Michael Leyde

Plagiarism-
Noun: The practice of taking someone else’s work or ideas and passing them off as one’s own.

If a pastor preached someone else’s message every week, he’d not only be guilty of plagiarism, but most of us would leave that church. Yet the worship pastor is allowed to freely sing other people’s songs without any question.

I think the lack of creativity seen in our Christian community is rooted in our culture that allows for unhindered reproduction in our worship service. I can freely sing other people’s songs (and actually make a living out of it) and never push the creative community forward. Here in Las Vegas there are plenty of bands that play famous music in the casinos. If you’ve ever heard them you know they’re good, but never quite like the original. Now I’m not saying we shouldn’t make room for new songs from outside our community, but unfortunately most of us need to make room for the sound within our community first. We seem to import more than we export. We consume more than we create, and this needs to change. If the Spirit of God who devised and developed all that we see in the cosmos is truly living within, what kind of fashioning and origination should be burgeoning from us?

Let us continue to make room for our artistic expression and the psalm of our hearts to ring within and without our communities. “He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God. Many will see and fear, and put their trust in the LORD.” Ps 40:3