1 Thessalonians 4:7 God has called us to live holy lives, not impure lives.
When my younger son was two months old, we took him out to the mall for the first time on a Black Friday. That night, he had a very high fever and we rushed him to the emergency. The doctors wanted to rule out the possibility of any infection and so wanted to do a spinal fluid tap. They suggested that I wait with my older son outside as it would be hard to watch the procedure. As I stood in the hallway with my older son, I cried out to God. As I stood there crying out, a thought kept coming again and again. That was about me listening to movie songs during that time. As my younger son would cry every time I kept him in the car seat to drive to my older son’s school, I started to listen to movie songs to help me focus on driving and not be distracted by his crying. I realized that listening to secular movie songs is a downward spiral. It makes us more and more addicted to listening to it and it corrupts our minds and thoughts. As I felt like it was God convicting me of this new habit, I cried out to God to forgive me and not punish my son for my mistake and that I will not listen to movie songs any longer. By God’s amazing grace, my son did not have any infection. When the results of the spine fluid came, it was ruled out as fever due to being in a crowded place.
By God’s grace, I kept my promise for close to a decade by not listening to movie songs. Down the line, my promise from the emergency room turned lukewarm and I would listen to these songs occasionally at work while juggling multitasking. I soon noticed a pattern whenever I started to listen to these songs, I would land on a problem from which only God could save me and I started to understand that maybe that was God’s way of reminding me of my promise. Soon after this decision, by God’s grace, I became part of the worship team in our Indian church. From then on, I had set my mind that I will neither listen to nor sing secular movie songs with the same mouth with which I would sing worship songs. James 3:11 Does a spring send forth fresh water and bitter from the same opening? By the strength God gave me, I never wavered from that decision. Though I wasn’t striving to do holy living during those days, this decision had been a starting point. Eventually, God honored that stand and turned around my life and gave me the desire to live in a way that pleases Him, to strive to live a holy life, and not to ignorantly please my fleshly desires.
1 Thessalonians 4:3 God’s will is for you to be holy.
Though many would justify secular songs by saying that it is “just music”, it is not “just music” As we know that Satan was an angel in heaven who was the highest worship leader and fell to his doom due to pride, he knows how to use music to corrupt human minds. I have felt the addiction that secular music brings to our minds. Though while listening, it would feel so entertaining, it does no good to our soul. It simply gives a temporary pleasure while getting us all tangled in this downward spiral. On the other hand, Christian hymns and pure worship songs that praise and glorify God brings so much peace and joy that is unexplainable regardless of what heavy burdens we go through. Devil is so cunning that he infiltrates even the worship songs these days. We ought to be careful about being carried away simply by the tunes and the words of worship music also and carefully analyze if it truly brings worship to God or it exalts oneself.
1 Corinthians 6:15 Do you not know that your bodies are members of Christ? Shall I then take the members of Christ and make them members of a harlot? Certainly not! 19. Or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit who is in you, whom you have from God?
As believers in Christ, we are called to strive to live a life that reflects the holiness of Jesus. Even though we cannot attain holiness in our own strength and ability, Jesus should be at least able to see that we are striving hard to live holy and thus He would help us to live holy.
Galatians 5:16 Let the Holy Spirit guide your lives. Then you won’t be doing what your sinful nature craves. 17. The sinful nature wants to do evil, which is just the opposite of what the Spirit wants. And the Spirit gives us desires that are the opposite of what the sinful nature desires.
We are naturally drawn to the music of the world. But we are having to discipline ourselves to listen and sing only His worship for the same reason as above. Our Christian walk is like a glass of pure milk. Every worldly thing that we allow into us is like a drop of poison added to the milk. If the poison itself is white in color, the milk would still look white, but would we drink it?
Jesus was able to boldly say that the devil had nothing in Him because He did not allow anything of the world to be found in Him. In the same way, may we not give any room for anything that belongs to the devil. There is no middle ground. It belongs either to God or the devil. In everything that we do, may we carefully check if it belongs to God or the devil? Like Daniel, may we set it in our hearts that we will do only what honors God! AMEN!
