I don’t listen to contemporary gospel or Contemporary Christian Music like I once did. Although talented and faithful remnants remain, and God continues using them, much of the genre today, at least what tops the charts, can feel mediocre or theologically hollow.
If not that, then at times I find it embarrassingly panders to whatever styles are trending, arriving a day late and a dollar short of innovation. Instead of winsomely and missionally showing culture the way, we are absorbed by it.
Most of the time, my playlist consists of relatively old-school classics.
James Ellis III
For example, Canaan James Hill’s American Idol audition became an instant classic when he sang the paint off Earnest Pugh’s “I Need Your Glory.” It was so powerful that the music legend and judge Lionel Richie nearly came completely undone. During the taping, he started pacing around, talking to himself and was visibly overwhelmed. Another song that deeply moves me is the Psalm-led spiritual anthem “Hear My Prayer,” performed by Callie Day.
Unashamedly, I listen to her rendition multiple times each week. That may sound excessive, but if you hear it, you’ll understand why it warrants repetition. She first went viral in 2016 when the video of an ordinary, casual rehearsal session, recorded one random evening at Berea College, was uploaded and widely shared, eventually amassing 30 million views among multiple platforms.
One benefit of being a seminary professor who teaches synchronously online is how easily I can expose students to a wide range of scholars and practitioners. My own expertise and insight aside, they regularly share how deeply they benefit from hearing additional voices. The accessibility of virtual education in this regard is unmatched, offering basically instant access to various laypeople and ministry professionals with whom it would otherwise be nearly impossible to interface in such up-close ways.
Callie kindly agreed to be a guest speaker in my missiology course recently. The class learned about her upbringing, faith formation and rich work as a music educator, classically trained opera singer and Grammy-nominated artist, to name only a few aspects of her background. It is a joy to interact with people who love what they do, and even more love the one who enables them to do it.
Even through my own thick biases, I can admit Day’s voice is both exceptionally rare and, in a sense, also common. She possesses greater talent than many top-ranking artists on Billboard or Spotify but simply hasn’t yet been masterfully marketed into that stratosphere. That’s how it goes sometimes. But particularly within the Black Church, we know there are oodles of aunties, deacons and everyday members who — as we say — “can blow.” They will break out into song wherever, whenever and however the Spirit moves, and most aren’t official ministers of music either.
“Technique and opportunity certainly have their place, but part of what Callie Day and the Black Church tradition exemplify is the importance of surrendering to the Spirit.”
There is an unknown Jill Scott, Lalah Hathaway, Erykah Badu, Gregory Porter, Keke Wyatt, Le’Andria Johnson, Jonathan McReynolds, Jennifer Hudson, Fantasia and John Legend in every city — at that church on the other side of town, or among those who frequent a certain denominational convention.
Technique and opportunity certainly have their place, but part of what Callie Day and the Black Church tradition exemplify is the importance of surrendering to the Spirit — something that, in turn, requires intentional investment in the gifts we are given. Those gifts must be carefully administered if they are to be of the best use.
This begs the questions: Do we have a “broken and contrite heart”? Will we sacrifice and prepare ourselves long before large crowds arrive, if they ever come at all? With what we have, will we honor the audience of one as our primary affection?
The quiet, prayerful, hard work of consecration, paired with excellence that praises God, produces beautiful fruit to share with the world.
This extends far beyond music, however. As a journalist, Ida B. Wells could have taken the easy route and avoided reporting on the sanctioned horror of Black Americans being lynched, but she did not. She faced death threats, working diligently so others might live. Condoleezza Rice took her study of the Russian language and her robust diplomatic preparation seriously as a way of fulfilling her calling in due time as secretary of state.
This is also part of why the Black Church always has taken Bible study and education to heart. To study and to prepare is to show ourselves approved (2 Timothy 2:15). Callie recounted to my students how during her upbringing, matriarchs supported her in “protecting her gift,” which she continues doing. For her, this is a reasonable act of service from someone determined to honor God as the giver of her talent, trusting God in this life and the next through Jesus.
Originally from Atlanta, with two master’s degrees and a doctorate loading at the University of Kentucky, she is clearly highly learned. But it comes across that at her core, she is a servant without the need to chase accolades or the opinions of others. This should be our posture whatever strengths or weaknesses we toggle through.
“What we need is ordinary Christians who are both anointed and invested in stewarding grace faithfully unto the Lord.”
If all we ever aim to do is create content, scroll social media and endlessly ask ChatGPT questions, we risk being left with a form of godliness that lacks power (2 Timothy 5:3-7). What we need is ordinary Christians who are both anointed and invested in stewarding grace faithfully unto the Lord. Such people understand they cannot simply do what everyone else is doing or always go where it is most popular to go.
Covering the biblical concept of anointing, the late holiness theologian James Earl Massey wrote in 1995, “When our natural side rightly surrenders to spiritual conditioning, our humanity is disciplined. … There is an intensity to what we do, because our actions are related to the highest frame of reference.”
Regarding Callie’s online performance we watched in another course last term, one of my students commented, “She’s an example of the difference between mere talent and talent that has been consecrated. She is using her talent in God’s service, rather than letting her talent use her.”
In celebrating Black History Month, which highlights the rich depth and dexterity of my people, I hope we will all affirm the responsibility that accompanies the work and witness God beckons us to in God’s name — for God’s glory and for our good.
Whether aspects of our gifts are ever monetized or not, every morsel belongs to the Lord.
James Ellis III is an ordained Baptist pastor and assistant professor of practical theology at Winebrenner Theological Seminary. He earned a doctor of ministry degree from Western Theological Seminary, alongside master’s degrees from Pittsburgh Theological Seminary and Baylor University’s George W. Truett Theological Seminary, and a bachelor’s degree in African American studies from the University of Maryland. His latest book is In Those Days as Today: Preaching through the Book of Judges. Learn more at his website.