{"id":21693,"date":"2022-11-21T10:25:56","date_gmt":"2022-11-21T15:25:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/?p=21693"},"modified":"2023-02-22T12:58:28","modified_gmt":"2023-02-22T17:58:28","slug":"the-gospel-changed-my-life-years-ago-mercymes-bart-millard-shares-the-hope-of-jesus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/idolchatter\/2022\/11\/the-gospel-changed-my-life-years-ago-mercymes-bart-millard-shares-the-hope-of-jesus.html","title":{"rendered":"\u201cThe gospel changed my life years ago.\u201d MercyMe\u2019s Bart Millard Shares the Hope of Jesus"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_23688\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-23688\" style=\"width: 768px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><a href=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2022\/11\/mercyme_credit-LloydGallman-flickr-scaled.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"size-full wp-image-23688\" src=\"https:\/\/wp-media.beliefnet.com\/sites\/87\/2022\/11\/mercyme_credit-LloydGallman-flickr-scaled.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"768\" height=\"576\" \/><\/a><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-23688\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">LloydGallman \/ Flickr<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>In the midst of their newly released album, <em>Always Only Jesus<\/em> and a 19-city fall tour, MercyMe recently spoke with <a href=\"https:\/\/www.christianheadlines.com\/contributors\/michael-foust\/mercymes-bart-millard-explains-why-he-sings-about-jesus-the-gospel-changed-my-life.html\">Christian Headlines<\/a> about the heart behind their 11<sup>th<\/sup> album. \u201cI think we just need someone to keep singing about Jesus, whether it&#8217;s contemporary Christian or worship or whatever,\u201d the band\u2019s lead singer, Bart Millard said. \u201cYou might be able to make the case of, well, \u2018We may not need the [CCM] genre.\u2019 But what we do need is to just keep talking about Jesus \u2013 providing hope to people.\u201d He also spoke about how the message of Christian music is what differentiates it from secular genres. \u201cEddie DeGarmo years ago, he said what\u2019s funny about the Christian music genre is [that] every other genre is defined by the style of music \u2013 country, jazz, whatever,\u201d he said. \u201cBut Christian music has all of those in it. It\u2019s the lyrics that define the genre. There is country [Christian music] &#8230; hip hop, we have it all. But it\u2019s the lyrics that sets us apart, which is really interesting.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>He said the lyrics and the message are what give his band meaning when they start a new album. In 2001, the band released their first album, which included the popular song <em>I Can Only Imagine<\/em>, which has since spawned a movie based on the history behind the song. Millard said one thing he can\u2019t imagine is <em>not <\/em>sharing the Gospel. \u201cI can&#8217;t imagine just singing in a bar or just singing about pop stuff that, to me, wouldn\u2019t have as much meaning,\u201d he said. \u201cThe gospel changed my life years ago. Somebody asked, \u2018Why did you sign up for Christian music?\u2019 I was like, I don\u2019t think we signed up for it. It\u2019s just kind of who we are.\u201d He admitted that the band can\u2019t get to the second verse or bridge without mentioning God in some way.<\/p>\n<p>In speaking with <a href=\"https:\/\/thealabamabaptist.org\/mercyme-hopes-new-album-reminds-christians-of-their-purpose-common-denominator\/\"><em>The Alabama Baptist<\/em><\/a>, the band spoke more about their hope to bring more unity to Christians as a whole. About half of the songs on the album were written during the pandemic when the band saw friendships and churches struck by division. Millard spoke about the timing of the album saying, \u201cIt feels like we just stumbled onto a very important record. It\u2019s perfect timing with an album titled \u2018Always Only Jesus\u2019 when we\u2019ve got a divided body of Christ that needs to be reminded of the one common denominator we should all have. And so it was definitely a God thing. It was kind of weird.\u201d Millard stated that the band hoped to encourage Christians to come together under their faith in Jesus and to set aside arguments over tertiary issues. \u201cSo we all thought, \u2018Doing our part is making an album to remind people that it is about the heart of God, it is about Jesus.\u2019 If you\u2019re gonna address the elephant in the room, you can argue and fight \u2026 as much as you want. But we have to be able to come together and agree that yes, we are still pursuing Christ.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the midst of their newly released album, Always Only Jesus and a 19-city fall tour, MercyMe recently spoke with Christian Headlines about the heart behind their 11th album. \u201cI think we just need someone to keep singing about Jesus, whether it&#8217;s contemporary Christian or worship or whatever,\u201d the band\u2019s lead singer, Bart Millard said.&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":664,"featured_media":23688,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21693","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-television"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.9 - 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