By: Dumebi Onoh
The topic of secular music and Christianity is one that I have found incredibly polarizing ever since I first came across the concept.
You see, 2017 was the year that made the difference for me because although I had first committed my life to Jesus Christ on an unassuming Sunday morning in 2015, it wasn’t until sometime in 2017, when the excitement of being a high school graduate had begun to lose its sheen, that I made the decision to invest in a relationship with the God I called mine.
In the midst of my quest to know the heart of my Father, a lot about me began to transform and soon, I found that I had stumbled knee deep into the waters of Christian Twitter. A rather strange place if you ask me. In between hot takes on trending matters, think pieces and arguments on doctrine and theology that I had no idea existed was the occasional word of encouragement but I digress.
Some years ago, I’d heard of this girl in my church whose iPod playlist was populated with only Christian songs. Even then, it was absurd but I never gave it much thought. It could, after-all, never be my reality. Until I came face to face with God demanding control over what I listened to. You see, I had, for a long time, taken pride in my music taste such that it had begun to form part of my identity. And it wasn’t like I was listening to explicit or vulgar songs so why was God bugging me about this?
The truth is music is an unmissable part of our culture today and like me, many of us can go an entire day listening to music non-stop whether it plays in our minds or on speakers. Philippians 4:8 encourages us to train our minds to think on whatever things are true, noble, pure, lovely and praiseworthy. But this becomes increasingly difficult for us when we consume content that negates the Word of God. Now I’m not hear to insist that anyone clears their entire music library. But to open our eyes to somethings we maybe have never really considered.
Paul tells us in Romans 6 verse 16 that we are slaves to whatever we obey. I never considered myself a slave to anything let only an artist or my autonomy over what I listened to, or even my identity and what I wanted people to know me as, but when the chips were down, I found myself struggling to obey any other voice but my own telling me who I was. And although I am not all the way there yet, I find that freedom, for me, currently looks like obeying and saying yes to the voice of God above my own ideas of what I ought to listen to or what society thinks I should listen to or even the fear of being considered as weird as I had thought that girl to be all those years back.
Friends, I hope you believe me when I tell you all that I am still trying to find my bearings regarding what God thinks about my music, but I have curated this playlist (or if you're a Spotify user, this one) with you in mind, comprising of mostly pop-songs by artists that remind me that freedom in Christ doesn’t mean negating our expression. It simply means submitting all forms of expression to the One Who gives expression.
This is Jubilee 1.
Enjoy!
