Posted on 09/23/2002 4:11:58 PM PDT by KMC1
"Oh just go listen to her Kevin, give her chance," came the considerable urging of my friends.
So Saturday night, there I am, finding myself winding the back roads of Rosemont, Illinois, trying to get to "the event" for the weekend - Amy Grant and Vince Gill live in concert. Arriving just on time, getting to my seat which was about 18 rows back center stage, I had just enough time left to say "Hi" to a few friends sitting nearby. One of whom could not resist.
"Kev! Surprised to see you here!"
"Well, hey, the opening act looks good, and we'll see what happens," was about the only response I could muster up.
Okay, a little history for you.
Amy Grant has been doing "Christian" music for over eighteen years. Throughout her early days I became a fan and faithfully bought every record/tape/cd she made. At a previous station where I worked, co-workers regularly tried to "stump" me by seeing if I knew a vague line of lyric from one of her albums. I was seldom stumped. As a young man, wanting to put positive messages into my brain I found Christian music to be the kind of reinforcement I needed to my choices. Amy's music was positive, fun, and upbeat. She literally "began" an entire genre of commercially-successful music, and many Christian musicians since owe their commercial success to the lady that really did make it popular.
Amy Grant enjoyed a parallel stream of success in pop music as well. Some of her songs centering more around the idea of positive relationships were added to pop radio's playlists and soon Amy stood on a platform amongst Christian recording artists that was truly head and shoulders above all others.
Many conservative-minded people were the ones buying Christian music, Grant's included, and as the eighties gave way to the nineties, conservatives, and people of faith made Christian music the fastest growing music in terms of sales increases and in new radio formats hitting the dial. The term "CCM" (Contemporary Christian Music) became a more regularly known term and the groups in CCM (Michael W. Smith, D.C. Talk, Jars Of Clay) became stars.
Through it all no one benefitted more than the lady who was already sitting atop the heap.
In the nineties there were troubles for Grant as well. Her longtime marriage to the man who wrote her very first number one song, Gary Chapman, was shaky. Her independence, wealth, and lack of accountability did not really create for her any need to try and salvage the marriage. The marriage was dissolved and Christian music's number one star, and someone who had avoided the ugly headlines that two other troubled Christian music artists, Sandi Patti and Michael English, had lived through seemed to be at peace with herself, and the world around her.
But over time - the truth was known.
Amy had soon married country crooner Vince Gill. Amy and Vince as far back as the early days of the nineties had become friends, but as her own music betrayed her. The two were soon "deeply in love."
I remember being a music director at a radio station when her single came out titled, "It Takes A Little Time". Having been tipped off as to the "close friendship" that Amy and Vince were experiencing, having seen her credit him on the CD's credits - with no mention to her husband, and after listening to the lyrics of that song - which should never have been released to Christian stations - made it all too clear. Amy Grant was experiencing a marriage that was dying, and it was dying in part because of her refusal to give up an illicit relationship, a relationship strictly forbidden by the faith that she had proclaimed from the stage for so many years.
And let me be really clear here - by sleeping with someone who is not your husband, and in fact, when that person you are sleeping with is actually someone else's husband - YOU are jeopardizing the health and stability of not one, but two families.
In her own song, "Love Will Find a Way," Grant wrote the lyrics for a woman responding to a letter concerning marital infidelity.
As Amy came out on the stage at the concert Saturday night here in suburban Chicago she did lots of her old songs. Sometimes I would catch myself reliving moments and places in my life based on what song she was singing.
She did the song "It Takes A Little Time", and like a knife through my heart - I was back in my old office holding that CD for the first time and with some fairly horrific feelings inside.
People of faith and conservatives in particular were outraged when a nation's president would let an ogling intern give him unspoken pleasures. People of faith criticized Hillary for allowing his philandering to continue. People of faith were further outraged when that President lied to cover it up.
People of faith, and yes even conservatives were some of the 49 people lined up outside the Mishawaka, Indiana, police station as Madelyne Toogood was brought in for beating her four year old daughter Martha - and getting caught on video tape. In one interview the lady waiting for the car carrying Toogood to arrive said, "I just want to give her a piece of my mind for treating her kid like that."
People of faith sometimes wonder why an outside world looks at them as though they are hypocritical. Well let's remove the "wondering" from the scenario. Others look at people of faith as hypocrites because while President Clinton is booed for engaging in illicit and immoral behavior (as he should be), people of faith were by the thousands filling seats in Suburban Chicago Saturday night applauding Amy as she raved about what a "good" man Vince Gill was. People of faith are seen as double minded when we condemn Madelyne Toogood for slapping her kid around in the car - and say nothing when the children of one marriage must now be split between 3 or more homes.
People of faith get pummeled because we have yet to step up to the plate.
Or then again, have we?
I left the Grant concert early to avoid anymore of Ms. Grant's glib comments about her formerly adulterous husband who is now a "good" man.
I got home just in time to see Miss Illinois Erika Harold be named Miss America 2003 on national TV. Throughout her pageant life Erika Harold has been an unashamed Christian who encourages young people to live moral lives. Erika through her own example, encourages kids to abstain from sexual activity until marriage, and once married to live monogamously for life (note to Ms. Grant).
Erika Harold genuinely lives out of her faith. The new Miss America says she hopes to run for office someday. I hope she does.
In my opinion, it is time to replace high profile personalities who have an obligation to live morally - and that goes for politicians, as well as singers.
And did I mention that Miss America sings, too?
ElephantLips: As far as the "purity" of christian entertainers...
1) I don't buy christian pop albums any longer. Call it age, taste change, whatever.....
2) If you think record execs give a rip about the purity of their signed artists....get your head out of the sand. It may have been ministry in the 70's but it's all about $$$ now. There are only a handful of labels still committed to the solid lives of their artists.
3) What exactly is the difference between secular and christian? Read Franky Shaffer's "Addicted To Mediocrity" before you respond.
I don't claim to have seen it all....but I've seen quite a bit out there in the world of "Nationally Recognized Ministry" and I'll give you a clue...it ain't all holy what goes on behind closed doors.
Only God is holy. The only thing worth your time is following Jesus. The rest is all fluff.
Plus, her new worship album is great. I love her rendition of "This is my father's world"!
It stopped becoming "their business" when they took it on the road. It's the price of fame.
They're all "travelers."
Never liked her music. Never spent a dime thereupon.
Never believed her bought-and-paid-for "pop testimony".
I always chose my music on three bases:
My so-called "Secular" or "Carnal" Music serves me just as well as it always has. Amy Grant's fans may have to "justify their love", but as for me and my car....
Volume dial goes all the way to 39, and the pedal goes all the way to the floor. Crank it, boyz...
"Christian Contemporary Music" is strangling on the weight of its own hypocrisy.
Good riddance to bad luggage.
I never much got this "Christian Music" thang either.
I can get ethereal on Tony Bennett or Alan Jackson. Or Vince Gill, for that matter.
Saint Augustine, who was allegedly the first Doctor of the Faith according the the Roman Catholic accounting of Saints, had a great Saying:
Sounds crazy, No? According to our modern understanding, sounds like a recipe for Godless Heathenism, right?
Anyone who thinks that, is not paying attention to the first half of the Proverb:
Too often today, we follow an intensely legalistic standard of "christianity". Shop at the "christian" Office Supply stores. Purchase "Christian" Music. Johnny Cash? A Definite "maybe". Better be careful!! And Frank Sinatra? Get thee to a "christian" artist... Sinatra is not "christian" enough!!
In short, we treat Christian Ethical Life as though it were a matter of nailing the 20-spot on a bar-room dart-board... better hit "God's Will" exactly, or you're not a "true christian".
Saint Augustine said that the Christian Life incorporated a lot more ethical Freedom... it's not like "hitting the 20-spot on a bar-room dart-board", it's more like hitting the broad side of a barn -- the important thing is that you are ACTUALLY AIMED IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION. The Important and Overriding thing is to Love God ("this is the first and greatest commandment") and on that basis, "do what you want".
That is both more DEMANDING and more LIBERATING than American Legalistic Christianity. Let EVERY thought be brought Captive to the Obedience of Christ. This is the first and greatest Commandment.
On upon that basis... Love God, and Do what you Want.
LOVE THE LAW OF GOD.... and do what you want.
Is Sinatra "christian"? Is Johnny Cash "christian"?
Exercise Discernment.
LOVE GOD.
And then... do what you Want.
Maybe not. But she did "begin" her relationship with Gill pretty soon "after" she split with Chapman. I don't fault her for making mistakes. Probably the only difference between Amy Grant and a lot of Christians is that not all of us make the headlines.
Still, she could've used better judgement and could've thought longer about what this might do to her witness.
What I find interesting is how these "stars" have all been treated differently within the recording community. Michael English was shunned, but Sandi Patti was not. To her credit, Sandi did take some time off and has talked openly about what happened.
It's the danger of "Christian" performance that's the problem. That bumper sticker is very trite, but also true. "Christians aren't perfect. Just forgiven." We're all prone to stumble. But where God forgives, the world often does not.
That should be a sobering reminder to anyone who is a "professional" Christian.
HUH??? That most certainly was not the case with Bruce Springsteen
Well, bowl me over. A "nice man". Isn't that special.
As it happens, June Cash married a womanizing drug addict.
"She prayed over Johnny and she prayed around Johnny and she prayed with Johnny, until Johnny found salvation."
"June saved my life," Johnny Cash says simply.
They have been married 34 years.
AMY GRANT?!?! Yeah, right.... You aren't even fooling yourself. Everybody knows this is make-believe excuses for Adultery, AND YOU DO ALSO.
Amy and Vince are a hedonistic fraud. Houses built on sand....
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