July 15, 2024 • 33 mins
Welcome to the Song Lab podcast, hosted by Michael Mauldin. In this captivating episode, we continue our conversation with Ray Hughes, exploring the theme of "Reawakening Wonder".
Michael and Ray dive deep into the creative ruts often found in church music, discussing why the church tends to stick to familiar songs and how fear stifles creative expression. Ray shares his wisdom on songwriting, urging listeners to allow "old silences" to speak and to write songs that challenge the status quo, invoking courage and authenticity.
Michael and Ray also touch on the current cultural landscape, discussing the impact of trauma in music and the potential for a new wave of creativity that brings life and legacy.
Join us for an inspiring conversation that encourages songwriters, artists, and creatives to break free from fear, embrace authenticity, and create transformative works that reflect the infinite nature of God.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:07):
Welcome to the Song Lab podcast. I'm your host, Michael Maldon.
Today, we've got a part two with Ray Hughes, Reawakening Wonder.
If you haven't heard part one, I encourage you to go back and listen to it.
Not necessarily necessary when you listen to Ray talk because he's always full
of gems and jewels and diamonds, treasures, all those great things. He's incredible.
Our last podcast was our most listened to podcast to date, and it provided one
(00:31):
of the most provocative social media clips we've had. It's gone crazy online.
So anyway, without further ado, part two with Ray Hughes, Reawaken Wonder.
Well, I mean, I think that's a big, it's been a big thing for me that I've always
been curious about is, you know, why it's so, why the church just,
they play the same songs in all the churches.
(00:51):
There's not this like beautiful expression of all these different types of sounds and expressions.
We have, you know, the reason we call Song Lab Lab is because we want to have
a laboratory where people feel free to express themselves, you know,
and get the song out and explore and until we can remove those paradigms.
But why do you think the church is in such like in that rut, like creatively?
(01:14):
I mean, I struggle with that because I feel like we should be the most creative,
you know, and there's such like fear to express.
And maybe we're just trying to be trying to be too safe because we don't want
to offend a religious. I don't know. What is it?
Well, songwriters, songwriters, songwriting is not just about hearing a new sound and writing it.
(01:40):
It's also about hearing old silences and allowing them to speak.
And we won't allow the old silences to speak anymore and come back and bring
our lives back to a place where we're unpredictably safe rather than the predictably safe.
(02:02):
Let me read something that I wrote about this.
It's also about hearing old silences,
allowing them to speak for some of God's most honorable attributes and greatest
expressions of his grace and his love have flown to the earth only to be taken
captive by religious trends and silenced by time.
(02:24):
And why? Because we want to create safe atmospheres, and that's what we do.
And we sink everybody to the lowest common denominator creatively,
and we call that unity when it's not. It's sameness.
We don't need sameness. And fear creates those atmospheres of sameness in church
because sameness is safe.
(02:48):
It's theologically safe, culturally safe, financially safe.
So we have safe preaching, safe teaching, safe atmospheres created by safe instruments
played by safe musicians behind safe worship leaders singing safe lyrics of
safe songs written by safe songwriters.
That do not want to step out of that realm of safeness.
(03:11):
So then there are songs in heaven that have been silently waiting and still
wait for you, and there's nothing safe about them.
Write the silences. Touch them awake. Give them the wings, and let's find out how safe they are.
Give voice to what has never been heard. That's what you're talking about,
(03:33):
Michael. Why can we not give voice to what has never been heard and cast light
on what has never been seen?
You know, every time creativity happens, God reveals another facet of his nature.
And he's so multifaceted and infinite, we have not even begun to scratch the
(03:53):
surface of the wonder and beauty and infinite nature of God.
But we find our pet safe things and we hold on to them.
We, we, when we should be welcoming a beauty that has never been known outside
of the Jasper walls, why don't we bring our songs from that realm?
And every time it comes from that realm in history, huge dramatic shifts in culture and humanity.
(04:21):
And we, you know, Solomon's temple, tabernacle of David, upper room on and on
it goes. Look what happened with John on the Isle of Patmos.
That was some weird stuff, man.
He was seeing beyond the veil. It's true.
He was seeing things that we don't even want to talk about in church.
(04:43):
For real. You know, seven-headed monsters and dragons.
Yeah. Yeah.
Write the songs that scare you. I love that dynamic of not being safe.
I mean, there was a season where I felt the Lord just kept telling me,
my body needs courage because we've been so safe. And I had this funny imagery
(05:05):
of like, you know, God giving a charge to Joshua and Caleb, it's time to enter
the promised land, guys. It's time to go in. There's these giants there.
You're going to take the land, but be safe, guys. Be safe out there. You know.
It's just, it's not that. I think we need that charge of courage again to write
songs that make us feel uncomfortable. comfortable.
(05:27):
I think there's that authenticity, what you're talking about,
because being authentic and vulnerable is not safe either.
And then I think that a lot of people believe that maybe I'm not as spiritual as somebody else.
But at the end of the day, if you've come to God, you've experienced him in some kind of way.
And the reason I love to cattle prod creatives is because when they express
(05:49):
and create, I get to see an aspect of God, of his character and in his nature
that I haven't seen before, because we are like those beings with all those
eyes, just different beings, right?
And I get to see, I get to behold the beauty of God from how you've seen him.
And man, it gets me, you know, I get to see God again, you know?
So that's why I, I'm so passionate.
One of the reasons I'm so passionate about getting creatives to create.
(06:12):
Yeah. So, so I can see, I can see him. Our lyrics should add what we've found
to have meaning to what many would become, be consider a meaningless life.
And songs and poems and music is not supposed to sound written.
It's supposed to sound like something that fell out of your heart and mind and
(06:34):
made your life make sense.
And there's a lot of songs and creative processes we want to welcome and applaud at all. Yes, we do.
But there's a lot of it that's supposed to make our life make sense as well.
And I think that's part of what we're missing. And that'll come from just pure,
real, authentic game changers.
(06:57):
You know, what is the, you know, lawgivers and lawmakers are not those who shape culture.
They react to culture and create boundaries and limitations and rails for everybody to run on.
But lawmakers don't shape culture. Songwriters do. Artists do. Poets do.
And on and on it goes. Yeah.
(07:19):
And, you know, we could learn an important lesson from that as well.
We need to, they need to find their rightful place within the body of Christ.
And everybody, let's go together and press the boundaries and beyond the limitations
into something that could really be profoundly powerful.
And I also, I think, can you imagine if we had a bunch of folks that carried
(07:44):
a reality of their song, welcoming a harvest and accelerating the fruit and
accelerating the harvest that's sure to come?
You know, touch heaven, heaven awakes, earth, you know, when heaven kisses earth
and we get caught in a smack, you know? Yeah.
(08:06):
Well, how does one do that? I think we, like some of the things we're talking about right now.
Oh, here's a good way to see it or think of it. Let me get this.
I just don't want to leave one of them out, so let me put that in.
(08:29):
David is our greatest example, of course. And his happened over,
first of all, what's the number one characteristic of David's life?
Think about this. David did not build on the shoulders of Saul.
He built on the shoulders of Samuel.
And the difference between David and Saul was when Saul sinned, it hardened his heart.
(08:54):
When David sinned, it broke his heart. and because david carried one reality
it's set in motion so the answer to how did he do it or how can we do it is
we live a life of longing and law and longing is what.
Longing many times sounds like sadness melancholy whatever but longing is nothing
(09:17):
more than reaching toward any situation david found himself in what did he do
he reached toward god Even when he had failed, he reached toward God.
Everything that happened reached toward God. And that longing that had been
in him since a child, longing then became lyrics.
And then lyrics became language. Think about it.
(09:40):
This guy would write a song and it would become the language of the nation.
There are people doing that now.
Even more so. So, well, you know, the shallow surface chatter of the things
that we long for and what we create novelty around and the language that we give people.
Permission in our lives is ridiculous. It's outrageous. Yeah.
(10:04):
But longing become lyrics. Lyrics become language. Language became the liturgy.
And liturgy married literature.
We have the Word of God, the literature today. And literature carries legacy.
Legacy sets the stage for multigenerational longings. So when they long, the lyrics come.
And so on. So here's the question.
(10:27):
How do when's the best time to to influence a child about 100 years before he's born.
You set lyrics and longings and language and liturgy and the beauty see we're
trying to we're trying to put a dysfunctional hollywood language in the house
(10:48):
of god and in our culture and we're We're all trying to learn that.
When we come from a story-rich culture full of truth that has sustained and
maintained generations of truth seekers, those longing after God, and what do we do?
We change the language in our generation, and we've changed it to the point
that we've corrupted it to the point that who even knows what's going on in this world.
(11:14):
So true. So to me, songwriting is not about writing next year's most popular course.
It's about writing the next generation's language for accessing God.
And how do we change it? One yes at a time.
We live our lives as inspirations.
(11:34):
As you speak to the sounds and the lyrics and the melodies that become liturgy
and the literature, have you read the book, How the Irish Saved Civilization?
Yeah. Years and years ago. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's such a fascinating read
to me because it's, it's one, it's a great piece of literature.
It's got poetry in it. The book itself is great, but the story of how the Irish,
(11:57):
you know, took these old, you know, pieces of literature, the Iliad, the Odyssey,
the Bible, and they would transcribe them while the rest of the world was kind
of going to hell in a handbasket through wars and all these literature and the schools were lost.
It was the Irish who then were like the stewards of these stories.
And then they went back out and evangelized the world with the Bible and then
(12:21):
these old great works of literature.
And me going to Ireland, when I go there, they're the best storytellers on the planet.
I mean, just hanging out with them. And I know you've had a rich history connecting
with Ireland. Ireland, what do you see from that perspective of the literature,
the storytelling, the Irish maybe?
(12:42):
Well, they were given permission. First of all, they were pre-Christianity. They were...
You know, really, really given to the mystical and given to the mythologies.
And they got, you know, they got hundreds of deities and regional deities and
all their pantheism and all that.
(13:04):
Well, once Christianity came in, what really came in was biblical permission to be who you are.
But now, from a site where there's redemption, be redeemed unto who you're really created to be.
And David gave them permission for all of it.
And that's one of the reasons, even to this day, you know, there's an old Irish
(13:26):
saying that says, in Ireland, under every stone is a poet.
The generations that are buried there, they did. They carried storytelling.
They carry that I, the ability to, the turn of phrase, and they look for the rhythms.
They wait for the imagery that marries the rhythms of what they try to communicate and so on.
(13:52):
And, yeah, they have the ability to interpret everything that they see.
I'll just, here's something. It means nothing. This is the way I live my life.
The old man stood and he looked out at the sea, as if the sea could tell him what life was all about.
(14:15):
Was he seeing where he was going or where he had been?
His gaze became slower and slower as wave after wave the past found him.
The longer he stood, the more his eyes danced, as the mist fell like a promise on his face.
Life is about coming and going till you're gone.
(14:37):
Now, if you sit down with an old shunnakee in Ireland, he would have a thousand of those.
Living in his mind, living in the brightness of his life.
He could reach back and grab turns of phrase and imagery, and he would tell
the stories in such a way that you would experience the story.
And that is what David gave permission for. And so when Patrick and all the
(15:03):
others came in there and began to create those little monastic cultures,
it was really giving the Irish people their DNA,
an opportunity to sing their truest song.
And they had already had a hierarchical system in place in their culture that honored the poets.
They were even, publicly, they would even be dressed different than the rest.
(15:27):
And they would carry themselves.
And then, of course, down through the brutality of foreigners coming in,
insisting Catholicism, which had been much later.
Patrick wasn't Catholic, nor was he Irish. He became Catholic about 500 years after he was dead.
(15:48):
But if you want to look at that Irish DNA and that storytelling DNA,
it's also in Wales. It's also in Scotland.
It's in that Celtic circle, which is Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Isle of Man, Cornwall.
And I think I probably left one out.
But anyway, but on a day-to-day basis, all the little spins and quirky little
(16:16):
things and all those old sayings that they have that came across into our Appalachian Mountains.
The foundation of it all, you'll find, is words should move the reader.
Or words should move the listener. They've got to move the writer first.
And joy, laughter, beauty, pain, loss. The writer is the one who struggles with words.
(16:41):
The reader should feel the beauty of the struggle.
You ever hear people, I just, you know, I'm just right, just flow of consciousness still.
And I'm a writer. No, no, writers struggle with words.
The reader should feel the beauty of that struggle. And then that Irish DNA,
(17:01):
somehow they have the ability to struggle on the move, if you will.
Yeah. Yes, because they're doing what David did. They're saying what they're seeing.
And it takes us all the way back to the beginning of our day today,
Michael. they give their imagination permission and freedom,
(17:24):
just like Jesus did when he would tell the stories in the parables.
And what would he do? He would reveal the heart of the Father,
and the Father would awaken those that would hear his words,
because facts inform, but truth transforms.
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(17:45):
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Doesn't even have to be a fact. I've read you a thing about an old man standing
looking at the sea, you know?
(18:07):
That carries a lot of truth. It does.
Beauty. I think that we need to be reminded of the beauty of struggle.
And even in the creative process, some of the most profound moments of things
that I've created have been birthed out of the struggle and the frustration,
(18:27):
feeling like I can't quite articulate what I want to articulate.
And I'm frustrated and I want to give up. I walk away. way.
And then, and then in that struggle, it's like all of a sudden,
you know, something comes forth.
And I wonder if it's like, I wonder if that struggle is, is sometimes representative
of like that transition moment when women, when a woman's given birth to a baby,
you know, she starts to freak out a little bit and it's like, this isn't coming.
(18:51):
But I think that so many are, there's a generation that kind of runs from the
struggle that wants that comfort.
And, and I think that there's, there's a need to embrace the struggle and that
conflict to birth something beautiful.
Yeah. And, you know, it's kind of tricky. I think you're absolutely right.
But many times what we'll do, embracing the struggle, we'll wind up glorifying the struggle.
(19:13):
Yeah. But what you're saying is absolutely true, man. The struggle is real,
but they're also the release is real.
Yeah. And to carry the struggle is an important part of it.
And as soon as we start living in denial of the struggle, we become inauthentic
in our Christianity Christianity, and we just happy, hallelujah,
glory to Jesus, and joy, joy, joy down in my heart, and all this stuff.
(19:35):
And I know that needs to be sung by faith as well. I get that. Yeah, for sure.
But also, you know, there was a friend of mine who was a great songwriter. He's in heaven now.
But he probably had, I don't know, he had 1,400 people. I think it's 1,400 covers of his songs.
Everybody from Sinatra to Willie Nelson to everybody.
(19:57):
And, you know, the list is ridiculous. Incredible songwriter.
And he could write the saddest songs you've ever heard in your life.
He brought poetry, beauty, and depth back to, you know. I think he had the number
of top five records in all five genres at one time in the same week. Incredible writer.
(20:23):
But also he brought a depth back to it and took the trivial motel rendezvous
craziness out of drunkenness and all that out of the music to a degree and introduced
depth and beauty back to it and poetry.
And he could sing the saddest songs you've ever heard in your life.
I asked him, I said, I said, I said, what's the deal, man?
(20:44):
You write, you're the happiest guy I know.
And I said, but, you know, and, you know, he would sing a lyric and the beauty
of the melodies were so spellbinding.
They would hold you captive while you experienced the depth and the emotion
(21:04):
of every word of image he would put in a song. It was incredible.
And I asked him, I said, you know, but you're the happiest guy in the world.
And he says, well, I write my sadness so I don't have to live it. Wow.
Sounds like a simple thing. Yeah. But what he did is he knew how,
(21:26):
he called it robbing from the dragon.
And he said, when I go into those dark places, I just, you know,
it's like, here's the same principle.
He said, somebody asked him, he said, what do you do creatively in your songwriting?
What do you do when the well goes dry?
He said, I write a song about the well going dry.
(21:50):
Yeah. I'm a writer, so I write.
And he writes the struggles, all of the pain, all of it. All of it makes a dragon.
Yeah. You know what's interesting? I was talking to a guy yesterday here in Atlanta.
He's a prayer guy. He's a rapper. He said the number one music genre in the
(22:10):
world right now is trap music, which was birthed out of Atlanta.
And it's kind of these hip hop beats, but he says all they sing about is trauma.
And so that's like, they're just stuck in the pain and it's like recycling the pain.
And so I know there's an element, David, you know, pouring his heart out and
getting that junk out, which is, I think one of the keys to keeping his heart open, right?
(22:33):
He was like authentically expressing, getting the junk out, but then he would
always turn it back, you know, unto the Lord, you know?
But we, I was contemplating that yesterday, you know, the generation that's
just singing so much about their trauma or the lust for not the longing, but there's a lusting.
Yeah and how do we how do we help heal
the trauma of a generation so that they can sing towards longing and love versus
(22:57):
lust and you know the other things wow we got a job cut out for us don't we
we do got to keep keep writing and creating yeah and you know history,
music history and reaching back into the david's way david's approach history
you know history is It's just dry bones of something that once lived until the
(23:20):
wind of the Spirit blows on it again.
And I think there's a fresh wind coming right now that's going to awaken those
things, the power of music,
the power of worship, the power of praise, the power of language, the power of the lyric.
(23:42):
It's going to become far more than just responding and repeating it's going to be,
resounding and renewing what the
word of god says about music i think that's why it's really important that if
you know if we we as the church if if we if we could change the way we understand
(24:03):
worship creativity and music we will change the way the world encounters god
yeah and see those Those that are taking a language of trauma,
you know what they're doing? They're longing out loud.
Those are cries. And unfortunately, it's a rallying cry that's causing all of
(24:25):
those that have been traumatized to come together around trauma.
But it could very well be a good setup. Good setup, yeah. Because wait till those voices find life.
Life. Wait till they bring rhythm and cadence and power in those expressions
that they have that are so powerful and musical that have been corrupted by their own trauma.
(24:45):
And for us to get on some kind of arrogant, you know, high horse,
we've all got that stuff in us, man.
We've got choices to make just like they do. And we have trauma just like they do.
But hopefully we'll be making the the right choices and singing the songs that will reveal him.
(25:07):
You know what I realized? I realized recently I stumbled across some old rap
music that I listened to back in the 90s.
And it was this, you know, this kind of gangster rap, real aggressive kind of stuff.
And when I was listening to it, I heard a sound of courage in it.
And I realized, man, I was a scared kid, latchkey kid, single mom around.
(25:31):
And so much of these guys are that. They don't have fathers around.
And they're trying to find a sound that's going to give them courage and strength
in a world that's really scary where there's gangs and violence.
And so much of that is just that what you're saying, there's a longing for that
to find strength in the sound.
The power of music to be able to do that. It's incredible what music is.
(25:55):
It still blows my mind. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
You know, once they get the language of life in them, though,
then their words and their music and their sound, that can be true legacy.
Totally. That they leave instead of regurgitating the loss to the next generation.
(26:16):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I know. I think one of my cries of my heart to set up a place
of worship and prayer for people to connect to,
I felt like the Lord was calling me to gather the artists and the creatives
so that they could create then from a place of His presence instead of just from their pain.
(26:37):
And I know the pain can lead us into the place of beauty and His presence too,
but when we get stuck in that, I think it's where our society and culture can get stuck.
And I think there's a real call right now to find healing in our own journey
by connecting to him and articulating that in such a way that others can be
led into their own freedom in their journey. Yeah.
(26:58):
You know, and religious spirit calls us to.
Lord, our beliefs over them, rather than reveal the love of the one who loved us into the kingdom.
And for you to create an atmosphere for authenticity like that.
Yep. I used, for six years, I preached in prisons every week.
(27:22):
And, you know, around a lot of folks that had a lot of trauma in their lives
and trauma in their past. And, you know, I used to minister a lot on death row situations.
Wow. And it always inevitably come out that, you know, the reason I was a bad
guy was not because I was a bad guy. The reason I was a bad guy was because I was afraid.
(27:47):
And once you come to that place of going ahead and embracing it,
I'm afraid of this world.
Worries but i don't want to react to that world to
the point that my fear drives me to do something that's not me
because that's what they always did they became something that they were not
they didn't carry it they didn't carry a a gun because they were bad and powerful
(28:12):
they carried it because they were afraid of not being bad and powerful yeah
enough to survive and the.
I know we've kind of gotten a long way from the musical aspect of it,
but, you know, the kind of environments we've got to create is what makes those
folks start longing now and reaching toward beyond what's got a hold of them.
And the only way to do that, I think, is just a bunch of folks doing something pure and authentic.
(28:37):
And we're going to, hey, you know, we're going to get together and meet with
him. We're going to walk with him. We're going to respond to him.
And, man, I love what you guys do.
Thank you. Thank you. Well, I don't think we got that far off because I think
we kind of circled back around to a place of fear and fear, which causes us
to be safe or protective,
(28:58):
whether it's in our creativity or whether it's in life that causes people to
end up, you know, putting on a facade in some ways to either be tough and then
you end up in jail or you end up creating a false, you know, creative thing.
And I think we need that courage and courage to be authentic,
courage to experiment and release new sounds, release our heart to God in such a way that is real.
(29:24):
And so would you mind just praying for people that are listening here just for,
man, for them to have the courage to be them, you know, to step out and let that and not be safe.
I'd love that. Lord, we're thankful for you and what you've done in our lives.
And, Lord, today as we've been talking and remembering that,
(29:48):
remembering so much of the beauty of what you've done in our lives just by your
grace and your mercy to us.
I ask you, Lord, that anybody that's listening to this, whatever day,
whenever they hear it, that there would be something said, spoken,
realized, and understood that will open our hearts and give us permission to
(30:13):
reach and long for the right thing.
Lord, I pray for a special grace on not just mine and Michael's words,
but I pray that you will touch ears, open ears and hearts.
Cause them to hear even the things that we didn't say.
(30:33):
Speak by your Holy Spirit into their life in such a way that they will begin to embrace race,
beyond their theological wrestlings and arguments that go on within their own mind,
Lord, we just break the fear down and ask that you'll just draw them close to
(30:55):
you and help them to learn to walk with you and to know you.
Lord, we just speak life over every listener in Jesus' name.
Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Ray. Ray, if people want to get in touch with you
and your world, I know you've got some. Stay away from me. I'm at home.
I'm at home. I'm not taking calls. Just stay away from me, people.
(31:18):
No. No. You're very welcome. We live in Alabama, and we're the third house on
the left. Y'all just come on over.
No. Just go to Alabama and go left. Go to Alabama and turn left. There we are.
You can follow your nose to the biscuit and gravy. You'll find us.
(31:41):
What's your website? RayHughes.org.
Ray's got some amazing courses and resources and materials.
It's meant so much to us being able to dive into that.
He's a well digger. And if you want to go into the well and just discover more
of the history of the church and music and worship to stir you to create,
(32:02):
I'd encourage you to go check it out. And he also makes some amazing pens birthed
out of these trees that were,
That were right around with the first, was it First Great Awakening or Second
Great Awakening? Second Great Awakening. Red River Meeting House. And Cane Ridge Revival.
In the Holy Land of Kentucky is where all that's at.
(32:22):
They're amazing. I was looking for mine today. I was going to pull it up,
but my wife keeps taking my pens. Oh, you got to watch them.
You know, she's a thief. That thief, Meredith. That little thieving songwriter.
We all know it. But yeah, I got one laying around here that I made out of.
It's made out of bog oak from the bottom of the bogs in Ireland.
(32:43):
And so that means that that pen is older than written history.
That's incredible. 5,000-year-old piece of wood.
Wow. I love what you say. What do you say about you hold a piece of history
to write the future? What do you say?
Holding history and writing the future. it's it's it's
that now that website is redriverturning.com i
(33:06):
think you can find it on on the rayhughes.org as well though if you if you go
to look yeah yeah they're great you know for inspiration for writing are great
gifts so anyway i love your stuff ray love you man thank you for taking the
time today all right buddy well well a hug meredith and all that wonderful little
tribe that chases you all around will do.
Welcome to the Song Lab podcast. I'm your host, Michael Maldon.
Today, we've got a part two with Ray Hughes, Reawakening Wonder.
If you haven't heard part one, I encourage you to go back and listen to it.
Not necessarily necessary when you listen to Ray talk because he's always full
of gems and jewels and diamonds, treasures, all those great things. He's incredible.
Our last podcast was our most listened to podcast to date, and it provided one
(00:31):
of the most provocative social media clips we've had. It's gone crazy online.
So anyway, without further ado, part two with Ray Hughes, Reawaken Wonder.
Well, I mean, I think that's a big, it's been a big thing for me that I've always
been curious about is, you know, why it's so, why the church just,
they play the same songs in all the churches.
(00:51):
There's not this like beautiful expression of all these different types of sounds and expressions.
We have, you know, the reason we call Song Lab Lab is because we want to have
a laboratory where people feel free to express themselves, you know,
and get the song out and explore and until we can remove those paradigms.
But why do you think the church is in such like in that rut, like creatively?
(01:14):
I mean, I struggle with that because I feel like we should be the most creative,
you know, and there's such like fear to express.
And maybe we're just trying to be trying to be too safe because we don't want
to offend a religious. I don't know. What is it?
Well, songwriters, songwriters, songwriting is not just about hearing a new sound and writing it.
(01:40):
It's also about hearing old silences and allowing them to speak.
And we won't allow the old silences to speak anymore and come back and bring
our lives back to a place where we're unpredictably safe rather than the predictably safe.
(02:02):
Let me read something that I wrote about this.
It's also about hearing old silences,
allowing them to speak for some of God's most honorable attributes and greatest
expressions of his grace and his love have flown to the earth only to be taken
captive by religious trends and silenced by time.
(02:24):
And why? Because we want to create safe atmospheres, and that's what we do.
And we sink everybody to the lowest common denominator creatively,
and we call that unity when it's not. It's sameness.
We don't need sameness. And fear creates those atmospheres of sameness in church
because sameness is safe.
(02:48):
It's theologically safe, culturally safe, financially safe.
So we have safe preaching, safe teaching, safe atmospheres created by safe instruments
played by safe musicians behind safe worship leaders singing safe lyrics of
safe songs written by safe songwriters.
That do not want to step out of that realm of safeness.
(03:11):
So then there are songs in heaven that have been silently waiting and still
wait for you, and there's nothing safe about them.
Write the silences. Touch them awake. Give them the wings, and let's find out how safe they are.
Give voice to what has never been heard. That's what you're talking about,
(03:33):
Michael. Why can we not give voice to what has never been heard and cast light
on what has never been seen?
You know, every time creativity happens, God reveals another facet of his nature.
And he's so multifaceted and infinite, we have not even begun to scratch the
(03:53):
surface of the wonder and beauty and infinite nature of God.
But we find our pet safe things and we hold on to them.
We, we, when we should be welcoming a beauty that has never been known outside
of the Jasper walls, why don't we bring our songs from that realm?
And every time it comes from that realm in history, huge dramatic shifts in culture and humanity.
(04:21):
And we, you know, Solomon's temple, tabernacle of David, upper room on and on
it goes. Look what happened with John on the Isle of Patmos.
That was some weird stuff, man.
He was seeing beyond the veil. It's true.
He was seeing things that we don't even want to talk about in church.
(04:43):
For real. You know, seven-headed monsters and dragons.
Yeah. Yeah.
Write the songs that scare you. I love that dynamic of not being safe.
I mean, there was a season where I felt the Lord just kept telling me,
my body needs courage because we've been so safe. And I had this funny imagery
(05:05):
of like, you know, God giving a charge to Joshua and Caleb, it's time to enter
the promised land, guys. It's time to go in. There's these giants there.
You're going to take the land, but be safe, guys. Be safe out there. You know.
It's just, it's not that. I think we need that charge of courage again to write
songs that make us feel uncomfortable. comfortable.
(05:27):
I think there's that authenticity, what you're talking about,
because being authentic and vulnerable is not safe either.
And then I think that a lot of people believe that maybe I'm not as spiritual as somebody else.
But at the end of the day, if you've come to God, you've experienced him in some kind of way.
And the reason I love to cattle prod creatives is because when they express
(05:49):
and create, I get to see an aspect of God, of his character and in his nature
that I haven't seen before, because we are like those beings with all those
eyes, just different beings, right?
And I get to see, I get to behold the beauty of God from how you've seen him.
And man, it gets me, you know, I get to see God again, you know?
So that's why I, I'm so passionate.
One of the reasons I'm so passionate about getting creatives to create.
(06:12):
Yeah. So, so I can see, I can see him. Our lyrics should add what we've found
to have meaning to what many would become, be consider a meaningless life.
And songs and poems and music is not supposed to sound written.
It's supposed to sound like something that fell out of your heart and mind and
(06:34):
made your life make sense.
And there's a lot of songs and creative processes we want to welcome and applaud at all. Yes, we do.
But there's a lot of it that's supposed to make our life make sense as well.
And I think that's part of what we're missing. And that'll come from just pure,
real, authentic game changers.
(06:57):
You know, what is the, you know, lawgivers and lawmakers are not those who shape culture.
They react to culture and create boundaries and limitations and rails for everybody to run on.
But lawmakers don't shape culture. Songwriters do. Artists do. Poets do.
And on and on it goes. Yeah.
(07:19):
And, you know, we could learn an important lesson from that as well.
We need to, they need to find their rightful place within the body of Christ.
And everybody, let's go together and press the boundaries and beyond the limitations
into something that could really be profoundly powerful.
And I also, I think, can you imagine if we had a bunch of folks that carried
(07:44):
a reality of their song, welcoming a harvest and accelerating the fruit and
accelerating the harvest that's sure to come?
You know, touch heaven, heaven awakes, earth, you know, when heaven kisses earth
and we get caught in a smack, you know? Yeah.
(08:06):
Well, how does one do that? I think we, like some of the things we're talking about right now.
Oh, here's a good way to see it or think of it. Let me get this.
I just don't want to leave one of them out, so let me put that in.
(08:29):
David is our greatest example, of course. And his happened over,
first of all, what's the number one characteristic of David's life?
Think about this. David did not build on the shoulders of Saul.
He built on the shoulders of Samuel.
And the difference between David and Saul was when Saul sinned, it hardened his heart.
(08:54):
When David sinned, it broke his heart. and because david carried one reality
it's set in motion so the answer to how did he do it or how can we do it is
we live a life of longing and law and longing is what.
Longing many times sounds like sadness melancholy whatever but longing is nothing
(09:17):
more than reaching toward any situation david found himself in what did he do
he reached toward god Even when he had failed, he reached toward God.
Everything that happened reached toward God. And that longing that had been
in him since a child, longing then became lyrics.
And then lyrics became language. Think about it.
(09:40):
This guy would write a song and it would become the language of the nation.
There are people doing that now.
Even more so. So, well, you know, the shallow surface chatter of the things
that we long for and what we create novelty around and the language that we give people.
Permission in our lives is ridiculous. It's outrageous. Yeah.
(10:04):
But longing become lyrics. Lyrics become language. Language became the liturgy.
And liturgy married literature.
We have the Word of God, the literature today. And literature carries legacy.
Legacy sets the stage for multigenerational longings. So when they long, the lyrics come.
And so on. So here's the question.
(10:27):
How do when's the best time to to influence a child about 100 years before he's born.
You set lyrics and longings and language and liturgy and the beauty see we're
trying to we're trying to put a dysfunctional hollywood language in the house
(10:48):
of god and in our culture and we're We're all trying to learn that.
When we come from a story-rich culture full of truth that has sustained and
maintained generations of truth seekers, those longing after God, and what do we do?
We change the language in our generation, and we've changed it to the point
that we've corrupted it to the point that who even knows what's going on in this world.
(11:14):
So true. So to me, songwriting is not about writing next year's most popular course.
It's about writing the next generation's language for accessing God.
And how do we change it? One yes at a time.
We live our lives as inspirations.
(11:34):
As you speak to the sounds and the lyrics and the melodies that become liturgy
and the literature, have you read the book, How the Irish Saved Civilization?
Yeah. Years and years ago. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It's, it's such a fascinating read
to me because it's, it's one, it's a great piece of literature.
It's got poetry in it. The book itself is great, but the story of how the Irish,
(11:57):
you know, took these old, you know, pieces of literature, the Iliad, the Odyssey,
the Bible, and they would transcribe them while the rest of the world was kind
of going to hell in a handbasket through wars and all these literature and the schools were lost.
It was the Irish who then were like the stewards of these stories.
And then they went back out and evangelized the world with the Bible and then
(12:21):
these old great works of literature.
And me going to Ireland, when I go there, they're the best storytellers on the planet.
I mean, just hanging out with them. And I know you've had a rich history connecting
with Ireland. Ireland, what do you see from that perspective of the literature,
the storytelling, the Irish maybe?
(12:42):
Well, they were given permission. First of all, they were pre-Christianity. They were...
You know, really, really given to the mystical and given to the mythologies.
And they got, you know, they got hundreds of deities and regional deities and
all their pantheism and all that.
(13:04):
Well, once Christianity came in, what really came in was biblical permission to be who you are.
But now, from a site where there's redemption, be redeemed unto who you're really created to be.
And David gave them permission for all of it.
And that's one of the reasons, even to this day, you know, there's an old Irish
(13:26):
saying that says, in Ireland, under every stone is a poet.
The generations that are buried there, they did. They carried storytelling.
They carry that I, the ability to, the turn of phrase, and they look for the rhythms.
They wait for the imagery that marries the rhythms of what they try to communicate and so on.
(13:52):
And, yeah, they have the ability to interpret everything that they see.
I'll just, here's something. It means nothing. This is the way I live my life.
The old man stood and he looked out at the sea, as if the sea could tell him what life was all about.
(14:15):
Was he seeing where he was going or where he had been?
His gaze became slower and slower as wave after wave the past found him.
The longer he stood, the more his eyes danced, as the mist fell like a promise on his face.
Life is about coming and going till you're gone.
(14:37):
Now, if you sit down with an old shunnakee in Ireland, he would have a thousand of those.
Living in his mind, living in the brightness of his life.
He could reach back and grab turns of phrase and imagery, and he would tell
the stories in such a way that you would experience the story.
And that is what David gave permission for. And so when Patrick and all the
(15:03):
others came in there and began to create those little monastic cultures,
it was really giving the Irish people their DNA,
an opportunity to sing their truest song.
And they had already had a hierarchical system in place in their culture that honored the poets.
They were even, publicly, they would even be dressed different than the rest.
(15:27):
And they would carry themselves.
And then, of course, down through the brutality of foreigners coming in,
insisting Catholicism, which had been much later.
Patrick wasn't Catholic, nor was he Irish. He became Catholic about 500 years after he was dead.
(15:48):
But if you want to look at that Irish DNA and that storytelling DNA,
it's also in Wales. It's also in Scotland.
It's in that Celtic circle, which is Scotland, Ireland, Wales, Isle of Man, Cornwall.
And I think I probably left one out.
But anyway, but on a day-to-day basis, all the little spins and quirky little
(16:16):
things and all those old sayings that they have that came across into our Appalachian Mountains.
The foundation of it all, you'll find, is words should move the reader.
Or words should move the listener. They've got to move the writer first.
And joy, laughter, beauty, pain, loss. The writer is the one who struggles with words.
(16:41):
The reader should feel the beauty of the struggle.
You ever hear people, I just, you know, I'm just right, just flow of consciousness still.
And I'm a writer. No, no, writers struggle with words.
The reader should feel the beauty of that struggle. And then that Irish DNA,
(17:01):
somehow they have the ability to struggle on the move, if you will.
Yeah. Yes, because they're doing what David did. They're saying what they're seeing.
And it takes us all the way back to the beginning of our day today,
Michael. they give their imagination permission and freedom,
(17:24):
just like Jesus did when he would tell the stories in the parables.
And what would he do? He would reveal the heart of the Father,
and the Father would awaken those that would hear his words,
because facts inform, but truth transforms.
Hey, if you found value in this podcast, and it's at least as valuable as a
(17:45):
cup of coffee, please go ahead, donate a few bucks.
The Venmo link's below. If it's as valuable as a movie or even going to Disney,
you're welcome to add on top of that because everything we do is listener supported.
So anyway, we thank you for your support. Enjoy the rest of the podcast.
Doesn't even have to be a fact. I've read you a thing about an old man standing
looking at the sea, you know?
(18:07):
That carries a lot of truth. It does.
Beauty. I think that we need to be reminded of the beauty of struggle.
And even in the creative process, some of the most profound moments of things
that I've created have been birthed out of the struggle and the frustration,
(18:27):
feeling like I can't quite articulate what I want to articulate.
And I'm frustrated and I want to give up. I walk away. way.
And then, and then in that struggle, it's like all of a sudden,
you know, something comes forth.
And I wonder if it's like, I wonder if that struggle is, is sometimes representative
of like that transition moment when women, when a woman's given birth to a baby,
you know, she starts to freak out a little bit and it's like, this isn't coming.
(18:51):
But I think that so many are, there's a generation that kind of runs from the
struggle that wants that comfort.
And, and I think that there's, there's a need to embrace the struggle and that
conflict to birth something beautiful.
Yeah. And, you know, it's kind of tricky. I think you're absolutely right.
But many times what we'll do, embracing the struggle, we'll wind up glorifying the struggle.
(19:13):
Yeah. But what you're saying is absolutely true, man. The struggle is real,
but they're also the release is real.
Yeah. And to carry the struggle is an important part of it.
And as soon as we start living in denial of the struggle, we become inauthentic
in our Christianity Christianity, and we just happy, hallelujah,
glory to Jesus, and joy, joy, joy down in my heart, and all this stuff.
(19:35):
And I know that needs to be sung by faith as well. I get that. Yeah, for sure.
But also, you know, there was a friend of mine who was a great songwriter. He's in heaven now.
But he probably had, I don't know, he had 1,400 people. I think it's 1,400 covers of his songs.
Everybody from Sinatra to Willie Nelson to everybody.
(19:57):
And, you know, the list is ridiculous. Incredible songwriter.
And he could write the saddest songs you've ever heard in your life.
He brought poetry, beauty, and depth back to, you know. I think he had the number
of top five records in all five genres at one time in the same week. Incredible writer.
(20:23):
But also he brought a depth back to it and took the trivial motel rendezvous
craziness out of drunkenness and all that out of the music to a degree and introduced
depth and beauty back to it and poetry.
And he could sing the saddest songs you've ever heard in your life.
I asked him, I said, I said, I said, what's the deal, man?
(20:44):
You write, you're the happiest guy I know.
And I said, but, you know, and, you know, he would sing a lyric and the beauty
of the melodies were so spellbinding.
They would hold you captive while you experienced the depth and the emotion
(21:04):
of every word of image he would put in a song. It was incredible.
And I asked him, I said, you know, but you're the happiest guy in the world.
And he says, well, I write my sadness so I don't have to live it. Wow.
Sounds like a simple thing. Yeah. But what he did is he knew how,
(21:26):
he called it robbing from the dragon.
And he said, when I go into those dark places, I just, you know,
it's like, here's the same principle.
He said, somebody asked him, he said, what do you do creatively in your songwriting?
What do you do when the well goes dry?
He said, I write a song about the well going dry.
(21:50):
Yeah. I'm a writer, so I write.
And he writes the struggles, all of the pain, all of it. All of it makes a dragon.
Yeah. You know what's interesting? I was talking to a guy yesterday here in Atlanta.
He's a prayer guy. He's a rapper. He said the number one music genre in the
(22:10):
world right now is trap music, which was birthed out of Atlanta.
And it's kind of these hip hop beats, but he says all they sing about is trauma.
And so that's like, they're just stuck in the pain and it's like recycling the pain.
And so I know there's an element, David, you know, pouring his heart out and
getting that junk out, which is, I think one of the keys to keeping his heart open, right?
(22:33):
He was like authentically expressing, getting the junk out, but then he would
always turn it back, you know, unto the Lord, you know?
But we, I was contemplating that yesterday, you know, the generation that's
just singing so much about their trauma or the lust for not the longing, but there's a lusting.
Yeah and how do we how do we help heal
the trauma of a generation so that they can sing towards longing and love versus
(22:57):
lust and you know the other things wow we got a job cut out for us don't we
we do got to keep keep writing and creating yeah and you know history,
music history and reaching back into the david's way david's approach history
you know history is It's just dry bones of something that once lived until the
(23:20):
wind of the Spirit blows on it again.
And I think there's a fresh wind coming right now that's going to awaken those
things, the power of music,
the power of worship, the power of praise, the power of language, the power of the lyric.
(23:42):
It's going to become far more than just responding and repeating it's going to be,
resounding and renewing what the
word of god says about music i think that's why it's really important that if
you know if we we as the church if if we if we could change the way we understand
(24:03):
worship creativity and music we will change the way the world encounters god
yeah and see those Those that are taking a language of trauma,
you know what they're doing? They're longing out loud.
Those are cries. And unfortunately, it's a rallying cry that's causing all of
(24:25):
those that have been traumatized to come together around trauma.
But it could very well be a good setup. Good setup, yeah. Because wait till those voices find life.
Life. Wait till they bring rhythm and cadence and power in those expressions
that they have that are so powerful and musical that have been corrupted by their own trauma.
(24:45):
And for us to get on some kind of arrogant, you know, high horse,
we've all got that stuff in us, man.
We've got choices to make just like they do. And we have trauma just like they do.
But hopefully we'll be making the the right choices and singing the songs that will reveal him.
(25:07):
You know what I realized? I realized recently I stumbled across some old rap
music that I listened to back in the 90s.
And it was this, you know, this kind of gangster rap, real aggressive kind of stuff.
And when I was listening to it, I heard a sound of courage in it.
And I realized, man, I was a scared kid, latchkey kid, single mom around.
(25:31):
And so much of these guys are that. They don't have fathers around.
And they're trying to find a sound that's going to give them courage and strength
in a world that's really scary where there's gangs and violence.
And so much of that is just that what you're saying, there's a longing for that
to find strength in the sound.
The power of music to be able to do that. It's incredible what music is.
(25:55):
It still blows my mind. Yeah, yeah. Yeah.
You know, once they get the language of life in them, though,
then their words and their music and their sound, that can be true legacy.
Totally. That they leave instead of regurgitating the loss to the next generation.
(26:16):
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, I know. I think one of my cries of my heart to set up a place
of worship and prayer for people to connect to,
I felt like the Lord was calling me to gather the artists and the creatives
so that they could create then from a place of His presence instead of just from their pain.
(26:37):
And I know the pain can lead us into the place of beauty and His presence too,
but when we get stuck in that, I think it's where our society and culture can get stuck.
And I think there's a real call right now to find healing in our own journey
by connecting to him and articulating that in such a way that others can be
led into their own freedom in their journey. Yeah.
(26:58):
You know, and religious spirit calls us to.
Lord, our beliefs over them, rather than reveal the love of the one who loved us into the kingdom.
And for you to create an atmosphere for authenticity like that.
Yep. I used, for six years, I preached in prisons every week.
(27:22):
And, you know, around a lot of folks that had a lot of trauma in their lives
and trauma in their past. And, you know, I used to minister a lot on death row situations.
Wow. And it always inevitably come out that, you know, the reason I was a bad
guy was not because I was a bad guy. The reason I was a bad guy was because I was afraid.
(27:47):
And once you come to that place of going ahead and embracing it,
I'm afraid of this world.
Worries but i don't want to react to that world to
the point that my fear drives me to do something that's not me
because that's what they always did they became something that they were not
they didn't carry it they didn't carry a a gun because they were bad and powerful
(28:12):
they carried it because they were afraid of not being bad and powerful yeah
enough to survive and the.
I know we've kind of gotten a long way from the musical aspect of it,
but, you know, the kind of environments we've got to create is what makes those
folks start longing now and reaching toward beyond what's got a hold of them.
And the only way to do that, I think, is just a bunch of folks doing something pure and authentic.
(28:37):
And we're going to, hey, you know, we're going to get together and meet with
him. We're going to walk with him. We're going to respond to him.
And, man, I love what you guys do.
Thank you. Thank you. Well, I don't think we got that far off because I think
we kind of circled back around to a place of fear and fear, which causes us
to be safe or protective,
(28:58):
whether it's in our creativity or whether it's in life that causes people to
end up, you know, putting on a facade in some ways to either be tough and then
you end up in jail or you end up creating a false, you know, creative thing.
And I think we need that courage and courage to be authentic,
courage to experiment and release new sounds, release our heart to God in such a way that is real.
(29:24):
And so would you mind just praying for people that are listening here just for,
man, for them to have the courage to be them, you know, to step out and let that and not be safe.
I'd love that. Lord, we're thankful for you and what you've done in our lives.
And, Lord, today as we've been talking and remembering that,
(29:48):
remembering so much of the beauty of what you've done in our lives just by your
grace and your mercy to us.
I ask you, Lord, that anybody that's listening to this, whatever day,
whenever they hear it, that there would be something said, spoken,
realized, and understood that will open our hearts and give us permission to
(30:13):
reach and long for the right thing.
Lord, I pray for a special grace on not just mine and Michael's words,
but I pray that you will touch ears, open ears and hearts.
Cause them to hear even the things that we didn't say.
(30:33):
Speak by your Holy Spirit into their life in such a way that they will begin to embrace race,
beyond their theological wrestlings and arguments that go on within their own mind,
Lord, we just break the fear down and ask that you'll just draw them close to
(30:55):
you and help them to learn to walk with you and to know you.
Lord, we just speak life over every listener in Jesus' name.
Amen. Amen. Amen. Thank you, Ray. Ray, if people want to get in touch with you
and your world, I know you've got some. Stay away from me. I'm at home.
I'm at home. I'm not taking calls. Just stay away from me, people.
(31:18):
No. No. You're very welcome. We live in Alabama, and we're the third house on
the left. Y'all just come on over.
No. Just go to Alabama and go left. Go to Alabama and turn left. There we are.
You can follow your nose to the biscuit and gravy. You'll find us.
(31:41):
What's your website? RayHughes.org.
Ray's got some amazing courses and resources and materials.
It's meant so much to us being able to dive into that.
He's a well digger. And if you want to go into the well and just discover more
of the history of the church and music and worship to stir you to create,
(32:02):
I'd encourage you to go check it out. And he also makes some amazing pens birthed
out of these trees that were,
That were right around with the first, was it First Great Awakening or Second
Great Awakening? Second Great Awakening. Red River Meeting House. And Cane Ridge Revival.
In the Holy Land of Kentucky is where all that's at.
(32:22):
They're amazing. I was looking for mine today. I was going to pull it up,
but my wife keeps taking my pens. Oh, you got to watch them.
You know, she's a thief. That thief, Meredith. That little thieving songwriter.
We all know it. But yeah, I got one laying around here that I made out of.
It's made out of bog oak from the bottom of the bogs in Ireland.
(32:43):
And so that means that that pen is older than written history.
That's incredible. 5,000-year-old piece of wood.
Wow. I love what you say. What do you say about you hold a piece of history
to write the future? What do you say?
Holding history and writing the future. it's it's it's
that now that website is redriverturning.com i
(33:06):
think you can find it on on the rayhughes.org as well though if you if you go
to look yeah yeah they're great you know for inspiration for writing are great
gifts so anyway i love your stuff ray love you man thank you for taking the
time today all right buddy well well a hug meredith and all that wonderful little
tribe that chases you all around will do.
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I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Crime Junkie
Does hearing about a true crime case always leave you scouring the internet for the truth behind the story? Dive into your next mystery with Crime Junkie. Every Monday, join your host Ashley Flowers as she unravels all the details of infamous and underreported true crime cases with her best friend Brit Prawat. From cold cases to missing persons and heroes in our community who seek justice, Crime Junkie is your destination for theories and stories you won’t hear anywhere else. Whether you're a seasoned true crime enthusiast or new to the genre, you'll find yourself on the edge of your seat awaiting a new episode every Monday. If you can never get enough true crime... Congratulations, you’ve found your people. Follow to join a community of Crime Junkies! Crime Junkie is presented by audiochuck Media Company.
Ridiculous History
History is beautiful, brutal and, often, ridiculous. Join Ben Bowlin and Noel Brown as they dive into some of the weirdest stories from across the span of human civilization in Ridiculous History, a podcast by iHeartRadio.