Is Collective Soul a Christian Band?

[Timothew]

The song, "Heaven Let Your Light Shine Down", Is that meant to be a Christian Song?

I just heard it on the radio. Its a very cool song.

 

[Blackknight]

I don't think they're a "Christian" band but a lot of bands write songs with religious themes.

 

[Qyöt27]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shine_%28Collective_Soul_song)

 

[Timothew]

I stepped out of music for a long time, as you can tell.

 

[NiobiumTragedy]

People who ask if a secular band or song is Christian because it has words like "God" or "Heaven" or other religious related words always make me a mixture of amused and annoyed. As if somehow that will make a song or band better if they are talking about Christianity and faith.

 

[Timothew]

People who ask if a secular band or song is Christian because it has words like "God" or "Heaven" or other religious related words always make me a mixture of amused and annoyed. As if somehow that will make a song or band better if they are talking about Christianity and faith.

I like a lot of bands that are definitely Not Christian. The reason that I asked is that I tend to see lyrics as being about God, when they are not intended that way at all.

Is AC/DC Christian? I love them!

 

[Rahm]

The song, "Heaven Let Your Light Shine Down", Is that meant to be a Christian Song?

I just heard it on the radio. Its a very cool song.

I really like Collective Soul--but they are not a Christian band. Though the name of the band may indicate a spiritual basis, they are clearly alternative rock which carries a lot of spiritual themes into their music. The same assumption could be made about Creed. The other day I was listening to 'The Faceless Man' and reazied that it was quoting/paraphrasing scripture.

 

[Timothew]

I really like Collective Soul--but they are not a Christian band. Though the name of the band may indicate a spiritual basis, they are clearly alternative rock which carries a lot of spiritual themes into their music. The same assumption could be made about Creed. The other day I was listening to 'The Faceless Man' and reazied that it was quoting/paraphrasing scripture.

Hi Kirkhaven

I need to listen to that song. I was listening to Nickelback's "If everyone cared", and thinking about Revelation (due to "revelation song") and how we will all really care for each other in the resurrection, the chorus really fits, "Amen, I, I'm Alive". Imagine being resurrected, I think I'll be saying that.

So, What is "A Christian Band"? Is it a Band made up of Christians? or a Band that only sings songs designed to proseletize? Can a "Christian Band" play songs that aren't "Christian" if the lyrics have special meaning to the band? Can a "Non-Christian Band" write a song that, without intending it, expresses God's Love so perfectly, that we have to take notice, and applaude them for it? I love it when that happens.

I think Niobium was right, whether they are "Christian" or "Not Christian" doesn't matter as much as what the lyrics are saying.

 

[Rahm]

That's a good question. I've often felt that it depends on who your producer is. Michael W Smith for years wrote only the most light hearted songs that sounded more like pop music than 'Christian music'. But he ended up having a deeper conversion expereince and apparently now is much more forward about his faith (I believe he's planted his own church and is the pastor of it too).

 

[Qyöt27]

So, What is "A Christian Band"? Is it a Band made up of Christians? or a Band that only sings songs designed to proseletize? Can a "Christian Band" play songs that aren't "Christian" if the lyrics have special meaning to the band? Can a "Non-Christian Band" write a song that, without intending it, expresses God's Love so perfectly, that we have to take notice, and applaude them for it? I love it when that happens.

Generally, the phrase "Christian band" is a superficial marketing device, even though churches that heavily promote them don't see them that way. They belong to a 'Christian' music label like Word (or did at one time, for those few artists that moved to mainstream labels like Atlantic or Arista) or labels that may not be explicitly Christian but have the reputation of being so, like Tooth & Nail. The subject matter usually is packed with passive spiritual references and praise, or can deal with more struggle-based issues, but almost always with an obsessively-positive outlook rather than a realistic one, and often mostly with topics that appeal to the Evangelical or Fundamentalist crowd. A lot of that sort of music (along with Praise & Worship, which tends to seem predominantly concerned with meeting a certain quota of saying 'Jesus' per minute) often gets criticized for having exceedingly shallow theology, on top of how extremely derivative of the mainstream Top 40 the musical aspects of them seem to be.

Obviously I don't think very highly of most CCM, but in many ways it has to do more with how low my opinion is of the Modern Church and the bubble subculture it's built around itself. CCM is just one of those things they've used to do so and it viciously feeds back on itself. The stuff I prefer that can be labeled 'Christian music' is mostly underground material (primarily because Goth Rock and Industrial haven't been profitable for the CCM industry since the mid-90s, and it was hardly even profitable then - they also had a tendency, like Steve Taylor, to bite the hand that fed them), centered around Flaming Fish Music.

 

[Fangtastic]

I would question that anyways an old favorite of mine. Hardly listen to them anymore though.

 

[MacFall]

No, they're not a Christian band. The writer of most of their lyrics seems to believe in God, but I don't know whether he's a Christian or not. The band's name is taken from a phrase Ayn Rand used in The Fountainhead to describe the "zeitgeist" of the culture of her day.

 

[Marisa Drolet]

The song, "Heaven Let Your Light Shine Down", Is that meant to be a Christian Song?

I just heard it on the radio. Its a very cool song.

There is a lot of stupid music out there. With no meat no nutrition to the soul. But I saw something in these guys wether they meant it or not realizing what there're heart was calling forward
Who are we ?
God is far greater than our understanding
Let him speak from the mouth of a donkey so that salvation may come as we all know the days grow shorter.

 

[PvQ]

CS is definately not Christian. They are Masonic and the light that shines that they talk about is Lucifer the light bearer.