Christianity Today has posted a good piece on social awareness and activism among evangelical Christian musicians.

It briefly chronicles the movement and also draws an important distinction:

…something more than endorsement is happening in contemporary Christian music.

Artists are directly immersing themselves and their audiences in missions to hurting people, whether they are six blocks or 6,000 miles away.

They are stepping to the forefront to address poverty, human trafficking, HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other fatal diseases, taking personal responsibility to invest in grassroots work.

The piece talks about the Bono factor, how most are avoiding “the minefield of short-term missions,” and how the upheaval in the music industry aids musicians invested in missions.

Definitely worth your read.  Also see:

• Jars of Clay: Clean Water, Clean Blood
• Sara Groves: Less Charity, More Justice
• Steven Curtis Chapman: Beauty Will Rise
• Derek Webb: A Different Kind of Neighbor
• Third Day: Diversification Is the Key

To get your church involved in what God is doing to awaken mercy missions through music, click here.

For every action there’s an equal and opposite reaction. There is some atonement built in: an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth. Then enters Grace and turns that upside down. I love it.

I’m not talking about people being graceful in their actions but just covering over the cracks. Christ’s ministry really was a lot to do with pointing out how everybody is a screw-up in some shape or form, there’s no way around it. But then He was to say, well, I am going to deal with those sins for you. I will take on Myself all the consequences of sin.

Even if you’re not religious I think you’d accept that there are consequences to all the mistakes we make. And so Grace enters the picture to say, I’ll take the blame, I’ll carry the cross. It is a powerful idea. Grace interrupting Karma.

• Bono, in U2 by U2, page 300.

(HT:  Pastor Ray Ortlund of Immanuel Presbyterian, Nashville, who is also an author and blogger)