The editors of CCM Magazine are in a quandary. It seems that Jesus Christ, our Lord and Savior, has made a pronouncement on the Christian music scene.
In an unprecedented event, several leaders of the evangelical church in the United States received simultaneous visions from the Anointed One of God. The vision was received by at least two dozen leaders of the American Evangelical church including Joel Osteen, Rick Warren, James Dobson, Oral Roberts, Al Mohler and, of course, Pat Robertson. The message received by each of these leaders was remarkably consistent: Jesus revealed in an instant all the songs, past, present, and future that qualify as Christian music.
The bad news for CCM: modern Christian music, for the most part, is not endorsed by the first Christian, Jesus. According to some of those that received the vision, Jesus said, "What you call Christian music is a sin. Your so-called Christian artists are just putting sappy lyrics to contemporary sounds. There is no real feeling and emotion in their music. It just seems contrived."
Some of the songs that Jesus endorses include Willie Nelson's On the Road Again, Hang on Sloopy by the McCoys, I'm with You by Avril Lavigne; the recent Justin Timberlake hit Sexy Back, and numerous others from every possible genre. Churches practicing the U2charist were largely validated as was The Wittenburg Door Magazine when it reported on the use of 70's and 80's pop music being recast in some worship services.
The Messiah apparently defined Christian music a little differently than CCM, however, citing the condition of the soul as the main qualification. Jesus was reported as saying, "The music I can identify with comes from the soul that is empty and searching. I just can't get into that formulaic stuff passing as Christian music today." Joel Osteen has reported that the vision was particularly disturbing. "We're going to have to rethink our entire musical program. Jesus told me that the Praise and Worship music we have during our services is just awful. That's a real shame because our congregants really like what we play. They say it makes them feel happy and positive." Similar lamentations were heard from across the evangelical community. The Willow Creek Community Church confirmed that it will be realigning its music ministry to match the revelation received from Jesus by their leader Bill Hybels, but that will take some time as the musicians and music ministry leaders develop their repertoire.
The simultaneous revelation could spell the end of the Christian music industry and will force many popular Christian acts to actually write and play quality music instead of the tired rehash of the sound created by more edgy artists. Christian rock station (89.7 KVTT in Dallas, TX) on-air personality, Chris Goodwin, was a bit confused, "I've been in Christian radio for almost 20 years, what am I supposed to do now? Jesus would have to just come in and turn my world upside down. This just sucks."
In related news, Billboard Magazine has reportedly entered into an agreement with Pat Robertson to publish a weekly Jesus' Top Ten list.
