Two weeks ago, I joined 25,000 people at the Ruoff Music Center in Noblesville, Indiana to see the first night of a series of performances by the Dave Matthews Band (known to fans as DMB). The show was extraordinary, mainly due to the enthusiasm and hospitality of the multi-generational audience (most of the audience was middle-aged like me, but there were also a surprising number of older people and families with children) and the sheer talent of a group of musicians who have been playing sold-out shows since the early 1990s. The band will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame this October.
Dave Matthews and the band took the stage at around 7:30pm without an opening act and played for three hours straight (the show was also broadcast live on SiriusXM Radio). DMB fans won’t be surprised to hear the extended performance and short, no-frills interludes between songs. There’s no choreography, pyrotechnics, or costume changes, just musicians switching guitars between songs, tuning their instruments, and starting the next song. One of DMB’s greatest skills is their ability to make familiar fan favorites new and different every night. It feels jazzy, but the style is often described as “jam band” in the spirit of Phish and the Grateful Dead.
At several points during the concert, I felt joy and even transcendence. It reminded me of something close to religion. I was viscerally reminded of the spiritual power of live music when nearly everyone spontaneously but simultaneously sang along to the refrains of songs or cheered when the opening notes of a favorite song began to play. I’ve written before that jazz music may be one of the best metaphors for thinking about the Holy Spirit, and it was this reality that I experienced again that night.
This experience isn’t unique to DMB, it could happen at a Taylor Swift or Beyoncé concert, or even a lesser known but talented musician or band. Whether it’s a few dozen people or a few thousand, being part of a live audience, listening to music together, experiencing the moment, not just witnessing something unfolding in real time, but participating in it, can be an amazing and overwhelming experience.
When teaching students the basics of spirituality, I often use a live concert as a metaphor for thinking about the unity and diversity of transcendent experiences. Given the demographic of my current undergraduate students, I usually suggest they imagine going to a Taylor Swift concert.
I invite my students to think about the different locations where you can buy a ticket in an arena or stadium — front row, backstage, in the middle of the floor, or high up in the “front row” — and then ask them to think about the different ways that thousands of people individually experience the same performance.
Some spectators may have clear and vivid vision and hearing, while others may have limited or completely different vision and hearing impressions from the person sitting next to them, depending on their ticket location, physical condition, etc.
Some of you may know every single note and lyric of the songs, while others may be seeing this setlist for the first time.
Still, some people may not be paying attention to the concert at all as they are busy running the event, selling food and drinks, and providing first aid to the crowds.
The key thing here is that while everyone is actually encountering and witnessing the same performance (there’s only one band on stage, playing one song at a time), the way each person experiences the event is as different as the number of people there. Moreover, no matter how much we try to understand, imagine, and empathize with how others experience, process, reflect on, and react to a shared musical event, only the individual has access to that first-class experience, and therefore there is something inherently mysterious and special about each person’s encounter with that single occurrence.
Now, imagine that instead of Taylor Swift or Beyonce or DMB performing on stage, the only event for those gathered was the very presence of God himself. And what if those gathered were not hundreds, thousands or millions of people, but the entire human race? God is “performing” (so to speak), reaching out to us, communicating with us, sharing His presence with us all the time. The question is not about God’s presence, but how we personally experience that presence.
The practice of spirituality is about taking the personal, intimate, sacred experience of the transcendent and making sense of it. This is where religion comes in, and communities of faith help each person give meaning, words, and voice to that sacred encounter. We reach a deeper understanding through communal discernment, liturgical practices, and traditions. We pass on frameworks and insights from generation to generation to help each person recognize and process the sacred encounter that is deeply personal and yet shared communally.
Practicing spirituality is about embracing and understanding transcendent, personal, intimate and sacred experiences.
As I reflected on my enjoyable experience at the concert and thought about the metaphor of live music as an encounter with God, I was reminded of a short video from nearly 20 years ago. Decades ago, former evangelical pastor and author Rob Bell produced a series of short films that attempted to introduce themes of Christian spirituality to a broad audience. One film in particular, titled “Rhythm,” touches on the metaphor of music as an encounter with God. While I don’t fully agree with some of Bell’s theological observations, I like his use of music as an image to think about the scope of God’s presence in creation and the ways in which we respond to it.
I also don’t think it’s a coincidence that some of the most important religious art throughout Christian history has been musical works, from early Christian hymns to Gregorian chant, the Baroque Mass, modern “Christian rock,” and contemporary liturgical music.
Thinking about spirituality through the metaphor of live music not only invites us to reconsider God’s universal presence in all people, but also to respect the particularity of each person’s relationship with God. Throughout the centuries, we have many lessons from mystics and saints who were ignored or rejected in their time because they tried to express their experience of God in ways that were not “normal.” Recognizing that everyone has a unique relationship with the same God helps us avoid hasty judgments of others.
And we can do our best to strive to create an environment of faith where we can all experience the joy of God’s presence together, just like we’re experiencing a truly wonderful concert.
