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My personal advices to gospel/worship or generally Christian musicians.

LW97Nils

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1. make sure what you sing matches with Bible doctrine (Matthew 4:4)
2. if you wish to make a record, do NOT sign to a "Christian" label. To not be a hypocrite, better sign to a small independent label. Your objection may be "but how am I gonna sell a lot?" My response - do not look at how much you give away. Your main audience is God. And with that we are come to the next point, namely...
3. do not ask for money. You should work with your own hands according to Paul. He never asked for money for his ministry. Leonard Ravenhill adviced Keith Green to stop asking money for his albums and concerts. You should have a job at the same time. Maybe a tentmaker, maybe build instruments, but music alone, art alone is not an occupation.
4. do not give your songs titles that look 'overly righteous' (Ecclesiastes 7:16). So many 'gospel/worship' artists do give those titles to songs, yet the content is not matching up. This is not to say a title named "Oh Lord You're Beautiful" is per se bad, but it IS dangerous. You are putting yourself on a high standard. With a more neutral title like "The Way", "Questions", "The Hypocrite" etc., the danger is not non existant, but certainly less.
5. make sure you live righteous. Your singing, your playing etc. is not the worship - it can only reflect it! You too can worship without singing. That is not to say that singing is bad if you feel that calling to be a NT David, but then also match that standard. Paul had it, yet he did not sing - at least there is no record that he did.
6. do not go 'touring'. Going on tours will easily make you a slave. You certainly can give concerts, even record them, maybe pick areas that are totally random. But you too can sing to God in a studio and record it instead to have to show it to an audience. Be an artist, not a performer!
7. do not do away with God's word. Music of itself is not to be limited to 'entertainment'. Roger Scruton claimed that once music was part of life and not a distraction from it. Whether that is true is disputable, however, indeed, music is not to be limited to entertainment, but telling a message. Which shows the bad side of #6 also, the recorded thing. It has become a necessity to have something to listen to, and from my humble opinion that is bad.
8. at the same time, do not become a pharisee. Meaning, do not pray in public, see Matthew 6. While praying for others is a good thing, you do not do good doing so in their presence. Also telling others 'I shall for you' is a dangerous thing. They'll see you as a hypocrite and think 'why doesn't he help me'?
 
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stevevw

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Thank you for the advice. I am looking at trying some busking. I have mainly played and sometimes recorded my original music at home on the guitar. I use to jam sometimes with some friends. I miss that as I moved. I think hats really important as you can share and learn from each other.

I volunteer at a local homeless hub which is a drop in center and we have a developing music group/therapy once a week. Its surprising how may homeless people play the guitar and busk and are pretty good.

As a result I have had to learn some covers as I have only been playing my originals. Thats when I realised if you want to play in public you need some good familiar songs as an ice breaker. Building the rapport. Theres one guy who busks and knoew all the good old favorites and people sing along and tap their feet.

So I am busily learning some covers and I think you can find covers that suit your style and you can make them your own so to speak. Rather than just trying to replicate the original. Which I could never do with my level of ability lol.

I have always been more implicit in how I express the my faith. Though not stating directly I believe the message is pretty clear overall. I think this is best on the streets especially nowadays where people are more sensitive to ideology and politics.

I mean bands like U2 and Supertramp never stated God directly but I sure got thinking about Him which contributed being led to Christ. I like to relate being human and focusing on the big questions of life which we all wonder about. Then trying to link this to Christ.

But I also think you can sing directly biblical or gospel songs and relate them to modern times. I always think of Johnny Cash and how he could get away with it. It wasn't just the words but the spirit and realness of the song. Sometimes even music without words done in reverence to God causes people to look to God. Stirs something in them where they are spiritually awakened.
 
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