If you have been told that Rock and Roll is bad, but don’t know why … this is for you. If you have been told that music is neutral … this is for you. If you are seeing worldly changes in your Bible Believing church and can’t figure out what is happening … this is for you. If you have a teenager that seems to be changing from the inside out … this is for you. If you have been told that God likes all styles of music …then this is for you.
CHANGE FROM THE INSIDE OUT
Before I get into the meat of this post, let me set the stage for the importance of it.
In Gary Schmidt’s book Hook, Line and Sinker: How the Enemy Is Dividing and Destroy the Christian Family there is a portion that speaks of an iceberg of change and you only see the tip of it when it is too late.
This hook of internal corruption defiles the heart, addicts the inner man, and then literally rewrites the attitudes of the heart and resulting actions. … (It is) incredibly subtle because it is spiritual in nature, seemingly harmless upon ‘ingestion’ and silent at its work. It transforms effortlessly, redefines who I am with seemingly no external warning. It takes time too! This isn’t an overnight thing. No, it often takes months and years for the full effect to be in place. With this corruption the devil is exceedingly patient! He is content to work slowly, gradually and methodically.
To understand where we are headed, you must first come back to the reality of the spiritual life – the inner man – and the spiritual battle for that part of your life! Everything that we will uncover in this section will have to do with the alteration and annihilation of a healthy inner man. In other words, you must believe that the spiritual world is more real than the world you see.
This hook has a redefining influence to the spiritual heart – very similar to how drugs or alcohol redfine reality in the human brain! What drugs and alcohol do to the mind and body physically, this corruption does to the heart, spiritually. This is what makes it so much more dangerous than physical substances. At least when a person is drunk or under the control of some mind-altering substance, you can see the physical signs and take proper action. This corruption hides beneath the surface and leaves you wondering what’s wrong with this person. The effects are seen, but usually not easily tied to the hidden cause.”
I said all that so that you can understand that Rock and Roll is a spiritual thing. Music is the language of the soul. You would not make a movie without background music. You would not have a commercial without background music. Video memes have background music. With no lyrics; you can hear music and feel sad. You can hear music and feel inspired. You can hear music and feel afraid. You can hear music and rejoice within. You can hear music and feel angry.
Music speaks to an element within you that cannot be seen and yet you will cry when you feel music’s sadness evoked from within you. You will run faster and harder when the beat pumps you up. You will raise your hands in praise when the majesty of a music swells. Those actions that you DO are the FRUIT of the musical language you HEAR. And that is why no director would create anything without it.
I cannot overstress the importance of reading this intro and understanding that I speak of the FRUIT of something unseen; the FRUIT of something spiritual that corrupts from within. You can tell something is evil by its fruit.
BY THEIR FRUITS YOU SHALL KNOW THEM
My largest challenge in this post is to be brief. There is so much evidence to support what I am going to share and while I spent the better part of a year delving into the topic I had to just stop because the proofs were endless. If you want more than my conclusions in a nutshell; I will share what I can, but for now I honestly did my best to give ample proofs without being overwhelming. These proofs are based on the following text.
Mat 7:15 – 20 Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep’s clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them.
This passage is given as a warning about the last days. It is a warning from Christ about false prophets that deceive the Christian flock. Jesus Himself says that we are to exercise discernment. He assumes we will be deceived because we cannot tell what is evil. Therefore He tells us to examine fruit. He goes further to say that no evil tree will have any good fruit. It is upon this premise that I share with you the Five Fruits of Rock and Roll.
1. REBELLION (ALSO MANIFESTED AS APATHY)
I am starting with this one, because rebellion is at the core of who Satan is. I will never understand how angels who actually worshipped and served in the presence of God could be seduced away from His Majesty and choose to rebel. But Satan should not be underestimated.
He is the father of lies, pride, murder, rebellion and all evil in the world.
The Encyclopedia says this about rock and roll while giving its history. http://www.encyclopedia.com/topic/rock_music.aspx
All aspects of the music—its heavy beat, loudness, self-absorbed lyrics, and raving delivery—indicated a teenage defiance of adult values and authority.
Here is one proponent of rock and roll at “WeWantInsanity.com” and what he had to say:
WARNING: This guy is pretty open about the true heart of popular music and rebellion, but is pretty vile in his support. I do not recommend his link.
The concept of “rebellion” has been at the heart of popular music for decades. Whether or not the music of a particular era or genre actually encompasses the tenants of true rebellion is debatable, but the sheer idea of “sticking it to ‘the man’,” if you will, is as much a part of pop music as are the concepts of romance, infatuation and partying. This concept appears early on in the development of Rock ‘n’ Roll, most obviously with the hit track from 1958, “Yakety Yak” by the Coasters…
In the end, I guess what I’ve really learned about rebellion in popular music is that, at every level, for every possible form of oppression that can exist, from being a kid who’d rather slack off than do chores, to being a (sexual reference removed) teenager who (sexual reference removed) because he’s always got to work, to people who actually have real problems with actual consequences, or even if you’re just some whiny emo (bad word removed) who thinks writing a song about stuff is going to make you feel better, no matter how insipid, there’s bound to be someone in pop music who’s complaining about it, as well.
Here are just two quotes from Rock and Roll “artists” and how they just understand that Rock and Roll is the music of rebellion. There are so many more but I only want to list a couple.
Jon of Bon Jovi observed, “I wanted to rebel against anything and everything, and it happened that I was able to do it by playing rock and roll in a band” (Metal Edge, Aug. 1987, p. 12)
Nikki Sixx of Motley Crue comments: “We never set out to be anybody’s role model. But since we have become that, we are trying to give our fans something to believe in. On the second album, we told them to “Shout at the Devil.” A lot of people… think that song is about Satan. That’s not true. It’s about standing up to authority, whether it is your parents, your teacher or your boss. That is pretty good advice, I think. But I’m sure that any parent who hears it is going to think it is treason” (Rock Beat, 1989 p. 41).
What is really concerning is that in the 1920’s – 1950’s people were shocked and aghast at the rebellion against morals and values and they censored performances because of their lascivious nature, but today with nudity in videos, sexually explicit lyrics, and twerking on stage; the thrusting of Elvis’ hips seem laughable.
Today we have progressed beyond imagination.
This new x rated trend in our pop culture today is directly reflected in this generation’s teenage rebellion with its oversexed overexposed youth. Like generations before the future eras will all be a combination of teenage rebellion trends from past. Though each time these trends resurface they have amplified in severity. If this trend of exponentially increase continues It’s hard to think what the future trends will bring for tomorrows youth in their act of the classic teenage rebellion. https://storify.com/TessaSage/evolution-of-r-and-b-and-rap-music
Can’t we see what is at stake? Look at how quickly and how far our moral society has denigrated since the introduction of rock and roll into our culture.
That brings me to the next fruit …
2. SENSUALITY AND SEX
How do I write an intro to this?
Maybe I would write about the children of Israel playing music and getting naked while dancing to the altar of Baal. (Exodus 32:17-19)
I don’t know, or maybe I could take you to Woodstock or some other Rock Festival and let you watch what is going on.
Maybe I could take you to a post-rock concert and you can see what kind of morality has been induced in the girls who attended the shows.
I could just take a snap shot of the people in the crowds at rock concerts and what they are wearing.
Maybe I could show you all the mini-skirts and shorty shorts in the CCM crowd.
We could watch the MTV music awards.
What kind of music do they play in “adult films?”
What do pagan tribal people wear to their dances?
What kind of music is played at raves, bars & strip clubs? I would undoubtedly claim that a woman’s body MUST have rock and roll to produce the needed movements at these clubs.
I am going to stop there, because the world of rock and roll is so vile in its fornication that it could become a stumblingblock just to read about it, but do you get my point?
You can take any song and change the emphasis of the beat, turn it into a rock song and it will do two things to your body. It will either make you move your body sensually or it will get your adrenaline running like crazy.
Sex and Rebellion at its core.
Take a minute to read a little bit of the history of Rock and Roll as found in the encyclopedia.
Encylcopedia – The History of Rock and Roll –
1950’s
The first rock ‘n’ roll record to achieve national popularity was “Rock Around the Clock” made by Bill Haley and the Comets in 1955. Haley succeeded in creating a music that appealed to youth because of its exciting back beat, its urgent call to dance, and the action of its lyrics.
Blues, and rhythm and blues, were too adult, sexual, angry, and solely identified with black culture to be acceptable either emotionally or commercially without adaptation …
The unadulterated black rock ‘n’ roll that Haley transformed can be heard in the sexually adult work of such artists as Hank Ballard and the Midnighters ( “Work with Me, Annie” ) or “Big” Joe Turner ( “Shake, Rattle, and Roll” ), the latter song adapted by Haley for white audiences and the former transformed into “Dance with Me, Henry.”
1950s – 1960s
The greatest exponent of rock ‘n’ roll from 1956 to 1963 was Elvis Presley, a truck driver and aspiring singer from Tupelo, Miss., whose plaintive, wailing, dynamic delivery and uninhibited sexuality appealed directly to young audiences while horrifying older people.
1960s-1970s
Rock Comes of Age
The dangerous, androgynous quality projected by the Rolling Stones was taken to extremes by performers such as Alice Cooper and David Bowie, who were perhaps as famous for their sexual ambiguity and outrageous behavior as for their music.
Rock music is an extreme form of rock ‘n’ roll. Here are several definitions by well-known rock musicians and singers. These are experts in their field, and they tell us exactly what it is:
“Rock ‘n’ roll: The term is a blues euphemism for sexual intercourse.”—The Rolling Stones Encyclopedia of Rock and Roll.
“Rock ‘n’ roll is 99% sex.”—John Oates.
“Everybody takes it for granted that rock ‘n’ roll is synonymous with sex.”—Chris Stein.
“Rock music is sex. The big beat matches the body’s rhythm.”—Frank Zappa.
“Rock ‘n’ roll: A general term with sexual implications, as rocking ‘n’ rolling, originally meant fornicating. It has been used to cover many styles and types of music since the early 50s.”—Robert Fink and Robert Ricci, The Language of 20th Century Music.
“In a sense, all rock is revolutionary. By its beat and sound, it has always implicitly rejected restraint and celebrated freedom and sexuality.”—Time magazine, January 3, 1969.
“You cannot take sex out of rock and roll or rhythm and blues. True, the quality of the mixture spans a wide range.”—Kathleen Sullivan, quoted in Martha Bayles, Hole in Our Soul, p. 349.
Newsweek mentioned the concerns of a worried mother who, though personally addicted to rock, feared for her children.
CONTINUED … http://insiderockmusic.com/what-is.html
You cannot take sex out of rock and roll or rhythm and blues.
How is it that Christians who understand that rock concerts produce groupies and all forms of sexual perversion refuse to acknowledge that it would produce the same form of sensual rebellion in their own lives?
3. VIOLENCE AND/OR SUICIDE
This next one is difficult because you can see it, but secular rock and roll loving people do not want to admit what is true.
How many mass shooters have heavy metal in their ears? There are quite a few court cases on the records of angry parents suing bands.
What about serial killers using rock and roll to hypnotize their followers?
What about the murders at rock festivals?
What about depression and suicide brought to fruition through rock and roll?
What about the 27 club?
What about pagan tribal music creating a mental frenzy before heading out to war?
What about the adrenaline pumping hard rock coming through your first shooter video games?
What about the heavy metal in boy’s “action cartoons?”
You will hardly find any form of action movie that doesn’t play some type of death / punk / heavy metal when there is a call to communicate adrenaline.
Although there is plenty of evidence that links rock and roll and violence, almost every article you find by secular media tries to justify that they are not connected. They say that “parents and police are trying to find someone to blame.”
Or maybe parents and police just aren’t stupid.
Even lost people can see the link if they are willing to see the truth.
So, before you plug in your head phones getting ready to pump yourself up for your next workout: THINK! Why does this music get my adrenaline running? What is it about this beat that motivates me?
I am not saying adrenaline is wrong. I am just saying that we cannot deny that the driving syncopated rhythms found in this adrenaline pumping style music are linked over and over to violence, suicide and death.
Be aware. We will reap what we sow.
If it wouldn’t take up so much room, I could list more, but these are the basic TYPES of examples you will find linking Rock and Roll with violence.
“The Counterculture springs more than anything else from rock ‘n’ roll music. The shattering, obliterating volume . . amounted to a new form of violence . . coupled with the anarchic, brute-sexual rhythm and lyrics of rock ‘n’ roll music. The counterculture is the world’s first socio-political movement to grow out of the force of electronically amplified music.”—Time magazine, February 22, 1971.
Encyclopedia – The History of Rock and Roll – Rock Comes of Age
From 1967 onward, the rock festival was regarded as the ideal context in which to hear rock music, and thousands of fans attended. The most successful and peaceful rock festival, Woodstock, was held near Bethel, N.Y., in Aug., 1969. Later, however, a similar event, featuring the Rolling Stones, was held at Altamont, Calif., and was marked by several violent incidents caught on film, including a murder.
Here is an entire list of rock musicians who have committed suicide. http://ultimateclassicrock.com/rock-and-roll-suicides/
Here is an entire secular PDF from the suicide prevention trying to convince people the while there is a link between rock music and suicide, we should not blame rock music FOR suicide. https://suicideinfo.ca/LinkClick.aspx?fileticket=8Ta2-hQ9Kuo%3D&tabid=656
Is listening to pop music linked with major depression in teens? – See: Teen Depression – Association BetweenMedia Use in Adolescence and Major Depression, Major Depressive Disorder (MDD), in Young Adulthood
Listening to music excessively is correlational with teen depression, according to one study.
While there may not be a direct causes and effect relationship, parents are cautioned to keep tabs on their children and teens’ music habits. Media overstimulation in general may play a role in mood or the mental development of teens and children. Music is one aspect related the overstimulation of the mind through media, or social isolation that may result from listening to music excessively.
Different individuals are predisposed to a different level of focus, sensitivity, and tolerances for the amount and type of music their brain can process or handle without interfering with normal functioning. Since many of today’s youth often spend hours daily listening to music from a variety of sources, in addition to input from other media sources, it helps us shed light on the impact that music might have in terms of the mental health of children and on adolescent mood disorders, as this study suggests. http://winmentalhealth.com/music_psychology.php
What is so sad about this is that while people are warned about the depression or violence that comes from rock music, because of their unwillingness to admit that is a direct influence to their mental state; more deaths and more violence will continue to abound. It’s like the alcoholic who won’t change until he admits he’s an alcoholic. Which leads me to the next Fruit of Rock and Roll.
4. ALCOHOL AND DRUG USE
There really is not one section of these FIVE FRUITS OF ROCK AND ROLL that can be separated from the use of drugs & alcohol. The mind altering effects of inebriates are highly linked to promiscuity, violence, rape, and … rock and roll. I read about the effects of rock and roll and over and over it is just assumed that people are drinking and using drugs.
Alcohol is not a big deal to them because it is just part of their life, but illegal drugs are also rampant. Drug overdoses are recurrent. Musicians no longer try to pretend they aren’t smoking marijuana. They do it on stage and on videos. Sex, drugs and rock and roll are just rock and roll.
This article from http://www.rockworldmagazine.com/history-of-music-on-drugs/ is so telling that I just want to paste a little bit of it here. Let me reiterate: this is not from a Christian site in any way. This is just how they see their world, and they see it as okay.
“Sex, Drugs and Rock ‘n’ Roll,” the rockers creed. We all know it. It’s a well-balanced motto that fulfills the precedent set by some of the greatest musicians in history. As a teenage rocker coming of age, the legends I heard had the grandiosity of deranged biblical tales, and seemed as surreal as any bit of children’s folklore. Did Ozzy Osbourne really snort a line of ants? Did Hendrix really die from choking on his own vomit? Did Syd Barrett really ingest so much LSD that he was left a permanent vegetable? As I grew up, I realized that these tales were generally true.
Wild drug-fueled behavior is expected from our rockstars – so much so, that we coined the expression, “Party like a rockstar.”
People have always used drugs, especially the creative types like artists and musicians. Ancient people often combined psychedelic drugs and tribal drumming as part of religious rituals. In 1830 Hector Berlioz wrote his odyssey “Symphonie Fantastique,” sonically detailing the effects of an opium experience. In 1937 Harry Anslinger, Director of the Federal Bureau of Narcotics convinced congress to criminalize marijuana use by telling them, “There are 100,000 total marijuana smokers in the US, and most are Negroes, Hispanics, Filipinos, and entertainers. Their satanic music, jazz and swing, result from marijuana usage.”
This was the beginning of an ongoing campaign to casting a dark light on recreational drug use and its connection with rebellious music, particularly with marijuana, which maintained popularity though out many other cultural changes.
There is so much more in this article as it just goes through the history of drug use and a timeline of its use amongst rock musicians, but it is the very last quote in this article that really sheds the light on how rock and roll musicians and their followers encapsulate the link between rock and roll and alcohol and drug use.
Music and drugs will always have a close relationship with artists. Perhaps it’s because drugs numb the same sensations so many legendary artists make music to ease or release, providing an obvious complement to their work. Or perhaps it’s a response to the stresses of fame, especially in today’s world of 24-hour news and celebrity gossip. Perhaps it’s because drugs can push musical and creative boundaries with their psychotropic effects. But tragically they also silence the most beautiful and talented voices.
Like all things, the relationship is complicated, but to deny that drugs have had an unequivocal influence in our culture is absurd. In the words of the late comedian Bill Hicks, “Drugs have done good things for us. If you don’t believe they have, do me a favor – take all your albums, tapes, and CDs and burn them, cause you know what? The musicians that have made that great music that has enhanced your lives throughout the years…were real (removed expletive) high on drugs.”
It is undeniable. With rock and roll comes alcohol and drugs … and fornication. (Prov. 23:33) This is fruit of an evil tree. Read more on Why The Christian Doesn’t Drink.
5. STRONG DEMONIC INFLUENCE
I guess I saved this one for last, because it just shows from where the tree stems. Rock and Roll is an evil tree and its seed and root are Satan. Without Satan, there is no Rock and Roll. The musicians know this. I would question the motives of anyone who tried to deny it?
In doing this study, I came across so much information that it again would take too much time to read. Also, many of the sites from which the information came are too lude or evil that I don’t want to put a link to them.
Before I give you the quotes, I want to tell you why this applies to you. You may be a Christian who reads their Bible and prays every day, but Christians especially are susceptible to demonic oppression.
We are to be soldiers for Christ and making ground in the Great Commission. But if Satan and his demons can influence our minds and open it to apathy or rebellion, depression and suicide, un-chaste sensuality and marital dysfunction, or defeatist lies … he will.
I have seen saved teens listen to their rock music and enter into an almost trance like state, obstaining from eating for days and coming out depressed and sullen. It was almost like an alive, yet comatose state. That is demonic fruit.
But my experience is not unique. Go to pagan and idol worshipping cultures and you can see their “religious” music have the same effect.
Rock music and its tribal beat is a known medium for demonic possession and oppression. I can say that without fear of being proven wrong. It is a fact.
America, a recently God fearing nature has rapidly changed and you can link its demise with a historical, societal acceptance of Rock and Roll.
Go ahead and read these next testimonies of the musicians who produce it.
“The energy of devils and angels is the same energy; it’s how you use it. It’s fuel. There is a saying: If you scare all your devils away, the angels will go away with them. You know, the halo and the horns are the same thing. I mean it’s OK to be spiritually horny – that’s what creative genius is all about. Geniuses don’t have time to think about how it’s going to be received… they don’t have time to think whether people like it or not, is it morally right, will God like it?” (Carlos Santana, Rolling Stone, magazine, March 16, 2000, p. 87).
“…you meditate and you got the candles, you got the incense and you’ve been chanting, and all of a sudden you hear this voice: ‘Write this down’ ” (Carlos Santana, Rolling Stone magazine, March 16, 2000, p. 41).
“Rock concerts are the churches of today.” (Guitarist Craig Chaquico of the rock group ‘Jefferson Starship.’)
The Beatles, in the late 1960s: “Our music is capable of causing emotional instability, disorganized behavior, and even revolution.”
John Denver, though primarily a folk and country-western singer, said of rock: “Rock music is a greater influence over the souls of men than primitive Christianity.”
In the hope of finding a cause of the national teenage monomania, studies were made and reports compiled. Researchers, journalists, and newspaper reporters began putting in personal appearances at rock concerts in order to get an inside view.
Here was part of one report:
“After an hour or so, even I felt drugged. But 20,000 people, most of them high on marijuana, if nothing stronger, were rocking the whole building, swaying, standing on their seats, arms around each other . . The crowd seemed hypnotized. It was part of a mass frenzy.”—Reader’s Digest, July 1973, p. 173. http://insiderockmusic.com/demons.html
From The Doors’ Jim Morrison’s mocking, screaming hatred of Christian prayer (“Petition the Lord with Prayer”) to Skid Row’s “Quicksand Jesus” (“Are we saved by the words of bastard saints?”) to the more explicit blasphemies, rock culture has often identified its aversion to Christian faith.
Ozzy Osbourne acknowledges “I’m not a born again Christian but a born again Hitler (Cream Metal, March 1986 p. 12).
“The Oath” by the band King Diamond: “I deny Jesus Christ, the deceiver, and I adjure the Christian faith, holding in contempt all of its works.”
“Possessed” by the band Venom: “I am possessed by all that is evil. The death of your God I demand. I … sit at Lord Satan’s right hand,” and “I drink the vomit of the priest, make love to the dying whore, Satan is my master incarnate, hail, praise to my unholy host.”
Billy Idol attempts “to show what a human rip off religion is.” Leon Russell thinks that “organized Christianity has done more harm than any other single force I can think of in the world” and suggests that the religion of rock and roll replace it.
CONTINUED: http://www.thugexposed.com/satanism-music/
I go right back to where I came from; music is the language of the soul and Rock and Roll is the language Satan uses to reach cultures and individuals and change them from within.
There is no good fruit that has ever come from Rock and Roll, but it always brings with it these Five Fruits; Rebellion, Sensuality, Depression & Violence, Alcohol & Drug Use and Demonic Influence. You can pinpoint its entrance into American culture and the early 1900’s and see its collective fruit upon it. But it didn’t just do it in our culture. It has transformed cultures across the world if you cared to research it.
CALL TO ACTION
I started this post by saying that this post is for you. Why? Because Rock and Roll is everywhere it is right now planting seeds in your life and the lives of your children and fellow Bible Believers. We are reapings its fruit in our lives and in our churches.
Maybe if enough people are interested I will right a post on How To Identify Rock and Roll in Your Home.
I will leave you with this thought … did you know that there are actually no negatives that can be found to traditional Classical Music. It is good for babies. It is good for plants. It is good for the brain. It is good to heal your body after surgery. It increases intellect. The list can go on and on. Now some more “contemporary classical music” (that integrate the rock beat) or “dissonent classical music” (that go against the original order of western classical music) have negative fruits; but in and of itself … traditional classical music has all positive fruit.
There is so much neat history about music and its cultural effects. It’s not about rock and roll versus classical. There are various cultural musics that aren’t American or western at all. They each have their fruits and cultural and spiritual uses. But today, I wanted to share with you a warning about Rock and Roll and beseech you to get it out of your life.
Dig out its seeds with vigilance before the roots are deep and all you see is the death it brings in your home and in your church.
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