re-mix

4 Feb 2008 | public | email this page
Maybe it's because I came across Greg Laswell's cover version of the classic "Girls Just Want To Have Fun" this week. I knew I had heard it before, it was just that it sounded so different, so haunting. The sense of 1980's abandon and confidence re-interpreted with a Gen Y sense of angst.
The same song re-mixed for a different generation. It got me thinking about church. How do we re-mix it for this generation?  I'm not talking about throwing orthodox doctrine out of the window and re-interpreting it so that it becomes more in line with where the culture is, I'm thinking more about how we re-mix what we do. Re-mixing the song for a generation who are increasingly biblically illiterate.

Let me be clear - this is about how we express the song, not re-writing it. This isn't about re-branding, it's about something deeper.
People often ask me why we do what we do at the evening service we run at St. Saviour's and I guess Greg Laswell gave me my answer. We are trying to bring the song of the ancients to a generation who haven't even heard of the ancients, much less the song. So we try to re-mix it so that at least they understand. Hopefully to a beat that they can move to as easily as any song on their iPod or cell phone.

The song is of a God who created us and loves us. Who allowed us to choose to reject him. A God who knew that the chasm created by our rejection of him would lead not just to a breakdown in our relationship with him, but also each other. A God whose love meant that he became one of us, who revealed God to us in himself and then died in our stead so that the chasm could be crossed. A God who became the bridge back to himself, and to each other. A God who has invited us to dance with him, to be romanced and captivated by him in such a way that we cannot keep silent. We have known this love and been changed by it. Who long to see the community we live in be transformed by him.
So we meet. We sing songs. We tell each other our stories. We tell The Story, and we are changed.
We speak a language that we hope the world understands.
We sing the old song, re-mixed.

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Submitted by 80dB on February 5, 2008 - 10:01pm.
yGod Generation  


Generation can also mean a stage or degree in a succession of natural descent as a grandfather, a father, and the father's son comprise three generations or an era covering many generations or a smaller segment of 'one' Gen.

Lets remind ourselves Jesus is Jesus from generation to generation and God changeth not....and in the church there is 'no generational gap'...Jesus said ..."have you not read ... He is not the God of the dead, but of the living." What He suggests is the 'dead' are not dead but alive.

Whenever we gather surely God is there, and the angels are there, and we join with our forefathers (mothers) in the faith, the saints who have gone before us, in adouration of the Lamb. Is this not so and a spiritual reality? We are the universal eternal Body of Christ, old testament and new testament believers together.

I caught Songs of Praise (BBC1) last weekend. they sung a relatively 'new' song in their typical way - with organ, strings and guitar a real cross section mix of styles.

I imagined how in thirty years time if any of our 'new songs' are good enough to be remembered and sung, they will no doubt sound and be played in the typical 'songs of praise mix' with white haired elderly people singing alongside the children. (and the latest y generation' nowhere to be seen as it may not be 'cool' enough for them? Pam Rhodes "Songs of Praise has only remained popular for 42 years because it is the people's programme" Ok things may be different but some things do last.


Maybe if we sang some older songs in a more 'creative' way our forefathers could join with us and not be just a "great crowd of onlookers" as we gather together to express our love for God. So I agree with you lets keep singing from the great historic wealth of psalms, hymns and spiritual songs - some of which were written in blood or at least with blood sweat and tears.

Good creativity and art is timeless but if we are governed by media led fad's and fashions or teenage passions will we loose the plot? Romans 12:2
Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will. 


Remember the first commandment with a promise and lets respect our elders and not leave them deaf and dumbfounded by our 'can't keep silent, shouting generation'! Lets at least be silent enough to hear God speak, the angels sing or the saints, elders and leaders of the great congregation sing their regular songs of "Worthy is the Lamb".


Lets remember in the eternal Christ there is no Jew or gentile, male or female slave or free or young and old! Lets MIX IT UP and not be forced into the worlds mold!


There may only be one thing worse than 'sex, drugs and rock and roll', and that's holy, righteous, pure, young christians who are entreated to display a maturity beyond their years trying to sing, sound, speak, act, walk or hang like aspiring rockers - with a language full of 'Americanisms'?


It just doesn't work, and the world knows it, so lets divert some of our our time energies and monies away from the 'rock idol' worship which rules the world and is only concerned about who is number one in the charts. Let not this spirit dominate the 'y generation church' to the extent that if you raise an objection you are liable to get your blog cut off! 

If they are 'bored' its time we flew from our youthful lusts, buying and listening to downloads and being intoxicated with music and got serious expending our energies making Jesus number One. 

Lets ask the young Indian and Chinese evangelists who have laid their instruments down to suffer in preaching the gospel if we have our priorities right? If any revival came (is it not already here) would we have time or inclination to set up any big sound systems or worry about getting the mix right? Would we need 'form a band' when the praise of God  would spontaneously and  instantaneously burst forth from the lips of the new babes of God. Has God not ordained it?


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Submitted by tuberider on February 15, 2008 - 11:09am.
Galatians 3:26-28 says

26You are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus, 27for all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28There is neither Jew nor Greek, slave nor free, male nor female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.

It does not mention anything about young or old. However, this passage refers to equality and not the idea that there are no differences between the generations. The early church would not recognise ANY of the songs we sing today. It is unrealistic to expect the church services to be relevant to every generation at all times.
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