Ojo Taylor – Relative
For 9 years I was “JulieMillerFan” on Ebay, seller of all things pertaining to Christian music. for 8 years I was the top dealer for that niche on Ebay. Prior to that I had worked for Mike Delaney’s Rad Rockers (C-Stone 1984, 1986, 1988-89) and John J Thompson’s True Tunes Etc. (1989-1991) I had written record and concert reviews for some magazines (Harvest Rock Syndicate & Heaven’s Metal, as well as many lesser known zines), been a Christian radio DJ (1984-85 WCRM, Dundee, IL & 1989-1991 WGSL Loves Park, IL.), worked stage & security for concerts (Harvest Rock Poductions, 1983-1985, Cornerstone 84, 86, 88-89) and generally hung around the outer fringes of the Christian Music market, getting to know many key players and lesser known talents.
In all the time I have been working with Christian music, I have seen many things that have caused me to question the validity of the artform. Most people will cite how stale the music sounds, how vapid, how shallow. Me…. I think it’s bad for entirely different reasons, which to me, hold far more dire implications. I think much within the genre ISN’T EVEN CHRISTIAN. It’s merely wolves, fleecing the flock for whatever $$$$ they can earn. There is no accountability, there is no theological or orthodoxic (OK, I made that word up) checks & balances…. in short, any thing goes…. as long as you name the name of “Jesus”… even if the “Jesus” you speak of isn’t even remotely close to the actual, historical, literal figure or person.
We just assume that because you say the name, you’re therefore in the game.
Nothing could be further from the truth.
Today I was posting up a CD by Ojo Taylor. It’s not my CD, it belongs to a friend who has asked me to sell through his collection in order that he might pay off the medical bills from his 6 year old son, Patrick. You see, Patrick has Leukemia. So Phil is capitalizing on my former popularity and personally I don’t mind, cause it’s helping him out.
In any case… the CD belongs to Phil. Were it mine…. I would simply chuck it in the trash and be done with it. It’s no different to me than Jennifer “I can be lesbian and Christian too” Knapp or Phillips, Craig & “We don’t believe in the Trinity” Dean…. Oneness Pentacostals who will use doublespeak to avoid telling you outright that the “Jesus” they sing about…. is merely a hat that God wears when convenient, not a separate, distinct person, but merely a role that God assumes. Or even Mike “I’m a liar, but I don’t want to admit it” Warnke, who’s whole testimony about being a Satanic priest…. is pure bunk. Fiction, made up fairy tales, that he’s told so long to so many people, that it’s become real in his own mind DESPITE THE EVIDENCE OTHERWISE. (RE: Jon Trott & Mike Hertenstein incredibly well documented “Selling Satan: the Real Mike Warnke Story” book.) The list goes on and on and on….
So much within “Christian” music follows down dangerous paths… and we, the UN-Discerning, nod our heads in time to the music, not caring to really do the harder work of checking the facts on what these folks are really believing. What God they are really preaching to us.
or, in Ojo’s case, not preaching.
You see, Ojo… former member of the Christian Punk Rock band “Undercover”… has renounced Christianity and become an outspoken agnostic, bordering Atheism. He’s freely spoken at “Freedom FROM Religion” conferences and blogs semi-regularly about his ANTI-Christian standing. Some would say he fell away…. but I see a darker side to this… He couldn’t fall away from what he never had.
NEVER…. had.
The “Jesus” he used to sing about wasn’t the honest, true, or real Jesus, it was merely the construct of his own personal devising, and upon the time wherein doubts came a-callin’, Ojo found nothing substantial to hold on to.
My comments on Ebay just now caused me to think that maybe I should blog about this. I have tried to in the past — entitled it “What’s wrong with American Christianity, Part 6 ‘Lacking Discernment’.” but that blog never finalized. It remains unfinished. But today, while I haven’t the time to flesh out the full nuances of what all that means, I can give voice to these thoughts and and maybe address the matter of “What does it mean when someone who once believed… doesn’t any more.” While they may loudly proclaim that they “Tried Christianity and found it wanting”…. the honest truth is, they never had Christ from the get-go.
Here’s my comments from the auction.
Were this my personal CD, I would merely chuck it and be done with it. Ojo has walked away from his faith… so there’s no point to me presenting this as “Christian”. But this isn’t my CD, it’s Phil’s, and I have a commitment to him to help him sell through things to help his son, Patrick.
All that said, I will simply point the auction reader to a few verses to consider.
(A) the parable of the soils. Rocky, thorny, hardened… at least two of them found themselves in a “spiritual commitment” to some lesser degree…. before something causes them to walk away.
(B) 1 John 2:15
“They walked away from us BECAUSE THEY NEVER BELONGED WITH US…. if they had belonged with us, they would have stayed, but their walking away only shows they were never with us from the start.”
That one verse right there should speak volumes to this situation. No matter how loudly Ojo may have talked about “Jesus” —- there was never a connection TO…. T-O … Jesus from the beginning, and his walking away only proved that. He was a goat among the sheep, a tare in the wheat field, and the fact that he’s now speaking AGAINST Christianity (or in general, all religion) only shows what was there all along. It’s to people like this that Hebrews 6:4-6 speaks to, saying it is impossible to bring them back. They weren’t “saved” and are now “unsaved”. They were simply never saved… and now they have it in their heads that Jesus, or Christianity, holds no value.
Say what you will about this… but to me, agnostic, atheist… both have staked their claim on the sandy shore. (Matthew 7:26) I took the long journey from Atheism to Christianity (it took 13 years) and in the end it was the sheer weight of evidence FOR the claims of Christ that moved my heart to commit. Ojo isn’t being honest, he’s being….”relative.”
The point comes down to this — Much of Christian music today is pure bunk. It’s not that it’s vapid or shallow by the standard of worldly music or contemporary artforms or even overall genre’s of sound (though there definitely is that)…. it’s empty and devoid of any true form of spiritual meat BECAUSE THERE’S NO REAL CONNECTION TO CHRIST FROM THE GET-GO. They simply never were “saved”.
Not every artist is this way… and maybe not even a majority of them…. but more and more we’re seeing artists for whom any form of veneer is being stripped away, and either they’re commanding that we count them among our numbers (RE: Jennifer Knapp, Ray Boltz, Marsha Stevens…. who all loudly proclaim themselves as ‘Christian Homosexuals’), we find that the “Jesus” they’re preaching isn’t the REAL Jesus (Phillips, Craig & Dean) or they’ve walked away entirely (Roger “Vengeance Rising” Martinez, Pete “Grammatrain” Stewart, Ojo “Undercover” Taylor) and left us wondering “what just happened?!?!?!?!?”
Truth be told…. It’s not these artists who are to blame for what’s happening…. we are. Because we’ve lost the ability to discern accuracy from error, fact from fiction, truth from lies. How else would you explain Joel Osteen topping the “Christian” best seller’s list in our bookstores, or Phillips, Craig & Dean topping our charts.
One day, Jesus will come and separate the sheep from the goats. But you know what…. He’s left us with a pretty interesting warning in the meantime —-
“Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravenous wolves. YOU WILL KNOW THEM by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thorn bushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a bad tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. Therefore by their fruits YOU WILL KNOW THEM. (Matthew 7:15-20)
Discernment is not an option… it’s a commandment. and it’s one we are shamelessly not obeying.
October 24, 2013 at 9:13 am
The old argument as to whether rock and Christian music can be wedded together is taken for granted these days as being settled, but this kind of thing makes me wonder…. The values promoted by secular rock music as a genre are diametrically opposed to Christianity, and secular rock was the original rock. Christian rock came along later and tried to adapt rock to Christianity.
But the issues you raised in this post raise for me again the question: Are rock and roll values and Christian teachings compatible? Forget for a moment the old question of whether the drum-beat came from the devil. Instead, consider the values promoted. Rock music emphasizes self and pleasure above all else–hedonism: if it feels good, don’t ask if it’s right or wrong, just do it. Pleasing the self becomes the only goal. Likewise, rock artists strive to be worshiped. Self-worth is sought through achieving fame and popularity, and through acquiring wealth and power.
Christian rock is an attempt to co-opt rock to serve its own ends. But can a genre of music that is so completely associated with hedonistic and self-centered values, and with artists being worshiped, ever successfully be adapted to serve the purposes of Christianity? An artist can be worshiped, or God can be worshiped, but not both.
Today we’ve turned church services into rock concerts with a sermon added. The music, though, is done very much like a secular rock concert, complete with a band making cool moves on stage, a dazzling light show and, in some cases, even smoke machines. How can this not be perceived as being on some level about the band and how cool they are? By adapting to this model, are we not implicitly not only accepting, but even promoting the values of rock music, which elevate the band to special status? We even speak of our pastors as rock stars now. Can a pastor be a rock star and exalt Jesus at the same time? I wonder….
I’ve also wondered if the “gospel” proclaimed in Christian music really bears any resemblance to the real gospel. Often it is little more than an encouraging message that says something like “We can change the world” or “we can make a difference” (weren’t those both in fact words from Christian songs over the last decade or two?). The message is all about us and what we can do, or what we must do. How is God necessary in that?
Today’s songs rarely ever mention Jesus by name (apparently they want to avoid offending anyone by being to specific in who they are worshiping). Some worship songs do talk about “the cross.” But when was the last time you heard a worship song that referred to Jesus as the Son of God or the Christ? The gospel is about us being forgiven of and delivered from our sin through Jesus’ atoning death. When’s the last time you heard THAT in a Christian song? If Christian songs mention God by name anymore, they only talk about his love, or his role in creating the world, or call him the “beautiful King” (“beautiful” being the most overused word in today’s worship songs). When’s the last time you heard a Christian song that mentions the Holy Spirit by name, or the Father, for that matter?
In trying to make the gospel “relevant” for people today, have they changed the very content of it until the actual gospel is missing from the message?
Then we come to the issue of the number of former “Christian artists” who have either renounced the faith altogether, or are certainly not living the Christian lifestyle anymore. To the ones you mentioned I would also add Dug Pinnick formerly of King’s X, who publicly came out as gay and renounced Christianity in the mid 1990s, and John Ellis, formerly of Tree 63, who based on the lyrics of his solo albums and content on his website, seems to have moved away from Christianity as well.
Given the “gospel” that is being proclaimed in a lot of Christian rock, which in many ways never totally repudiates rock and roll values, is it any wonder that these artists have instead repudiated Christianity? Jesus said you can’t serve two masters.
Understand, these words are being written by a man with a large collection of Christian rock music. I’ve been as steeped in it as a fellow can be (well, not as much as you or some others in the Jesus Music groups, but more so than the average person). But these questions have nagged at me from time to time, and your post brought them out at a new level.