.

Take it out of the realm of music for a moment, and imagine a different art form. Imagine you're reading a novel that's written by a pretty hacky, mediocre novelist, and the novelist writes, the woman entered the room and she was very beautiful. OK. You've got the information.

You don't really care, but there's a beautiful woman in the room. Got it. a great novelist will not say the woman was beautiful. A great novelist will describe the woman in such a way that makes you put the book down for a second to catch your breath.

And I think in a similar way, the best songs, the best hymns for worship don't tell you what to think, they don't tell you what to feel. They actually put Christ and Him crucified on display, and as you see his beauty, your heart responds in worship to Him and is drawn along to worship Him. So, that's my story. Those are a few points.

we've got another 20 minutes to talk about whatever you guys want to talk about. I can expand on anything that, if, if I need to clarify anything, if something was a little bit confusing, I can do that, or if you need to talk about something that, I haven't talked about, that's, that's great too. The only rule is just raise your hand and let me call on you so that the extroverts don't run over the introverts. OK.

I'm an introvert. Yes, ma'am. 00, I love that one let me go. I think that was George Matheson.

Yes, ma'am. Yes. Yeah Was that Yeah, yeah, yeah. That one's on my album, Watch the Rising Day.

So, it's on the table back there. And the, the, the hymn is called I Need Thee Today. And when you hear it, I had one friend say like, oh, this seems like it should be a very mournful, like slow, sad hymn, and you made it pretty upbeat. And I said, actually, I made it desperate.

I, I heard the desperation in the lyric, and, and so I tried to write a desperate song. so when you hear it, if you're, at first you're like, wait a minute, how does this fit? That's what I was going for. Whether I hit it or not is that, that's for other people to judge.

But I feel desperate when I sing it, so. Yes. Yeah, 16, I started writing. And then when, when I got to college, I started I probably wrote the music for commune centers.

My sophomore or junior year, yeah. Yes, I prefer English. Yeah. Yeah, the question is basically, what about contemporizing, changing some of the words to, to, make it more understandable for today.

I'm glad you actually gave an example, because I think And Ebenezer is a, is a biblical term. And there's so many of these things that we might look at in him and be like, what does that mean? And it's in the Bible, and that's why we don't know. Do what?

and so I If it's something that was, is just a bridge too far, I will change it. So we, we did one called I Asked the Lord that I Might Grow, and it had a, a line that said, he blasted my gourds. And that, we changed that one. Cause we thought it might be a distraction.

But, But that's a rare instance. We usually will leave difficult language in there cause we think it's worth learning. our culture is such an instant gratification culture that thinks if you don't understand it the first time, it, it's not worth engaging in. whereas the Christian tradition has always been one that values education and teaching people.

And I, I can't tell you how many times I've been reading the Bible and I read something that I'm like, oh, I thought that a hymn writer came up with that, that they just got it from the Bible. And, and so I think, and sometimes people be like, yeah, but our people don't understand this. And I'm like, man, you're in a tough spot because the Bible is a lot harder to understand than any one of these hymns. Do what?

Like, I, it's hard for me to read the Bible without having to study Bible, cause I get so caught up in like, I have no idea what this passage means. And I'm not like a dummy, I don't think. but I still need a lot of help to learn. I've got a lot to learn.

And so, I think, we should really Take the time to, even explain sometimes, not every time you sing a particular hymn, but a, a worship leader can, can explain, a particular word and, in, in doing so can open up that meaning of the, the meaning of the hymn for the entire congregation. So if you sing like on Christ the Solid Rock, I sand, Which we're singing this morning. I'm not actually gonna explain this line, though. I'll explain it to you, and you can tell other people.

It says, I dare not trust the sweetest frame, but wholly lean on Jesus' name. You can say, this doesn't mean like a picture frame? what is it talking about? It's an old way of saying your feelings.

I dare not trust the sweetest feelings I have. But even, even when I'm feeling great and the sun is shining outside, well, it's Southern California, so I guess it always is, but, even when I'm feeling great, I dare not even trust in those moments in that feeling, but only in the name of Jesus. It's a pretty short explanation that clarified, but also, as soon as you sing the first word of that hymn, your, your, your heart is already engaged in the truth of it. So, so I would say, and one other note, when people rewrite lyrics, usually the lyrics that they write are not as good.

As the lyric that it's replacing. It's a little bit, reminds me of the Sesame Street game. One of these things is not like the others. I'll see some of those sometimes and be like, Oh Charles Wesley wrote these and you wrote this line, and I can totally tell.

You might, I didn't, what a surprise. You're not as good of a writer as Charles Wesley. So, You never asked me that on Twitter, did you? Did we talk about this on Twitter?

OK. Yeah Yeah. Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah Yeah. Right.

Yeah. Yeah Yeah. Yes. oh.

Talking about that part you said you could talk all day on, yeah, yeah, yeah, and I guess maybe my question would be. just like, where do you see? I, I don't, I guess that resonated with me that that's something the church struggles with a lot is hiding. True feelings to fit into the community.

Because it doesn't match what we're supposed to be as Christians. So what form a question out of that if you can. we do Yeah, what, what aspect because I already talked about it. What, what aspect that I haven't talked about do you want me to talk about?

How strongly do you see that affecting? Yeah. worship to shift that. Yeah, what can we, yeah, what can we do to help, help shift, the American church more into emotionally honest worship.

Yeah Yeah, I think, I think develop a sense of smell for whether a song is honest or not,. is it, Walker Percy said, Bad books lie, and they lie most about the human condition. And I think that's true of all art. I think bad art lies, and it lies most about the human condition.

So if a, if the premise of a Christian song is, if you believe in Jesus, you, your, all your problems will go away, if that's implied. that's a lie. That's not what the Bible says at all. but if If the song is implying that Jesus will be ever present with you in your struggles and in your problems, that's the truth.

and, and so sometimes people misunderstand me with this, and they think that I'm advocating for singing a bunch of mopey, woe is me songs. OK. So I played at a college one time, that will go unnamed, a Christian college, and, not out here. and it was a chapel, and it was really great.

The students were really kind and what they said afterwards, but This professor came up to me afterwards and he said, excuse me. Do you have any happy songs? I was like, oh man. and I can't remember everything that we sang that morning, but we did.

I know that we sang Jesus What a Friend for Sinners. hallelujah, what a savior, hallelujah, what a friend, saving, heaven, keeping loving. He is with me to the end. Not a mopey song.

Seems pretty uplifting, right? But you look at the lyrics, and what are the lyrics? Even when my heart is breaking, he, my savior, makes me whole. Friends may fail me, foes assail me.

He is with me to the end. The person who is having the best day of their life can sing that song and praise God, and the person who just found out that their spouse is cheating on them. Or their best friend has betrayed them. Or They just got a diagnosis and their heart is breaking.

can also sing that song. Cause it's honest. It's presenting life as it really is, rather than simply as we wish it would be. There's no wishful thinking involved.

There's only the promises of God. and wishful thinking, power of positive thinking will only get you so far in life, and the promises of God will get you to eternity. Yes, Biggest Outside of, I really admire Keith and Kristen Getty, obviously, their, their commitment is to write new hymns, and, obviously, in Christ Alone is, I think, one of the greatest hymns of all time, including the, this, which that's saying something, and, and has reintroduced people to the idea of hymns., it's a modern song, but it's, it's a four-verse hymn.

It's as hymmy of a hymn as a hymn could hymn.

really. So those guys, are, are, are, are, I would say primary, older, he's, he's, he's, been with the Lord for a while now, but Rich Mullins, wrote some really honest songs, and I think modeled that approach, helped me develop that sense of smell a little bit. And the way he talked about the Christian life. I don't really listen to worship music very much or Christian music very much, and that that shocks a lot of people.

I just don't feel the need. I don't have to keep up with the trends or anything. I, I'm not part of the Christian music industry at all. I, I just, I live outside of that completely even though I live in Nashville.

so, if something's really good, I usually, there's a friend who will eventually say like, oh, you should listen to this, this is really good, but, but yeah. So, that's probably the answer to that. I like the Beatles. I like Paul McCartney.

I know he was a Beatle, but I wanted to say him separately. U2 is my favorite band. what an amazing band. their most recent album, Songs of Innocence, is just, just fantastic, just fantastic., those are my, those are my favorites.

there's an artist, I'll give you two music recommendations if anybody wants music recommendations of, of Christian artists. one is Jeremy Cassella, C A S E L L A, Jeremy Cassella. any of his albums are good, but I would start with his newest one, it's called Death in Reverse, and it, it will blow you away. And if it doesn't blow you away, let it grow on you, and then it will blow you away.

and then the other one, this artist that has just completely mesmerized me is Jess Ray, J E S S R A Y, Jess Ray. her album, Sentiment Sentimental Creatures, Oh man, it's so good. You can tell I like it cause it's called Sentimental Creatures. but, but there's a, there's a song, every song on it is great, but there's a song called Headed for the Hills that makes me cry every time.

it just has that, that longing and that ache for heaven that we were made for, and that really gets me. So, those are some music recommendations. I also recommend the Beatles. On that you you did a short video.

Secular music Oh yeah. Snippet Maybe, maybe just go watch it. I don't know. I don't, I'm tired.

I was arrested that day. Yeah, I, I, I think when I was talking about, somebody asked me about secular music, What it's, when it's OK. I, I would say, if you're, under your parents' care, if you're a child, whatever your parents say is what goes, and they're the authority that God has placed in your life over you, and you should, follow their direction, even if you think they're wrong, because they're, they are right and in authority over you. And that we should be discerning about whatever art that we, consume or engage in, whether it be Christian or secular art.

I think you need to be discerning about Christian art as well. I think I've already talked about that quite a bit this hour. but see what vision, of the world it's, it's telling, and there's a lot of secular art that actually does tell the truth about the world and a lot that, presents a pretty distorted view of, of love and relationships and any number of things, and we need to develop discernment, and not just buy into it wholesale or claim that you only listen to it for the music and you don't pay attention to the lyrics.

That's, you're either, dumb or a liar, if you say that, right?

Because you do, you do, you absorb the, unless it's in a totally different language, then you totally get a pass and you don't know that language. If you're super into Italian pop. French Baroque A favorite song? Right now, probably that Jess Ray song Headed for the Hills.

Yeah, that's probably my favorite song right now. Yes. Yeah, I go through old hymnals and hymnal reprints, and also some Google Books scans and find these old hymns, and I just read through them and see if they resonate with me. and, sometimes one will jump out and I'll try to write a melody to it and try to, it's, I, I approach it as co-writing, even though the other writer is dead.

The Super dead. the difference between dead and super dead? Dead is if people still are alive who remember you and super dead is everybody you ever knew is dead too. And these handwriters are super dead.

The question would be when, when you're going through those old towns. What makes you Great question. Old hymnals do not have musical notation in them, OK? that, right, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Sometimes people be like, I've got an old hymn. It's from an old hymnal. It's from 1945. I'm like, bless your heart.

Do what that means in the South? I won't explain it to you if you don't, but, but. But, old hymnals don't have musical notation in them. So, and these hymns weren't written to melodies.

So, like, people, I think that like Amazing Grace, that tune has always existed, whereas John Newton, who wrote that hymn, never heard that tune. Didn't that blow your mind? Cause it seems perfect for it, right? and so, these, these hymns were just written as words, so, no tune has like particular authority over that, with, to be with the text.

It was just matched, usually with it by a hymnal editor when they started adding musical notation hymns, and then they put the metrical index in the back so you can mix and match, and then everybody promptly forgot about the metrical index and never used it again. so, I, I'm usually not, aware of any melody to these hymns as I approach them. Great question. Yes.

Would you address the difference between a a worship. Manipulating Right, yeah, I take the diff difference between a song that's manipulating people's emotion versus what's actually drawing people along in, in emotionally, emotional honesty. I think Is it telling the truth? I really, I know I'll say that over and over again, but, But is it presenting, because usually sentimentality is a rose-colored false view of the world.

That does not hold up to actual experience. and it's very attractive. To us, I, I'm taking my family to Disney World next year, do what? And there's a magic there that's sentimental, but it's not real, those, those are people in costumes, it's not actually Mickey Mouse.

so there's a, there's a, there's a A, a sentimentality that is attractive to us cause we, we wish it was true, but ultimately, it will, it will poison us. if we, we, we, it's sweet to drink, but it, it's actually poison because it, it's, it's a lie. And, who the father of lies is, right? I don't need to tell you.

whereas when some, when a song presents honest emotion, That, that does not gloss over the pain of living in a broken world. then, then it invites us into true joy rather than momentary happiness. So, there's momentary happiness and good feelings that can be stirred up and manipulated, but real joy is something that you can't fake, and it's not something you can manufacture. I would argue it's a gift from God that he gives a believer that you can even experience in deep sorrow.

You can still have joy. I've, I've seen it, there's one of those U2 songs from Songs of Innocence says, I've seen for myself, there's no end to grief, and that's how I know that there's no end to love. And he's talking about God's love, by the way, there, and that there's that, that co-mixture. where, where true joy comes from.

we'll sing about that this morning from, from the depths of woe in that psalm, you'll, you'll feel that, that grief and sorrow, but the joy that comes, from trusting God in the midst of that. so it's not a, a temporary manipulation. It's a, it's a lasting joy. thank you guys for coming.

I think our time is up. Mike, do you wanna take it from here? Thank you. That's great.

Thank you so much, Matthew. Should I go right here or here? OK. Thank you so much.

What a great kickstart to the morning. so, Matthew's gonna be leading us in worship at 10:30, then Pastor Milton will be preaching, wrapping up our series on the Psalms, and then, stick around for the pizza lunch, and, and then we'll have a concert at 1:15. So, God bless you guys. I will be back in about a half hour.