Secular or Sacred?

Once a semester we host singer songwriter Tom Conlon.  He’s such a humble rockin guy.  I love to take a night a semester to chill out and listen to Tom praise God and play the crap out of his guitar.  When we hosted him this past time, he said something really interesting about his music.  He said that he likes to mix the secular and the sacred.  He said that God is ever present through our life and that God in the midst of the sacred time and the non sacred, both are equally valid.  So why wouldn’t he sing about both?  In life we like to live in boxes.  It’s certainly tidier that way.  You have a work box, mom box, church box, sister box, and the list goes on.  These people get this part of you, this part of your life and personality.  What would it look like if we mixed them?  If we were the same person at church that we are with our kids and our work folk?

This past weekend at Exploration something very interesting happened.  The opening song to the worship on Saturday night was Firework by Katie Perry.  When it came on, I didn’t think ‘hey that’s not from the hymn book…’  I thought woo I know this song!!!  It didn’t occur to me that it maybe didn’t fit until the Mormon boy next to me asked if these were all songs from the UMC hymnal.  Later I was asked by Meg what I thought about the selection, if it belonged.  For the purpose of the weekend (discerning what God desires for our lives and finding what He has placed within us to do such a thing) I thought the song fit well, not to mention everyone was jamming to it.  I mean everyone.  The chaplains from the airforce started the dance line two rows behind me.  The song motivated us and set the tone for the rest of the evening.  But the song is secular, it’s pop music for crying out loud.  How in the world does that belong in a worship service?  These preachers all weekend were taking about wanting us to reach out to our generation and be the Ipad not the typewriter, in a worship setting could mixing the secular and sacred be part of that answer?  Why do songs have to be secular or sacred?  What determines it as such?  I mean obviously there are songs that are not appropriate in a church setting, but a song like Firework is a great example of a song that could be the middle of the road.  Is such a determination made by the person who penned the words, the person singing it on the stage, or the meaning found by the listener?  Is it set in stone, or can it be flexible?  Can a pop song be church music?  I think the answer is, could be.  God is there in everything through everything.  God is the meaning of mixing secular and sacred, I mean isn’t that sort of what happened when Jesus came?  Please do not misunderstand, I’m not saying songs like “I’m Sorry Miss Jackson” or “Rumor Has It” should be your call to worship next week, but I want to know what you think.  Can you push the lines in worship music, and if so could this be a way to reach the Ipad generation, or do we keep genres in their separate boxes?

Peace and Blessings Erica Oliveira

Here’s a video of “Firework” you decide, did it belong?

Exploration 2011

Hey,

So I guess I get to be a guest blogger this week talk about this past weekend. What’s so important about this past weekend you ask? Well for one thing everyone on the trip got to embrace there inner child again (though one might argue the Winthrop Wesley never really takes breaks from the innocence of their inner children) on the biggest most awesome playground ever! For those who don’t know, we went to the City Museum on the second day of the event. It’s quite literally a giant playground for people over three feet tall, and needless to say everyone took advantage of the opportunity. We also spent some other time site seeing around the St. Louis Arch which was nicely adjacent to our hotel.

Now then on to the more serious things. Though, I should take a moment to observe, that having fun is very serious business if one wishes to stay happy and healthy. Regardless the weekend was about more than just acting like tourists around the city. The Exploration event is very much centered around encouraging young adults to ascertain and explore their calling in life with a special focus on those interested in ordained ministry, and we definitely took the time to do just that. Most of the weekend was given over to reflection in one form or another. We were placed in to small groups with current seminary students, and we spent the time discussing our own personal callings in life or lack thereof.
I think the biggest impact of those small groups came for me when the group leader asked a very simple question. The topic at the time was compassion, and the leader pointed out that empathy is a key component of compassion. Empathy in fact means walking in someone else’s shoes. So how can a person walk in someone else’s shoes if they don’t know what is in their own? He asked that question the first night, and I believe I spent more of the weekend considering that than anything else. After all, what goes in shoes besides feet? I personally think I have my answer to the question, but the reason I tell that story is to bring up a point about how we relate to other people. So much of the communication between two people is based on each individual person’s prior experiences that self awareness can matter a great deal with regards to how any one of us is able to attempt to communicate with other people. More self awareness means better communication, and when we communicate well with the people we reach out to our ministry is fleshed out into something life changing. When people communicate with each other in real, vulnerable, honest, deep and loving ways we can see the holy spirit moving in the world.

So for me, exploration was really an opportunity to do some serious exploration deep down and try to answer those big questions that brought me there in the first place. Before going to the event, I was pretty sure that I was going to seminary, but now I can better articulate the way, and I feel like that level of personal reflection bettered me as an individual. I might even recommend reflecting like that to other people. Actually go ahead and consider this an endorsement to hang out and just think in silence for a while.

Thanks for listening!

Blessings and Peace!

Jon