A Love-Hate Relationship

Those words, love-hate, describe the relationship between Christians and this world. On the one hand Paul says, "For everything created by God is good, and nothing is to be rejected if it is received with thanksgiving" (1 Timothy 4:4). That is, the world, and the things of this world, are good and are meant to be gratefully enjoyed by God's people. On the other hand, John says, "Do not love the world or the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him" (1 John 2:15). Life in this world is meant to be enjoyed, and it is meant to be resisted. We are to love the world, and we are to hate it.

I'll be writing a devotional on this subject in our church's upcoming newsletter. For now, I share a video which I recently came across that illustrates this point powerfully. It is a video of Carter Beauford, the drummer for the Dave Matthews Band, playing one of the band's songs. In my opinion, it is simultaneously one of the band's best songs, and one of it's worst.

The song is basically a celebration of a one-night stand. With all that God's Word says about the sacredness and beauty of marital, covenant-keeping love, the message of this song is repulsive (to put it as bluntly as I can). I do not make a practice of listening to this song for that reason, and if you believe listening to it would cause you to stumble in any way, please don't give yourself to temptation (though you can see some incredible drumming in the first 1:20 of the video, before the words of the song begin. There's also a great clip around 5:15 into the video where he breaks one of his sticks):



While the message of the song is indeed repulsive, the music (and Beauford's drumming in particular) is beautiful. I am not a drummer, but Carter Beauford's skill is simply astonishing, and is a gift from God and a reflection of His creative beauty.

I think this video teaches us two important lessons about the love-hate relationship Christians are called to have with the world:

First, the original beauty of this world that God created and declared good is still found all over the place, despite the arrival of sin and the curse upon creation. To the best of my knowledge, Carter Beauford is not a Christian. Yet I believe that his skill is something that God declares good, even though his heart may be indifferent or hostile to God.

Second, in this sin-soaked world, great beauty can be used in profoundly wicked ways. The good of creation can be used by sinful people to celebrate what is evil. What grieves me so much about this song is that the musical beauty of the song actually makes the wickedness of the one-night stand seem attractive and beautiful by the end of the song. That is why my conscience will not allow me to listen to this song for pleasure, though I share it here as a tool to think through these principles of loving and hating the world.

All this means that Christians must be very careful in this world. We can love it and enjoy it, but we must also hate it. And when Christians mindlessly absorb music and other forms of entertainment in the name of celebrating God's creative goodness, we must be very careful that we do not subtly begin to delight in what is evil.

It is a hard thing to live in this world, but to not be of it, to live in such a way that you fulfill both 1 Timothy 4:4 and 1 John 2:15. Yet that is the call of Jesus for His followers. I have no easy, absolute answers for how to tread this difficult road, but I'd certainly value the input of any other readers.

And would you join me in praying for Carter Beauford, that he would come to know the great and glorious God who is the Giver of his extraordinary talents, and bow joyfully before the glory of Jesus Christ?