The Deep Depths of Relevancy

I thought I had reached the point where there wasn’t much done in the name of Christianity that would shock me. America has taken just about every worldly device imaginable and tried to Christianize it. Yet there seem to be some last holdouts that are really just too bad to try to pass off as Christian. Or so I thought. It may sound very crude, and I don’t say this for the shock factor, but could you imagine someone trying to pass off pornography as Christian? After what we discovered this week, it doesn’t seem so far off.

The Cornerstone Music & Arts festival is an annual, four-day event held on a 500-acre plot in central Illinois. The main attraction is the music. Multiple stages showcase many different artists and bands who are supposedly Christian. You will probably recognize some of the bigger names: Toby Mac, Skillet, The David Crowder Band, Switchfoot, and the like. While these in and of themselves may present their own problems that would require another blog entry, the Cornerstone Festival has shown itself to have an evil underbelly that is not just a masked attack upon Truth but is bold and blatantly demonic.

The Apprising Ministries blog recently posted an article written by an attendee of the festival who experienced and saw things that are not only shocking but being passed off as Christian. Typifying the worst of the musical acts was a band called Grave Robber whose influences include bands and singers such as Alice Cooper, Type O Negative, GWAR, and Black Sabbath, just to name a few. If you aren’t familiar with these ‘artists’, consider yourself blessed. They are among some of the most evil and, yes, even bloody and gory acts that have been popular in the past 30 years. Grave Robber, decked out in masks and costumes that make them appear like, well, they were just dug up yesterday, even sometimes share the stage with members of the aforementioned bands. They refer to Jesus as the re-animator, and themselves as zombie slaves.

The audience really gets into their performances, too. Comprised of mostly teen-agers and young adults, they are often painted like zombies with make-up blood splatters on their clothes and dripping down their faces. And speaking of zombies, the increasingly popular zombie culture has now been adopted by “christians.” Cornerstone offered a zombie walk that was attended by more than 300 participants who dressed like the living dead. The march ended in a dance that would be considered in the secular world a rave.

Cornerstone also held a movie night that was billed as “not kid friendly,” even though people were encouraged to attend the festival with their entire families. The movies included The Texas Chainsaw Massacre and The House of the Devil. First of all, if it is not good for the kids, then why is it good for the adults? Secondly, these movies are a celebration of some of the sickest and most reviled acts of sin imaginable. How is it even remotely possible that these things are edifying to a Christian?

So, you may say, why even point these things out? They are obviously a very extreme segment of a false Christian culture. Yet this is not the case. This is a major event attended by thousands of people that has been held for the past 27 years. There are many who are drawn by mainstream bands such as David Crowder, who, if they are not regenerated, will see their favorite Christian ‘stars’ associated with some of the most degrading and vilest forms of entertainment and fully accept them because that is what their flesh desires. And here, the organizers of Cornerstone, have given thousands of people a blank check for their consciences to pursue the lusts of the flesh because they label these things as Christian.

The organizers of the Cornerstone Festival are wrong with a capital W. They are purveyors of filth. If one cannot see this is wrong and know that the light of Christianity cannot mix with the darkness of Satan, they are in spiritual bondage beyond anything that we have ever seen before. This is the ultimate end of relevance. The overarching thought that one has to be like the culture and in the culture and part of the culture in order to reach the world is the root of this problem. And here we see it reach its logical conclusion. All this does is allow filthy, stinking, sinful people to follow the lust of the flesh and soothe their God-given consciences because they smack the label of Christian on it.

What this has done for us is give us a renewed soberness in the fight to which we are called. It also allows us to praise our Father for the fact that He has rescued us from these things. We are no better than the people who put on this festival. But God has dealt graciously with us to show us light that they have yet to see. If it were not for the grace of God, we would be doing such things, perhaps even worse things.

Continue to remain vigilant with us. Put on the full armor of God, girding your waist with truth, having put on the breastplate of righteousness, and having shod your feet with the preparation of the gospel of peace; above all, taking the shield of faith with which you will be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked one. And take the helmet of salvation, and the sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God; praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, being watchful to this end with all perseverance . . .

Stand with us and fight the good fight!

Ephesians 5:8-14 For you were once darkness, but now you are light in the Lord. Walk as children of light (for the fruit of the Spirit is in all goodness, righteousness, and truth), finding out what is acceptable to the Lord. And have no fellowship with the unfruitful works of darkness, but rather expose them. But all things that are exposed are made manifest by the light, for whatever makes manifest is light. Therefore He says:

“ Awake, you who sleep,
Arise from the dead,
And Christ will give you light.”