What do you think?
Rate this book
A Plea to Southern Gospel Music Fans
This book is a plea for Southern Gospel music fans to wake up and tear down the bridges that are being built from conservative Southern Gospel-loving homes and churches to the world itself and to the one-world church represented by contemporary Southern Gospel and CCM.
It is a plea to wake up to incremental steps that are bringing God’s people ever closer to the world, the flesh, and the devil.
I know by long and sad experience that many Southern Gospel fans do not listen to biblical warnings and reproofs. They treat biblical reprovers as carnal critics and refuse to give serious attention to the warnings.
I am publishing this warning for those who are true disciples of Jesus Christ and who therefore “continue in” His Word (John 8:31-32). They love Christ and His Word above the closest friendships and relationships (Luke 14:26), certainly above music! True disciples of Christ esteem all of God’s precepts concerning all things to be right, and they hate EVERY false way (Psalm 119:128). They “prove ALL things” by God’s infallible Word. They have a testing mindset.
Here is a challenge.. Do you have a testing mindset? Will you put Southern Gospel Music to the test?
It is a plea to wake up to incremental steps that are bringing God’s people ever closer to the world, the flesh, and the devil.
I know by long and sad experience that many Southern Gospel fans do not listen to biblical warnings and reproofs. They treat biblical reprovers as carnal critics and refuse to give serious attention to the warnings.
I am publishing this warning for those who are true disciples of Jesus Christ and who therefore “continue in” His Word (John 8:31-32). They love Christ and His Word above the closest friendships and relationships (Luke 14:26), certainly above music! True disciples of Christ esteem all of God’s precepts concerning all things to be right, and they hate EVERY false way (Psalm 119:128). They “prove ALL things” by God’s infallible Word. They have a testing mindset.
Here is a challenge.. Do you have a testing mindset? Will you put Southern Gospel Music to the test?
141 pages, Paperback
1 person want to read
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
May 9, 2025
I liked this one better than the congregational singing book. It had an even more detailed music philosophy spelled out, and some good biblical principles that are hard to argue against.
It was still weak in trying to create objective criteria for a subjective subject matter: music. The emotions of music ought not lead to emotionalism (a key point throughout the book), but should emotions be entirely dismissed? It's a hard line to take.
As I said in my other review, I appreciate anyone trying to tackle this subject and taking on the mobs. I'm not sure how many people this would convince, but I maintain that these ARE some questions that we have to face biblically.
One other minor critique is that although so much of the Southern Gospel base would be that camp-meeting-style emotionalism, I've had a lot of conversations with people who ARE sincerely trying to choose music based on the EXACT biblical criteria he lists in this book, yet who land in a slightly different place. Are they wrong? Cloud says yes, and says so with almost zero nuance. I remain slightly less convinced than him, yet I often find myself agreeing.
The tone of this book is clearly separatist. Some might call that mean or nasty, but I don't think it is. It's certainly not gracious and accommodating, but that's kind of the point. So, I get it. And I'm okay with the tone.
I was in a Southern Gospel culture for a while, but never grew completely comfortable with it. I even sang baritone on a traveling quartet, but today, the music that ministers to me is FAR different. It's a worthy conversation to have, and this book is one I'll be referencing for an upcoming sermon series on music.
It was still weak in trying to create objective criteria for a subjective subject matter: music. The emotions of music ought not lead to emotionalism (a key point throughout the book), but should emotions be entirely dismissed? It's a hard line to take.
As I said in my other review, I appreciate anyone trying to tackle this subject and taking on the mobs. I'm not sure how many people this would convince, but I maintain that these ARE some questions that we have to face biblically.
One other minor critique is that although so much of the Southern Gospel base would be that camp-meeting-style emotionalism, I've had a lot of conversations with people who ARE sincerely trying to choose music based on the EXACT biblical criteria he lists in this book, yet who land in a slightly different place. Are they wrong? Cloud says yes, and says so with almost zero nuance. I remain slightly less convinced than him, yet I often find myself agreeing.
The tone of this book is clearly separatist. Some might call that mean or nasty, but I don't think it is. It's certainly not gracious and accommodating, but that's kind of the point. So, I get it. And I'm okay with the tone.
I was in a Southern Gospel culture for a while, but never grew completely comfortable with it. I even sang baritone on a traveling quartet, but today, the music that ministers to me is FAR different. It's a worthy conversation to have, and this book is one I'll be referencing for an upcoming sermon series on music.
May 13, 2025
REALLY bad. The ironic thing is, I don't really like most Southern Gospel music personally. But most of Cloud's arguments are truly terrible.
First, I largely agree with his critiques that most southern gospel has shallow lyrics and is driven too much by emotion and entertainment (he didn't even mention the endless key changes that serve no purpose but to raise enthusiasm). This actually led me away from most southern gospel, to contemporary Christian music. This is unfortunately an extremely broad term, with a massive variety of content within it. But for reference, I love songs with great theological depth, like much of the music of the Gettys, CityAlight, Sovereign Grace Music, Andrew Peterson, etc. I also enjoy plenty of secular songs (though not in church) as I believe that music is a common grace gift that can glorify God through its beauty even apart from an explicit Christian message.
The bad: Cloud quotes lots of Scripture, but NEVER with any effort to interpret it properly in context. His application is almost entirely off base because of his poor hermeneutics. Also, most of his criticism focuses on the style, not the content, attacking such things as "danceable music" and "sensual rhythms." This is a purely preference based opinion, with no Scriptural case. Add in a dose of racism (he mentions “the sleazy side of the black culture”) and you get the picture. Finally, much of his focus is about the lack of separation from CCM and the ecumenical movement. Here he utterly fails to use any kind of theological triage, mixing up true gospel issues with minor doctrinal differences and matters of pure preference. Totally lost is any sense of the gospel unity which John 17 and Galatians 1-2 view as essential.
Cloud appears to have made a writing career of attacking anyone and anything he doesn't like, and it's a long list. This is merely another entry in a long line of unchristian drivel.
First, I largely agree with his critiques that most southern gospel has shallow lyrics and is driven too much by emotion and entertainment (he didn't even mention the endless key changes that serve no purpose but to raise enthusiasm). This actually led me away from most southern gospel, to contemporary Christian music. This is unfortunately an extremely broad term, with a massive variety of content within it. But for reference, I love songs with great theological depth, like much of the music of the Gettys, CityAlight, Sovereign Grace Music, Andrew Peterson, etc. I also enjoy plenty of secular songs (though not in church) as I believe that music is a common grace gift that can glorify God through its beauty even apart from an explicit Christian message.
The bad: Cloud quotes lots of Scripture, but NEVER with any effort to interpret it properly in context. His application is almost entirely off base because of his poor hermeneutics. Also, most of his criticism focuses on the style, not the content, attacking such things as "danceable music" and "sensual rhythms." This is a purely preference based opinion, with no Scriptural case. Add in a dose of racism (he mentions “the sleazy side of the black culture”) and you get the picture. Finally, much of his focus is about the lack of separation from CCM and the ecumenical movement. Here he utterly fails to use any kind of theological triage, mixing up true gospel issues with minor doctrinal differences and matters of pure preference. Totally lost is any sense of the gospel unity which John 17 and Galatians 1-2 view as essential.
Cloud appears to have made a writing career of attacking anyone and anything he doesn't like, and it's a long list. This is merely another entry in a long line of unchristian drivel.
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews