During my college years in the Philippines, I was a member of a Christian vocal band. Our ministry was to use the medium of music as a means to present the gospel of Jesus Christ. Our primary gigs or engagements were in churches and student gatherings. Sometimes we would be part of a mission team that would go to rural villages. We were often tasked to present an “evangelistic concert.”
Occasionally, we were invited by friends to sing at weddings and wedding receptions. While it was our pleasure to minister to friends in this way, I personally am not a fan of singing at a wedding reception. Oftentimes, people are not really listening to the music. The din of the conversations at the tables tends to drown out what’s going on at the stage.
And so, when I read in Christianity Today about musicians who aren’t happy about “smoky bars where [their] hard-earned craft becomes background noise for drunken patrons,” I can understand the frustration. Of course, we had no “drunken patrons.” But it still can be discouraging. As musician Chris Payne would put it, “Without an audience, the performance and craft is pointless.”
In response to this state-of-affairs, Payne and another musician founded the Listening Room, in Richmond, Virginia. It is described as “an intentionally small, growing music venue where the keyword is connection between songwriter and audience.” One musician observes: “[The performer] always comments on the quietness of the room, the respectfulness. And when a song ends there’s a hush in the room—a holy moment.”
Then my thoughts turn to how Christ may feel when we supposedly come before him for our devotional time. Do we really enter into our devotional time to actually listen to him? Or do we just fit him into our busy (so we say) schedules such that we are not really present with him—mentally, emotionally? Think about it. We even talk about having our devotional time while driving or doing some other thing. Now I do believe that our devotion to the Lord ought to extend to our daily life. But merely fitting Christ into our schedules may be no different than what “drunken patrons” do to musicians. We still need to set aside a time when we enter into our spiritual Listening Room, where there is a real, uninterrupted connection between Lord and worshipper. The Lord deserves our undivided attention.
—Keith Jainga