Do you believe Christians should listen to secular music?

[ExtremeDays]

If you're talking about buying CDs from someone who is a well known drug addict/alcoholic or whatever, and if you know for a fact that they are spending all profits destroying their lives and the lives of their families and promoting an anti godly lifestyle rather than trying to kick their habit or help others or support charities; then maybe. That wasn't what I was talking about. My point was that music in itself is not Christian or otherwise.

But music doesn't kill people. I'd say that the vast majority of the time it's the words that are put to songs that can be detrimental, even harmful.

I agree about the music part being just a tool that can go either way. I meant songs- which usually but not always include lyrics. Although, I still stand on my point that there could be influences involved. I just think of David ministering to Saul who was under demonic influence. Does the Bible say those songs David played had words or not? Was the ministering just because the music itself (David was a good harpist, they were soothing songs) or was it because of the spirit behind the music (because of the one playing it)David who had the Spirit of God with him.
So is the opposite is true, someone under demonic influence (not just Satanism) can "minister" something evil?

Yes and that's sad. But what's to stop people like you from promoting a positive image of the rainbow, explaining what it is - a thing of beauty created by God and a positive image for many Christians? If negative connotations go unchallenged then people will come to accept them as the norm. It's like halloween - very few people associate it with the evening before all Hallows (All Saints) day which is on November 1st. It has become widely associated with witches, ghosts, skeletons and is seen by some as a means of promoting the occult. Halloween is a bad, or negative, day in Christian circles because other people have been allowed to take it over and make it what they want it to be.
And if we don't challenge it, that is how it will remain.

I mostly agree, but I think we have to pick our battles. Like abortion should definitely not go unchallanged. As for the rainbow I personally wouldn't wear such a pin (even though there's nothing wrong with a rainbow) because of the whole appearance of evil thing, and not wanting to cause someone to stumble.

Yes, but if a Christian has decided for themselves, and before God, that listening to a particular song/piece of music is ok, who are we to come along and say that they shouldn't be doing it? It may not be our choice or to our taste, and we can certainly say "do you realize what that song says/teaches", or point out the lifestyle that the singer has. But that's between them and God.

We can certainly decide for ourselves what we believe God's Word & the Holy Spirit are showing us. At the same time I believe people should also have the right to share what they think is harmful. Who are we to force them to stop, but who is someone else to say we can't share our beliefs? I think a lot of people have been influenced by the whole tolerance teaching that has overcome society. People cannot say things because someone else might get "offended". Is being offended the same as getting hurt, is it akin to murder? Will getting offended kill you? If my conscience is clear with God, if I am secure in my beliefs, I'm not going to wither up if someone doesn't like what I'm doing, or if they tell me I shouldn't or should be doing something.
It's also happening in the church where people are complaining a pastor, teacher, prophet or whoever, cannot say any shoulds shouldn'ts or that certain things are harmful.

There is a prime example of how a teaching/worldview has gotten into peoples minds without them even realizing it. It's there, a part of your thinking and you don't even realize how it got there- like through a song or a TV show etc.

God can work through anything and use anyone to achieve his purposes. In the OT, the people of Judah were taken into exile by the king of Babylon, who destroyed their temple. The prophets said that this was punishment because the nation had rejected God and forgotten his law. God used a foreign - uncircumcised - king who no doubt worshipped other gods (if he worshipped anything at all) to chastise and punish his own, chosen, people. I'm not saying that God will routinely speak through devil worshippers rather than those who have been filled with the Spirit, but that he will use what he can to reach the people he wants to reach - and if this is through a seculkar song, then that's what he'll do.

Again, what you just described happened, but was it His first choice, was that way Gods perfect will? God's first choice was that Judah would have served God, then He wouldn't have had to use an ungodly nation to deal with them.

Personally, I'll admit right before I got saved God was using some secular music (Simple Minds, Peter Gabriel, the Alarm-some old stuff ) to deal with me/remind me of God. It didn't lead to me salvation though because it didn't speak of Jesus. I didn't know Christian music, Bible verses, etc. Now that I am saved, God doesn't have to use those things to speak, to try to get my attention because now I have more accurate tools and resources, Christian ones.

I don't understand what you're saying here. This is the charismatic and Spirit filled board of the forum. We - and I - believe that the Holy Spirit is alive and at work in believers and in the church today, and that the gifts of the spirit are also for today, and in use today. Saying that God can sometimes speak through an unbeliever, or use "secular" music to get someone's attention does not deny this belief, because it's true - he can.

I'm not saying it denies it but it might be a substitute. Just like some Christians may be trying to find excitement & life in other things instead of in His presence, etc. Personally, I would rather have God speak to me (dreams & visions, the prophetic, audibly, through the gifts, etc..)through the things that come by the Holy Spirit...than through a "donkey".