Note: Can I Say This at Church is produced for audio listening. If able, I strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which has inflection, emotion, sarcasm where applicable, and emphasis for points that may not come across well in written word. This transcript is generated using a combination of my ears and software, and may contain errors. Please check the episode for clarity before quoting in print.
JMM 0:00
But I am saying I give myself a little more room and if I'm going to trust God, like I can trust I can trust Jesus to help me through bad theology, you know, but I have to allow myself room for bad theology. Because if you don't consider I guess there's maybe not enough time in life to consider everything but I think you've got to consider multiple options in order to have some sort of real faith. If you just pick the first one and say, “Okay, this is it.” You might be right. You know, but I gotta believe that it's a conversation that Jesus is guiding me through this whole conversation.
Seth Price 1:27
Happy, almost 2019, we are in the throes…I guess we're in the death throes of the end of 2018, and I really hope that your Thanksgiving was good and that your holiday season leading up to Christmas as well is going well. And for those of you not in the States, I really hope that that one random Thursday that we all celebrate over here and eat copious amounts of food was just as good for you, as it was for so many of us.
So, welcome to the Can I Say This At Church podcast. I'm Seth and I'm still your host and I'm blown away by the continued support on Patreon, every week, it seems like someone new joins the community and I am humbled by that by you supporting the show, you literally make this happen and you make it possible for it to happen and in 2019, I really think if we can continue at the pace we're going that we're going to meet each other face to face that we can have some live episodes that we can do just some different things, some neat things. And all of that is being planned. And so thank you to each and every single one of you. And please hear me when I say I appreciate you.
So I have to think that you looked at the episode of the show before you download it. And so John Mark McMillan is someone that if I'm honest, earlier on in my Christianity, and earlier on in my “I like to listen to songs on the radio” never really spoke to me and then as I as I deconstructed my faith and as I deconstructed what God and church and religion is kept being drawn to his music, and others like him, because they were dealing with issues that mattered. They weren't just la di dah-pie in the sky music-it was music with intention is the best way to say it.
And so I am very pleased, and very happy, to introduce to some of you maybe for the first time John Mark McMillan and to many of you kind of the voice behind the songs that we love and behind the songs that I know sit in the hearts of many of us. And so here we are a conversation with John Mark McMillan about music, about language and metaphor, about God, and about why honest conversations through music and honest syncopations through music are really one of the things that can help us tremendously daily, if we'll allow it. And so here we go. John Mark McMillan.
Seth Price
John Mark McMillan, I'm so happy that you're on the show man. Normally when I put things out into Twitter, nothing happens and so when you when you messaged me back I was, I was excited and ecstatic and so thanks for coming on to the Can I Say This At Church podcast.
JMM 5:03
Yeah, man, I'm stoked to be here. Thank you for having me.
Seth Price 5:07
So for those unfamiliar with you, and I do this based on feedback, I thought at one time when I interviewed Walter Brueggemann, that everyone was familiar with him. And then I was I was wrong based on feedback as I bypassed it. And so I'm realizing that many of the people that I talk to the first experience that people have with them, and so their voice is is today.
So tell me a bit about yourself kind of your upbringing kind of what brought you from, you know, five year old John Mark McMillan to however old you are now?
JMM 5:41
38
Seth Price 5:42
Yeah, there we go. Yeah. So kinda so kind of that that story in brief.
JMM 5:45
Yeah. Wow. Okay. Yeah.
Well, let's see, at five years old. I lived with my parents on what seemed like a commune, but it wasn't a commune, they were jobs and things like that, but they live I've done a farm in a Christian community with a bunch of other believers. And probably about around when I was around seven years old, they left the community. I think there was some I don't know, the details, I think there was some sort of, you know, blow up or implosion or something, they sold the land and we moved into just a regular neighborhood. Um, but those are my earliest memories of music and church.
You know, we're sort of a kind of charismatic, hippie Jesus movement type. You know, it was, I remember being pretty exciting. You know, five, you mentioned five. But yeah, so my dad went into business for a while, went into sales for a little while, but he always felt called to some sort of ministry. So he started a church. I can't remember exactly how old I was. But he left his job and started a church and so that sort of became our life, you know, was church and he's pastoring a small church and trying to take care of his family.
And so we had guys playing on the worship team, they're probably all in their 40s. They loved sort of the classic rock, you know, the old school type of stuff, and they would teach me in my teen years, we'd sit out on-my dad's church was in a strip mall-and so we would sit out on the loading dock, sometimes they would teach me classic rock songs on the guitar. And that's some of my earliest memories, playing music. Probably I was probably 14 or 15 years old, when a good friend of mine stopped by the house. I remember his mom dropped him off and he had this tiny little guitar amp and a red Fender Squier Stratocaster, and I was like, what's this magic what's going on here, you know, and he came In the house, he went up to my room and he played all the songs from the radio, Pearl Jam, Nirvana, REM Counting Crows, kind of stuff that, you know, we were listened to as teenagers on the radio and I was captivated by his playing, it was, it seems like an illusion, you know, he was playing. He's my age. He's my friend and music was coming out of his fingers, you know, real music too.
You know, it was not just strumming chords it was like stuff from the radio that I liked. You know, and I thought, whoa, I want to be a part of this, this music stuff here that this guy is creating, like, maybe I could do that. I wasn't good at sports. I was really into drawing comic books. And I learned that that was not impressive to the ladies.
(laughter) And so I thought my ticket might be this music stuff, you know? So I dug up my dad's old guitar, his old Samak guitar and his little amp, and I bought magazines at the drugstore and learned how to play songs from the back of magazines at the drugstore. And that's really where I started playing. I was in bands for a while I played in church some and they (my parents) were happy for me to play in church. I think that they thought that you know, would keep me connected. You know, I had long hair, you know, it's classic 90s shaved underneath, long, Nine Inch Nail t shirt every day
Seth Price 9:32
Shaved underneath so you mean like, like Zack Morris kind of thing happening or something different than that.
JMM 9:36
Not with shaved…sort of like you'd shave the bottom part and then the hair would hang over it. It was like if you put it up in a bun It was kind of Mohawk five to kind of do it again now but not quite the way we did it, you know?
Seth Price 9:47
Yeah, we're similar in age and first off you can see that's never gonna happen again. And for me anyway with the lack of hair that I have, but I don't miss that. That stage of life that in What is the MFG Gibaud when you combine the two. I'm not not a fan of any of that. So, yeah. So you said that they tried to keep you engaged with church that way so that that didn't work for you?
JMM 10:15
Well, no, I don't know, um, I think they were just happy that I was engaged in church because for the longest time, my dad being the pastor, of course, you feel like, I'm definitely not going to get excited about church, my dad's the pastor so I’m not going to express any interest here. You know, when I would sit on the back with my friends, and I think they worried about me, I looked like someone who was into drugs, but I never was. A lot of my friends were, it just didn't interest me.
They didn't like my musical choices, you know, and it's the 90s were very, very dark. I think sometimes we forget how dark the 90s were, I do anyway. When I go back and I listen to a lot of the music from the 90s and a lot of the dialogue from the 90s if you go back and watch that documentary About a Son it was Kurt Cobain talking about his life. In his own words, you're like, Whoa, it was a very dark time, I mean, there are terrible things happening now. You know, you think about shootings and that kind of stuff just awful. I mean, a lot of a lot of terrible things happening now. But in the 90s, it was very popular to hate yourself. And to hate other people. I don't I don't feel like self hate is a trend.
You know, I mean, you run into people who probably hate themselves, but like self hate, suicide, you know, like it was trendy, at least in my circles to not love life and to hate yourself and other people and to be depressed was not just something that people sort of dealt with it was popular, you know? Yeah, it is weird. And I think it sounds super weird now and you're trying to explain it to younger millennials. Like, it was cool to be depressed, you know?
Seth Price 11:56
I relate to that. I agree. Yeah, I agree. We're about 18 months in age difference. So, yeah, like I am, I recently found my old CD collection, I was going through a box in the basement because I decided nothing in here I need, so I should just throw it all out. But then there was just a treasure trove of Toad the Wet Sprocket, Smashing Pumpkins, which I played again and really enjoyed that old stuff. But one album, I found specifically was Stabbing Westward. And as I listened to the entire album, I don't know if you ever listened to that or not, I was like, Man, this is, well, it places me back emotionally to where I was at, like 16-17 year old at the time, and it's heartbreaking.
And I had to turn it off. Like I'm not ready to deal with all these again, whatever emotions were there, they've been repressed. And I don't feel like dealing with them again. So I'm just going to hit stop and turn back on KLOVE or whatever. So how do you get from barely engaged in church to writing the type of music that you do now?
So, I mean, the music that you right now is, is I would, I would say for me overtly spiritual. I'm not sure if Christian even is the right term for it. I don't like the word Christian music, but it is overtly spiritual and religious. For me at least. So how do you how do you navigate from A to B?
JMM 13:12
Yeah, so gosh, that's a really good question. I don't know that it's that simple. I think there was a moment, I really struggled in my faith throughout my teen years, you know, and there was a moment when I just decided that I was gonna try to believe in God as a teenager, where I wasn't sure what I believed and, you know, I was like, You know what, I'm just gonna try this whole faith thing. I mean, that sounds weird, you know. But what's really interesting, without, with, you know, trying really hard not to sound like a cliche. My entire life changed, you know, not immediately but over the course. I was happy, you know, life wasn't easy, you know, but there was something to the faith thing. You know, all of a sudden, things started to make sense in ways they hadn't before. And this is as a teenager, and there were some very smart teenagers, but I didn't have a lot of language as teenager for this kind of thing. So I got involved more in worship music.
And I think that there was something really interesting happening in the 90s and worship music as well, you know, I'm sure you remember, there's just something really unique happening in worship music, and I really found like, kind of a…gosh, I don't know, I thought, you know, maybe I can take this worship music and I can create art within this format. Because I didn't listen to a lot of Christian music growing up. I didn't listen to a ton of worship music growing up, but I got connected in worship music almost sort of as a side thing. It's not not that I didn't like it necessarily. But I think I was at church I played and then I didn't know what I wanted to do for college. So I went to a ministry school and whilst in the ministry school you had to write your own songs.
Seth Price 15:02
Everybody did or just if you were studying music?
JMM 15:05
Yeah, you pretty much had to write your own songs if you want to be on the worship team. And so I wrote some of my own songs. I mean, I guess it was more.
I guess there was a genuine passion there, as well. And it's not like I don't have a passion for worship. I just think it's my what I consider to be worship has broadened so much since then, you know, I think more than anything, I wrote some worship songs and people really responded to the songs and I thought, well, maybe I have something to say here. My couple years in ministry school, I really enjoyed learning about Scripture, and I'd say theology, but I don't even know that it dug that deep into theology, necessarily, as I just read the Bible and tried to understand how it really, you know, what kind of life is supposed to live? I don't know, man. I think too. There was. At one point, I felt like maybe there was a calling like, I want to do something important. And I mean, honestly I thought man, people probably need my music is such an arrogant, pious thing to think but you know, people really need my music. There are people who might die if they don't hear my music.
I mean, I was in that whole world for a little bit, you know, and I think now I feel differently about that. I feel like, probably, God's gonna do what he's gonna do and I think he'll let me be a part of it because he likes me. I don't think he needs me at all. But I don't know. I've also learned and this is sort of a side conversation, but I've also learned people a lot of times the people who are the most successful at things like really, really over believe in what they're doing. They're way too into what they're doing oftentimes, and that doesn't mean that's wrong, but sometimes to be super successful, you almost have to be more into what you're doing then maybe make sense. You know what I mean?
Seth Price 16:54
Then is healthy…
JMM 16:56
Than is healthy. Yeah and I’ve found that all sorts of areas No. But so that might have been a part of it. When you really believe that what you're doing is really important. You put a high value on it. And I think I probably did that. Put a high value on it maybe too high a value on it.
But Gosh, that's really interesting what I having a hard time articulating what it was that sort of like bridge the gap there. But I think I saw something in worship music of the 90s, something that was happening there that I thought I could be a part of, I could find a place here with this. And then very quickly, it changed and I ended up signing a record deal. And I was outside of my little stream of what worship was and I was like, I don't know that I like everything that's happening on the outside.
Seth Price 17:42
What do you mean outside?
JMM 17:45
Well, outside meaning like in my own little stream, there was some exciting things happening. I think creativity was highly valued. And you could do weird things and there wasn't a lot of judgment there. You know, at my ministry, school and at the church I was a part of during those years, you were encouraged to try. You know, if you wrote something that was weird, they'd be “Hey, I don't know how I feel about that. Maybe let's not do that”, but they wanted you to try. You know, I mean, we had sometimes the worship leader played a sitar, you know, sometimes we had a Marshall Stack. I mean, we had percussion, strings, all sorts of crazy, you know, things that you would not think of and worship today, and constantly trying new things. And it was exciting. You know, it felt like something important was happening. It was mysterious.
You know, maybe that's a big part of that is trying to sort out the mystery of why did I feel this way when I heard this type of music, like why will all of a sudden, you know, and I would say that it was God, the Spirit of God, the Holy Spirit, and I think it was, but I think there's more to it than that. You know, But I was sort of mystified by the way the music made me feel in context with sort of this spiritual conversation. And so I think even now, I think a lot about why music makes people feel a certain way. I mean, music is like a billion dollar industry, I want to say, you know, and it's mostly sounds, it's mostly just bits of primitive information.
Seth Price 19:29
Well, but it does, there's something I've read or heard this or I'm plagiarizing it from somewhere. And so whoever said it, I'm sorry, but something about like, when we hear a music or when we sing music, like something deep inside of us get syncopated with one another, like we become “a whole” as opposed to just individual parts of humanity. And that's, it's a very bad metaphor. I'm not. I'm not saying that well, but I think there's something so I sometimes when I try to lead worship at my church, and every once in a while something happens where I'm no longer singing. I'm just participating in something and something bigger than a song or an emotion. And that's still those words still fall very short of it. But there is something wholly innate almost in in music and I don't even know that it's the words it's something in between the melody; for me anyway.
JMM 20:27
Totally.
Seth Price 21:01
So what I can remember so I was at Liberty after high school and a lot of that 90s you know, praise and worship we got to get the Jars of Clay we'll get all the Third Day, definitely DC Talk, you have to do that at Liberty, which I can't literally listen to hardly any of that anymore. But I can remember someone later on down my dorm listening to some of your music at the time. And I'll be honest John, it didn't sit well with me something about it just didn't connect with me until about two or three years ago, honestly. So I was struggling with my faith and a lot of doubt and grief. And I guess a fracturing of my ego, of what I thought was important and not really knowing how to put it back together. And Spotify recommended your songs to me and so I said let's go for this thing.
And ever since then I've just gone down a rabbit hole. And so your music speaks to me in a way now that prior, it really didn't. And I don't know if that's that I'm at a different place than I was now or it doesn't really matter. But my question is, so when you write a song, what are you intending for people to get out of it or is it more for you to get something out of it?
JMM 22:17
I think it's both. And I actually think the more I think about music and why music is so important to people, is that music sort of this sounds weird, but music, like making music is sort of the practice of not being alone in the world. You know, like, I think if you're listening to music, I think even subconsciously, you're listening for other people, and you hear a song and it makes you feel a certain way and you imagine other people feel the way you're feeling right then. As a writer is the same thing. Like I feel something. I'm gonna put it out into the world and like, I don't know who it's gonna be; maybe it's just me later in life, you know? But I'm hoping that someone is going to hear it and they're going to feel the way I feel right now, you know, at least that's the way I I feel like I approach it is.
I don't want to say that it's not for other people. I think anything all music is made to be heard if it's not heard then what's the point? Music is made to be heard art's made to be seen, maybe seen by a few maybe seen by many or maybe just seen by you again later or maybe just seen by God, you know. But it's like, music is made to be heard.
So for me, it's like I think early on, I didn't understand myself. You know, I'm a little bit of a mystery to me. I would have certain feelings I didn't understand how to work through so I would write songs and not even that they would tell me what was going on but something about it feeling okay, I worked something out. Now I'm satisfied. I can go to bed.
Looking back is really interesting because I see those songs like whoa, if you asked me what that song was about back then I say I couldn't tell you probably but now I can tell you everything that this song is about because it's almost like an imprint of who I was or what I was going through at the time, you know, but I'm so close to it back then I can't see it. You know?
So for me, music was like therapy, songwriting was like therapy, in a lot of ways. I went through some hard breakups, and, you know, I had a close friend that I lost and during those seasons I would stay up late at night and sing and play and sometimes worship and sometimes just write songs, you know, and so for me, that's how it started always started with like, putting my finger on a feeling saying, okay, what's going on here? You know, so really, when I'm writing, that's initially what I'm looking for is a feeling. What is something that sort of pushes a button emotionally for me, you know, it could be a word or a phrase or something and normally I'm like, okay, there's something there. Why is this getting to me?
You know, why is this making me feel the way I'm feeling you know, and start to unravel that thing. And I think the hope is that you put it out there and it means something to somebody else and they sort hear you and feel you. And I think that's, you know what happens to me. I know even scientifically when you are in a crowd of people and you're singing with other people, you know, there's dopamine and oxytocin released in your brain, and you are actually chemically more open to other people. When you're in a musical situation, you know, when you go to a concert, you know, if you go to a really good concert, there's people who are strangers to you, like I remember like hugging people, not even like a worship concert-like a secular concert-maybe they were drunk, you know, but you know, you just, you just somehow you just feel so connected to these people. And it actually happens in your brain chemically. And why did God make it that way? You know, there's just something that happens in music that helps us to see one another.
Seth Price 25:48
And if you don't think that's true, then just turn on the Boston Red Sox play the Sweet Caroline song and the entire Stadium's doing whatever, nobody knows anybody, but they're all touching Yeah, me touching.
So I'm curious. So I think a lot of people, when they go to church don't really know how to worship. And I’ve told my pastor this before, and I'm sure he'll listen eventually. But I often get more out of an interaction with God when I'm leading worship than anything that he says. Although lately, he's been talking about Hebrews, and I'm really enjoying it. But I know though for many people, the only worship music they engage in is whatever's on the radio. And when I hear music like yours, or like The Billiance, or, you know, other musicians that are talking about…Remedy Drive, Propaganda, regardless of genre are really talking about things that seem to speak to the heart of the message of the Bible and the overarching gospel. You don't hear that on the radio. So I'm curious your thoughts on why the worship music quote unquote, that have on the radio is entirely different from what I would think worship music should be?
JMM 27:07
Yeah, well, I think there's a number of things involved. I mean, just the more like, brass tax a little more of a crass answer would be that they've realized the people who spend the most money on faith based music, you know, the people go to Walmart, Target and pick up the records, the people spend the most money on it are a certain age and demographic, it's generally middle aged females-conservative. You know, they actually it's really, you know, I hate to reveal all this stuff, if you haven't heard it before. But in the Christian industry, they actually have a name.
You know, they have if you studied demographics have names for different types of people. They call her Becky. She's the number one buyer of Christian music.
Seth Price 27:54
I don't think I had heard that…Becky…
JMM 27:56
But you know you're allowed to do a number of things but like, if you really want to like You know, they tell you, you really want to make the money and CCM music like you got to write music and market music for, you know, middle aged conservative females. I mean, and that's…that's a real conversation people have, you know, it's not speculative.
And I understand that demographics and stuff like that, but at the same time, it's also probably that, I mean I know some really amazing people in that demographic who are not like what the people selling music think of, you know, so I don't want to be a gross generalization, but generally they think of them as being somewhat conservative and easy to offend and having certain values.
And so they make the music based on that. I mean, those are the people that radio exists for, those are the people that are most likely to listen to the radio and so they cater to that group of people and that's fine. But the church is made up of all types of different people. So I mean, so that would be my first answer; that's the more crass and to the point answer, but I think there are some other maybe cultural things going on.
I think sometimes, you know, the people who support Christian music would support it on a mission type basis; they're not supporting artwork they're supporting mission. I think they want to hear their lyrics saying the right things because I'm not gonna support this. And that's fine. The problem is that I personally think that language, or the lyric are the words, not that they're unimportant, but they're kind of the sheen on the surface of meaning. And so you can say a lot of the right things, but sort of like the iceberg principle, like when you hear something that you consider to be good, a good song or good music, you see the surface where you see the lyrics. Right. But what you feel is so much bigger than the lyric itself, it's so much bigger and it comes from a different place.
So in sort of the world of advertising or propaganda you would create music and then you would put the lyrics in there (that are about) sort of these ideas you want to tell people about, right? The spreading ideas, but more so than that is sort of like propaganda or advertising tells people what to think, as art invites people into a conversation. And if you're really good at it, maybe you still tell people what to think. But you make them think that they came up.
Seth Price 30:47
So Inception music.
JMM 30:49
Yeah! My wife does that to me all the time.
Yes, but you know, but that's, to me, that's the difference and so you get a lot more of what would be technically labeled more and this sounds so bad, because I'm not so mad Christian music but what's more likely to be supported as something's more in the like propaganda where it becomes more of like advertising for Christianity. My only issue with that is that I just don't think that people need to be advertised that Jesus isn't a thing that means he doesn't need a good PR campaign. So let's say we're really honest, we're like, Okay, if you're good, you're good person and love Jesus and you are still going to suffer in life. And that's a song that's I think needs to be sung because that's something we all experience, right. It's like, why does bad things happen to good people? I don't have an answer, but I have to put it out there because it's real, you know? I was like, Oh, no, we're not gonna put us on the radio. This is bad PR for Jesus.
Seth Price 31:51
I would argue that's what people that's what people need to hear. Like that's, that's what people struggle with. And I know for me music helps me process things in a way that I'm not able to give voice to an emotion that somewhere in there. Because I mean everybody has those experiences where they're having a fine day and all of a sudden they drive over the road and the right song comes on compound with the right memory compounded with the argument that just happened while they were thinking about that, you know, whatever their thing about and they just have to pull over because it's too emotionally gripping. it rips you apart. And I feel like the world would be more compassionate if we had more of that.
Seth Price 33:10
What, I guess theologically, is the biggest change for you over say the last 10 or 15 years?
JMM 33:19
Well, this is a little vague, but I think allowing myself to change.
Okay, so first of all, I'm a Christian, I believe in Jesus. I believe in the Father, Son, the Holy Spirit. But I would maybe consider myself to be a little bit of an “open theist”, in the sense that God doesn't change, but my ability to see and understand who God is definitely does, you know. So I've allowed myself like it's okay to daily sort of reimagined who I think God is attempting still So not saying that you can't find truth, but knowing that I don't always see it just right.
And so I think when I was younger, I thought there's going to be this set of things. And I'm going to, like, latch on to this set of things, and I'm never going to have to let go. But slowly, it seems like almost every one of those things have been challenged. I've found that if I just hold on to certain things, just out of habit, or just because I'm afraid to consider other options, it's, it makes life really hard. All of a sudden, it's sort of like I become a caricature. You know, I'm like a Christian caricature I'm filling out become a caricature of a believer. Like, I believe this. I can't tell you why. But I've just decided that this is what it's gonna be. You know, I'm like, you know, I don't think that God requires that of us. I mean, I think you got to be honest with yourself and it's not like, I really want to like, have some fun. So I'm gonna just conveniently think about God differently today, because there are things I want to get into today that are not consistent with the way I believed yesterday. (laughter) So I'm not talking about that.
Seth Price 35:14
Tomorrow, I'll go back to the way it was yesterday and I’ll repent.
JMM 35:16
Yeah, totally. But I am saying I give myself a little more room. You know, and I trust if I'm going to trust God, I can trust Jesus to help me through bad theology, you know, but I have to allow myself room for bad theology. Because if you don't consider it, I guess there's maybe not enough time in life to consider everything, but I think you've got to consider multiple options in order to have some sort of real faith. You just pick the first one and say, “Okay, this is it”, you might be right. You know, but, but I got to believe that it's a conversation that Jesus is guiding through this whole conversation, so that's why I feel more comfortable saying I'm an open theist. Maybe that sounds a little bit…maybe a little bit strange to some people. And maybe people would be surprised for me to say that. But I like that.
Seth Price 36:16
I'm good with it if you are out, because open theism has has multiple ways. So there's the open theism, like the inverse of predestination, not that I'm forced into anything, but that God knows all the possibilities, every single one but doesn't force me to choose either but isn't surprised when I choose any.
JMM 36:37
Yeah.
Seth Price 36:38
And then as the open theists were, and someone asked me the other day, he's like, well, what what do you think? He's like, assume you did your, you know, your your faith work in a different country? Would you still be Christian? I was like, I don't. I don't know. I don't know that I'm man enough to admit if I had been born in Syria, that I would be Christian or Muslim or if I had been born in a different country altogether, like I am Wonder how much of my faith is because I happen to be born in Texas?
JMM 37:04
Yeah. I wonder about that too, you know? And I wonder, you know how Jesus looks at what is faith? You know, when Jesus said we have to have faith like children, I don't think he means that, that faith is naiveity of faith, or what do you call it, gullibility!
I don't think he means you know, have faith like a child means you need to be as gullible as a child. I think what he's saying is that faith is a different thing altogether, that faith is something different altogether than an intellectual assent. I think it's putting your faith in something once again, if language is the sheen on top of meaning, you could have the sheen wrong a little bit off not fully understand it, but the meaning itself be there you know.
So I you know, I wonder sometimes if you know, and I'm not super familiar with this, but this is fascinating to me. Apparently, there's a movement Like a Christian atheism is a movement right now, people intellectually consider themselves to be atheists, but have a desire for the kingdom. Right? And so, you know, they say, well, intellectually I can ascend. But I do believe that like, believing in these things make my life better. And that there's something really beautiful about it. I almost wonder if like, just seeing the beauty in it, if that could be considered faith.
And then again, I think about like Jesus, and I mean, I have all these ideas. I don't want to like spit out or anything, but you know, I think about my children. You know, they're sweet, and they're smart for children, but like, they don't know anything. I think about like my grandmother in her last years, you know, she lost her mind. She didn't know if I was my cousin, my uncle, my dad or my granddad at moments, my name changed. And we're taking her to a baseball game towards the end of her life and she called me all of those people at different times. I was like, she definitely doesn't understand and so like are my children out of the club because they can't understand that is my grandmother out of the club because she can't understand or his face something different?
What if faith is living from a narrative and what if the narrative? You know, language is evolving, right? And so Jesus his name was Yeshua, which I think is Josh, that's what I called him Jesus of Nazareth, because they're like, yeah, “Josh from Albemarle over there”, you know, Josh is just is super common name. It's not so much the name because his name was super common. It was the narrative, right? It was the place he lived from. And so if, if I can tap into that place, as a believer, I want to believe you can tap into that place, and maybe not have the name quite right.
I don't want to claim universalism, but I think that it's not so neat and tidy, and at the end of the day, I think I still believe no one comes to the Father except by the Son. It's just the way Son gets to us is up to him. Right? So maybe he approaches me through the Jesus narrative, but maybe he approaches other people with the same narrative in different ways. I don't know. And people might hate that I say that! But, you know, I want to believe that everyone's invited, even if you don't fully understand the language, or the history, or the details, right. Who am I to say, I'm unbelieving. I agree. Yeah. But you know, I hope though, yeah,
Seth Price 40:40
I agree.
Someone asked me the other day what my thoughts was on eschatology, and I was like, I have no idea but I hope I really hope that everybody's there. ya know? If not, how arrogant of me to think that I figured it out somehow faster than someone else. How arrogant is that? And that doesn't seem much like the God that I currently worship not even not even close.
I want to talk a bit about the Lightning Sessions. That album, I love and I like to interplay it with and I don't know what the other album is because I've made my own “somebody needs to hold me” playlist when I'm struggling spiritually. (laughter)
And there's a few songs of yours mixed in with a few others that the two of you specifically but on the Lightning Sessions what was the hardest song that you recorded on that one? Like what was the one that you like this was easy to write but I can't sing this or when I go to play this live. I just can't you know this, this is the heart but you'll hear some people like I've heard Bono say, you know, there's some times I can't hit the notes and so I let the crowd sing. And I'm sure some of that's his voice and I'm sure other parts of that are I just can't sing these tonight. Is there a song like that at all on the lightning sessions for you?
JMM 41:51
Maybe a little bit like that. I don't have a problem singing it live, but Nothing Stands Between Us was a hard song to write because when I wrote it really part of me didn't believe that, you know, it's like nothing stands between us, but it doesn't feel that way. I feel like there's a lot of things between us. But as I continued to write this song and sit with the song, I felt like I was like, actually, no, I do believe this. I do believe it.
And for me when I wrote the bridge, that's when I was like, Okay, now I can sing the song, honestly. You know, and the bridge is a huge question. And so to me, it says, like, I can have these massive questions and still believe them, no matter what, there's nothing between us but love. And that one was tough. I think I had to come to terms because I have a really hard time and it's a kind of a curse. I have a really hard time singing a song that I don't believe. Yeah, even when I sing older songs, I have to tell myself like, this is who I was back then it's like a baby picture, a high school photo, sort of like that's what I want so I can own it because that's who I was.
But especially when I'm putting a song on a record. I have to believe this fully, not even that I don't believe technically nothing stands between me and God. But I was really struggling with my faith during that record. As like, I really don't just want to throw a worship tune on the record as a token, I want it to make sense.
Seth Price 43:19
You think Nothing Stands Between Us, well, I mean, you wrote it so you can take and you get to have the authority here. So when I talked about this, so there's the three songs of yours that I always mix in when I'm having an existential crisis, our Monsters Talk, and then Nothing Stands Between Us and then I always end with Future/Past and for some reason, that tells a story for me in a way that's reparative at the end, but the bridge specifically and maybe it's the wave metaphor in each of those songs.
I forget the lyric and Monsters Talk. I can't think of the lyric but I know there's waves in there. As you know, the stuff I'm dealing with, but the bridge normally You know, in every song that we sing is so euphoric. It's so yeah, the Jericho walls fell down or yay Easter's here or Yay, Gods so glorious. As opposed to that one. You know, it sounds more like when I'm struggling I'll have I like I'm constantly trying to scale your walls in vain process I just pushing against everything I should be. And then for me, I always end with I can rest in you were my first you are my last totally. So actually, someone at work the other day saw me jamming. I was actually went into work late and she's “What were you listening to”? She's like, we were trying to get your attention when you were just gone. I was like, and so I told her the story. And she's like, you're gonna have to send me the song. So I sent her those three songs. I was like, just go downstairs, turn the lights off, play them. And just think about God. I don't care who your God is. But just think about God. And then tell me what you think she came up in tears and she was like, I can't deal with that.
I was like, “Well, there you go. Sorry. I was late to work.”
So well not to fan out a little bit. But thank you for that. I appreciate that.
So I want to end with this. So you have a Christmas album coming up. Which is this your first Christmas album?
JMM 45:16
Yep. Totally is.
Seth Price 45:18
Yeah. So, so why now after all these years write about Christmas?
JMM 45:22
Totally.
Well, I've always loved Christmas. It's always like, it's super mysterious. You know, Christmas is like, there's hope. And there's, like magic. And then there's kind of some sadness mixed in there. And then then there's the annoying commercial side of the whole thing, you know. But it's always been a really magical time for me and time for reflection and introspection, and, you know, so I've always loved Christmas and it's always fascinated me. I think about Christmas and why I feel this way only around that time of year.
Also, the music industry tends to slow way down during the Christmas season unless you're doing Christmas music. And so when I slow down, I get bored and I start creating things to do; time off me as dangerous because I will find and I'll dream up new ideas that I'm gonna have to pursue.
And so every year around Christmas, or not every year…often, I would call my buddy Everett's and say, I'm bored. Let's do a Christmas song. You know, so, about three years in row we did that we did a Christmas song for mostly for fun. And I think I gave them away. And Everett and I were working on the Mercury and Lightning sessions. He produced the Mercury and Lightning sessions. And we were having so much fun and he's a composer as well; he plays the cello, he does arrangements. And I was like, this is so much fun, I don't want to stop. I don't want to stop working.
You know, he and I, for years have joked around about doing a Christmas album or like, let's just keep rolling, let's do a Christmas record! Let's do the songs! Let's re-record the songs that we've done together the last few years and do some new stuff. And so we just kept working through the mercury sessions. In one sense, it's sort of the process continued.
So we ended up renting a studio out up in the mountains for a few days, and we did drums and piano stuff with some really amazing musicians from town and then I tracked vocals in my basement and then sent stuff up to him and just like with the mercury sessions, he would write strings and weird parts. And he lives in a college town in the mountains, Boone, North Carolina and no matter what there but there's a big music school connected. You know, they have a big Music Department, I should say. And anytime I need an instrument like ever, where can I get a harp? Where can we get a French horn? Where I can get a flute or an oboe?
And Everett is like, “Oh, I know someone” and just this college kids, just pull them in and just rope them in, and how to just go, that's cool. Let's go and roll them in. And so we were doing that on the sessions records, like this would be such a great way to do a Christmas record, you know, so let's just do it. So that's kind of what we did. We just created this super kind of mysterious nostalgic, you know, happy and sad Christmas record.
And they're also songs I've wanted to cover for a long time that didn't make sense. But I was like, I think we could do this in a Christmas context. Like, What a Wonderful World. It's one of my favorite songs of all time. Make You Feel My Love, a Bob Dylan song, Adele covered it and it's like Bob Dylan wrote it and then Adele covered it.
So I was like, “What do I have to offer that song” and was like, let's do a Christmas version, kind of a Motown Christmas version song, you know? And so it's just an excuse to have a lot of fun and to explore some songs that I don't know if it otherwise would make sense to record. And then my wife and I…it was a great opportunity for she and I to work together some more. She sang with me on several of the tracks and she covered a song called Silver and Gold. It's from the Rudolph the Reindeer soundtrack.
Seth Price 49:19
Burp Ives!
JMM 49:20
Yeah, Burl Ives. We discovered that there's only one verse in the song, apparently, and we thought there was a whole song. And then they just put the first verse in the movie, but apparently there wasn't. And so we wrote two more verses to the song.
Seth Price 49:31
So they only wrote one verse?
JMM 49:32
Yeah, they only wrote one verse as far as I can tell, we couldn't find any more, if they had more we couldn't find it. So we just sort of finished the song ourselves. It was really cool because we look at the lyrics even while we're doing it was like man, this song is a great song and when I printed the lyrics I was like, if you take this literally in singing about how great silver and gold are, you know, I was like this is not awesome. If you take it literally obviously there's nostalgia, but singing about how wonderful silver and gold are and how silver and gold make the world so great, and how much value to silver and gold.
And I'd like to think that silver and gold are metaphor for people, a metaphor for the short days that we have, you know, metaphor for the years that you get with your kids for the grow up and have families of their own. So we sort of stayed up late one night and wrote the rest of the song, assuming that was the context for the song and it was super beautiful and kind of sad-I love it.
It's got to be one of my favorites on the record and my wife sang it-she's sang so good on that song-her voice sounds great. So yeah, and you know, and we get to explore it's also the Baby Son song. I think that's another reason I really wanted to do a Christmas record is that I wrote that song in 2013, before there was the type of political turmoil that we're experiencing right now, or at least I was oblivious to it, if there was anything like what we're experiencing today.
I pulled the song out, and I looked at the words, and I was like, wow, like this is actually like, really appropriate for right now. So, that may have been like, sort of the final reason I was like, okay, we're gonna have to like push and actually do this because I think people should hear this song, like in 2018.
Seth Price 51:31
I wholeheartedly agree, considering that's the only song of that album that I've heard. (Laughter) So that Christmas album is out…what the week after Thanksgiving?
JMM 51:45
Yeah, it comes out on Black Friday.
Seth Price 51:50
So for those listening, that was like two or three weeks ago, by the time you hear this, so in closing, where can where can people kind of engage in your like how to they interact with you if they feel like it, where can they come and support you? And buy your music come to your shows like where are you going to be at over the next few months?
JMM 52:07
Yeah, well, I'm going to be mostly in the studio writing trying to get ready for a new record sometime next year. In January, we'll be in Australia and New Zealand. I think I've got a show in Gatlinburg, Tennessee. But mostly we're International.
So we'll be in the UK, Australia, New Zealand early this year. But if people want to engage, one thing people would do they don't think about very often is just hit the follow button on Spotify.
Seth Price 52:38
Really?
JMM 52:39
Yeah, you get a lot more of the content when it comes out, and their albums do that now cool thing well, because a lot of people don't know when new music comes out now because it just music just kind of leaks now. So that's one way to stay connected with everything we'll likely release some fun things before the new record comes out, may or may not even be a part of the new record. I've got some ideas, mailing list, you know, the website, johnmarkmcmillan.com. The socials, I'm not on Twitter so much because Twitter these days is just so nasty, hateful. But I am on Instagram some and we post on Facebook.
Seth Price 53:19
Yeah, that's cool. Well, thank you so much for your time tonight, John!
JMM 53:22
Yeah, thank you.
Seth Price 53:30
For those of you listening in Australia, in New Zealand and over there, and I know that you do because I see the numbers. If John's coming close to you go and see him. It's a fantastic concert. I've seen him twice in person and both times was blown away. You're in for a treat.
So go find them on the website. You'll see that in the show notes and if you have a chance go you I promise you you will not be underwhelmed. You will be overwhelmed and you'll leave with joy and you’ll leave with happiness, I promise. So, do that. Remember to rate and review the show on iTunes, please, that really does help tremendously. And I know every single other podcast on the planet says that and it's because it's true, we can’t all be wrong.
I really hope that you all continue to have a good lead up to the holiday season or Christmas, and that we all can sit with intention. Really excited for Christmas conversation that's coming out in a few weeks. In closing, I’m gonna lead you out with probably my favorite song I heard john and i both reference it. Nothing Stands Between Us and so I'm going to let that play and I really hope that you'll just quiet yourself and listen to these songs and put yourself in the picture of someone yearning and searching for God and just be held Talk to you next week.
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