United Through Worship

It is not hard to understand why older people advised to choose music carefully. Music has its unnoticed hidden effects to listener. You might don’t believe it but you may now realize why reading this article, that if not because of music you are not bad (or not good). Music gives a huge influence to you, it affects your mode and actions a lot. But this is seems to be normal and it is so much unnoticed to the listener that music can kill you softly without your knowledge.

The lyrics. Lyrics are fundamental components of music, they are the message of it. It guides the listener into the deeper meaning of the sound, it gives more meaning to the beat and rhythm of the sound. The lyrics is the most influential part of music, where the listener give his deeper time to interpret the lyrics and to apply it. The listener need to accept the lyrics in order to be appreciated and it affects the thinking of one listener. The lyrics allow the listener to think what should he do.

The genre, the beat and sound. This is the ear catching of the music, there are classification of genre where they are classify as soft and hard. Choosing a genre or a type of music reveals what you really like. Some listener prefer listening to music even don’t really understand the lyrics because of its genre, beat and the sound. This gives influence to the listener in terms of actions. The genre allows the listener to move.

The singer, is the one who is singing the song. This gives the biggest influence to the listener, because the listener imitate closely the singer on whoever he is. The listener portray himself as like the singer, that is why if the singer is Emo, then the listener is also Emo (even he deny it). When the listener saw the singer crying in the music video, the listener also overreact to cry when they experience the same situation as being watched in the music video. Example with the song “Untitled” by simple plan, music is emotionally driven and the song is “good”, but still knowing Simple Plan as a singer makes the listener feels like he is a member of simple plan or just simply imitating them when the listener sing the song.

The Music Video, is the audio and video presentation of the music, it gives interpretation and color to a music to be appreciated. The main entertainment spice of the music to be appreciated. This gives the listener a closer appreciation to the music in:

* The appreciation of Lyrics;
* The appreciation of Genre (and)
* The appreciation of Artist.

The imitation of Artist and so much deep respect with too much appreciation is a sign of idolatry, sometimes the listener want to imitate the fame and playing style of the artist. That is why most band player imitate the artist closely to be recognized and to gain fame as the same with the idolized performer. I would like to emphasize that this article doesn’t discourage you to listen to music, but you need to choose your music wisely in terms of lyrics, genre and even artist. As we all know, Contemporary music or some called as Inspirational Music (with good lyrics) are converted into a type of entertainment that promotes immoral dress code, unaccepted hairstyle, stage performance style, fame with idolatry, controversial singers and business money making.

If you will listen into a music being performed by Hillsong and Chris Tomlin which one of the popular inspirational music, you will notice that the lyrics are excellent, but the genre for “One Way” is not suitable for a inspirational music, many claims that the important is you have the purpose why you listen, play and hear, but the effect is really unnoticed because they don’t consider the solemnity of the genre for worship and the personality of those who sing it or the artist itself, they are even called as Christian artist despite of controversies of the band and the song as Christian music even some of it are profit oriented. They are even use in churches and the worship is in the form of entertainment same to as the video linked above. Listeners might feel emotional feelings in listening to the song while because they feel the fame of the artist or the local performer, the enjoyment choice of a genre, a good entertainment with a multimedia video, special human prestige, recognition, and fame. It is similar when an individual cry for joy as he called on stage for being awarded as “Honoris Causa” and “Recognition”, and some interpreted as a “presence of the holy spirit”.

It is not bad to listen to songs, but you need to be choosy with music and your purpose of listening to it. Even it is a very good song that have a good genre and lyrics, if you give worship and too much time and contribution to the artist itself,…is considered as idolatry. You might unnoticed that you are already under the influence of hidden effects (such as idolatry and being obsessed like this video of the song Stan) that even you don’t notice it, you may start doing negative things such as lying, immoral sex, anger and worst of all even killing (an experience with Eminem song that a kid killed his mother), it is just because of music. Your physical appearance might change and you follow the artist’s mode and styles. Your words might be based on the music you previously listen. Your actions might be based on the beat of the music you rock with. This blogpost doesn’t aim to discourage you on listening to your favorite music, but it is only a warning that music should not be your master and you are the slave. But you need to make sure that the music you listen is something that makes you a better person or has positive effect. Think about it, if the music you listen right now gives you positive output, then continue listening to it, if not. It is up to you to deny all this things to yourself. But the most important here is use music to express your feelings, let the music heal your soul for whatever problems you may have, be inspired and control the music you are listening. But avoid music controlling you!