Pop
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Christian music thats real
By ROBIN TAYLOR
I wish I didnt have to wear a
nametag on my waitress uniform. It bothers me that people I dont know can
greet me by my name or call me from across the room. Robin, they
say. We need steak sauce. Iced tea. Butter.
Its my duty to get what they need, to make their dining
experience a pleasant one. Mostly, I do a good job. Lately, though, the work
has begun to wear on me. I no longer shrug off the more difficult customers,
the ones who scold me like a naughty child if I take too long to fill their
requests.
Those are the times when I complain too much to my coworkers and
spew bitter, mean things about the customers while in the bus station.
Afterward, on my drive home, I feel dirty inside. My well-trained religious
side knows that all my restaurant angst has its roots in a lack of faith. If I
were a better Christian, I wouldnt worry about what people tip me,
because Id remember that God provides in spite of them.
My faith isnt usually that strong, though. Recently, I
discovered a singer who seems to understand this, a man with questions of his
own. Rich Mullins had a long string of Christian albums, some with his
Ragamuffin Band. His focus, though, was not so much on his career as on
following Jesus. He took a vow of poverty, went back to school to earn a degree
in music education and then moved to the Navajo reservation to teach music to
children there.
He was planning a new project with the Ragamuffins, Ten
Songs About Jesus he called it, which he told them was the most important
record of his career. It was the first record that had to be made, he said. The
others were just for fun.
On a Wednesday in September 1997, he recorded demo versions of
nine of those songs in an abandoned church with a battery-operated recorder
from K-Mart. Nine days later, he was killed in an auto accident. The demo songs
are half of a two-CD collection that Ragamuffin Rick Elias later produced,
The Jesus record. The second CD features the Ragamuffins performing
the same songs and one extra, Man of No Reputation, which Mullins
reportedly was deeply moved by and didnt think he could sing all the way
through.
Other musicians on the CD include Amy Grant, Michael W. Smith,
Phil Keaggy and Ashley Cleveland.
The second CD, the polished one, is lovely. The first CD, where
Mullins sings alone, is rough, haunting and holy. More than any Christian music
I have ever heard, it is prayer. Mullins never could have imagined that these
raw versions would be mass-produced or heard by anyone other than his close
friends. Its because the songs are unpolished, though, that they speak to
me in such a powerful way.
This is an album that I will listen to, over and over again.
Because the songs remind me of Jesus, and they pop into my head at the best
possible times. They redeem my ordinary moments, even my bad nights at work,
and remind me that Jesus is alive. Even as the fat man yells and demands his
own pitcher of iced tea with copious amounts of sugar. As the
harried cooks burn a steak or we run out of prime rib just as I have four
orders for it. Surely God is with us, today, Mullins sings. Somehow
its true.
I like the Jesus that Mullins helps me see in this album. This
Jesus is a homeless man who has the hope of the whole world resting
on his shoulders. He is a deliverer, who will never break his
promise, a promise we will never doubt, though we doubt
[our] hearts -- doubt [our] eyes.
They accused him of making himself leader of a strange kingdom
where paupers, simpletons and rogues were the honored subjects,
where prostitutes and drunks toasted him, where the sinners have become
the saints and the lost have all come home. Mullins Jesus taught a
lame man how to dance, played with children, baffled doctors of the law, even
raised the dead. He loved the weak with relentless affection.
The songs on this album escape the sickly sweet conventions
of much Christian music to hit the stuff of real life, the fears and doubts
that we pretend dont exist. Hard to Get, the first song on
the Jesus Demos, is a prayer that asks Jesus tough questions.
Did you ever know loneliness? Mullins asks. Did
you ever know need/Do you remember just how long a night can get? And,
Will those who mourn be left uncomforted? Even, Did you
forget about us after you had flown away?
Later, he sings, Im reeling from these voices that
keep screaming in my ears/All these words of shame and doubt, blame and
regret. The answer? Youve been here all along I
guess/Its just your ways and you are just plain hard to get.
What a relief for someone to finally say this. To admit for all of
us that though we love Jesus and long to follow, that deep down were
still so scared [were] holding [our] breath.
Sometimes I feel like Im holding my breath all day long. In
many ways, I wish I were more like Mullins, which really would be more like
Jesus. I hate that I lie to myself about how rich I am, that I am so far away
from Mullins life of voluntary poverty and holistic ministry. I hate that
I dont know what to say to the young hostess who came to work with a
split eye and stitches from where her boyfriend hit her. She is engaged to him
and pregnant. If he does it again, she says, she will leave.
I hate that our new busboy feels out of place in our small Nevada
town. He has seven tattoos that hell show you if you ask, is fresh from
Los Angeles, and tells me that he misses his family and homies. Hes been
stabbed before, shot. He is kind to me, genuinely friendly with the puzzled
customers, a hard worker. I think Jesus would have felt right at home with him.
Hes not someone that I would have hired, though. Which just
shows what I would have missed.
I know I need to change my attitude at work. To view people as
people and not just as potential tips. Mullins music helps me remember
this.
The Jesus record is about life. My life. Yours, too. I
dont know why Jesus called Mullins home just days after he recorded these
songs. The singing must have touched him deeply. Now, Rich is with Jesus, while
the rest of us are left here, bumbling along as best we can. We sin. We love,
sometimes. We have songs run through our heads, again and again.
Through all of that, in spite of ourselves, Jesus is with us.
Jesus is here. In all places and situations, through all times and storms.
Robin Taylor writes from Dayton, Nev.
National Catholic Reporter, July 2,
1999
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