We started a new series called “Mixtape” at Gateway Church in Austin.
Music has always had the power to shape the way we think, feel, and live. Every song does something to us, whether it’s the anthem that defined our teenage years, the breakup ballad that got us through heartache, or the worship song that lifted us closer to God. Lyrics carry messages. Melodies stir emotions. Rhythms embed themselves into our memories. The songs we put on repeat become more than background noise, they become the soundtrack of our lives.
In this series, Mixtape: The Formative Years, we’ll explore how the music around us forms our perspective on life, love, identity, and faith. Some tracks speak lies that pull us away from God’s best, while others point us toward truth, hope, and worship. God invites us to be intentional about the soundtrack we live by. He wants to rewrite the playlist of our lives so that His Word and His presence set the rhythm for our future.
Digging Deeper:
Take the message and apply it to your life going through the Bible study and discussion questions with your small group, your family, some friends, or your roommates.
Message Video from Gateway South Austin:
Message Audio from Gateway South Austin:
Message Notes from Carlos Ortiz, Jr.:
Music has always had a mysterious power over the human soul. It moves us in ways words alone cannot. Every song does something to us — it shapes the way we think, feel, and live. For some, a song defined an entire season of life. Maybe it was the anthem of your teenage years, the breakup ballad that got you through heartbreak, or the worship song that carried you closer to God in the middle of pain.
- Lyrics carry messages.
- Melodies stir emotions.
- Rhythms embed themselves into memory.
And the songs we put on repeat don’t just fill silence — they form us. They become the soundtrack to our lives.
That’s what this series, “Mixtape: The Formative Years,” is about. It’s about how music — and more broadly, the voices, messages, and rhythms around us — shape who we are. Because whether we realize it or not, we are always being formed. Our habits, our playlists, our conversations, our screens — they’re all part of a greater liturgy that tells us who we are, what we should love, and where our hope lies.
Some songs — and stories — pull us away from God’s best. Others point us toward truth, beauty, and worship. God invites us to live with intention, to be aware of what’s shaping us. He wants to rewrite the soundtrack of our lives so that His Word and His presence set the rhythm of our future.
“Music gives a soul to the universe, wings to the mind, flight to the imagination, and life to everything.”
– Plato, 2500 years ago
That’s not far from what the Bible tells us: that we were made for music. It’s natural to sing, to admire great singing, to cry to a song that moves us, or dance to a beat that brings joy. We were made by a musical God — one who spoke creation into existence and who rejoices over His people with singing (Zephaniah 3:17).
So it makes sense that the Apostle Paul would use music to describe what a Spirit-filled life can look like.
Let’s turn to our focus passage for this series:
Ephesians 5:15–20
“Be very careful, then, how you live—not as unwise but as wise, making the most of every opportunity, because the days are evil. Therefore do not be foolish but understand what the Lord’s will is. Do not get drunk on wine, which leads to debauchery. Instead, be filled with the Spirit, speaking to one another with psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. Sing and make music from your heart to the Lord, always giving thanks to God the Father for everything, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ.”
There’s an interesting connection here: Paul contrasts being filled with wine with being filled with the Spirit. One form of filling leads to losing control; the other leads to holy joy and mutual encouragement. And how do we express that fullness of the Spirit? Through music. Through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit.
The parallel passage in Colossians 3:16 echoes this:
“Let the message of Christ dwell among you richly… as you teach and admonish one another with all wisdom through psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit, singing to God with gratitude in your hearts.”
Both passages reveal that worship — and especially music — isn’t just something we do for God; it’s something God does in us. When the Spirit fills us, it overflows as song.
Now, Paul doesn’t mention musical styles or instruments. Instead, he gives us three categories of spiritual music — psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit — each serving a unique purpose in shaping us to be more like Jesus.
The Three Musical Genres of the Spirit
1. Psalms
These are honest, emotional, Scripture-rooted songs that teach us to be real with God. They follow the pattern of the Old Testament psalms — filled with lament, joy, thanksgiving, confession, and praise. The psalms remind us that God can handle our honesty.
2. Hymns
Structured songs declaring God’s truth. Hymns are theological and timeless, passed from generation to generation. They center not on us, but on the unchanging character of God — His holiness, His faithfulness, His grace.
3. Songs from the Spirit
These are deeply personal, spontaneous expressions of faith. They may or may not directly quote Scripture, but they overflow from the heart of someone walking with God. They are born out of experience — moments of joy, grief, or awe that rise up as melody.
In our modern terms, these genres are less about musical categories and more about spiritual postures. They represent how we bring our lives before God — through truth, honesty, and heartfelt expression.
This week, we’re focusing on that last one: Songs from the Spirit — and our message title is “When the Music Fades.”
In 2018, researchers analyzed Billboard Hot 100 songs from 1951 to 2016 and found something fascinating — and sobering. Popular music has grown sadder and angrier over time. The use of positive words like “love” and “peace” has declined, while themes of loneliness and despair have increased dramatically. I think it may be that we know we were made for so much more!
In other words, the soundtrack of our culture has changed keys. We’ve moved from major to minor.
That’s not surprising, is it? We live in an age of anxiety — more connected than ever, yet more isolated than ever. We scroll through curated happiness, yet carry deep sadness. Music often becomes both an expression of our ache and an escape from it.
But here’s the danger: when the music fades — when the thing that used to stir us no longer works — we don’t always know what to do next.
The truth is, the silence between songs can be deafening. And that silence often exposes what we’ve been leaning on for meaning.
Have you ever felt like God went quiet on you? Like you were singing, but the echo was gone?
Maybe it’s been a long season of unanswered prayer, or disappointment that won’t lift, or grief that still feels raw. In those moments, even the most familiar worship song can sound hollow.
But here’s what we must remember: when God feels silent, He is still closer than you think. His apparent silence is not absence. His stillness is not apathy.
More often than not, God does His deepest work in the quiet — when we’ve turned down the noise long enough to hear His whisper.
Over twenty years ago, Donald Miller wrote Blue Like Jazz, a raw and honest reflection of faith and doubt. There’s a moment in that book that captures something profound about life with God. Miller wrote:
“I never liked jazz music because jazz music doesn’t resolve. But I was outside the Bagdad Theater in Portland one night when I saw a man playing the saxophone. I stood there for fifteen minutes, and he never opened his eyes. After that, I liked jazz music. Sometimes you have to watch somebody love something before you can love it yourself. I used to not like God because God didn’t resolve. But that was before any of this happened.”
– Donald Miller, Blue Like Jazz
That’s a remarkable insight. Jazz doesn’t resolve — it leaves tension hanging in the air — and in that tension, there’s beauty.
Life is like that. Faith is like that. It doesn’t always resolve on our timeline. But if you stay in it long enough, if you watch someone else love God through the unresolved parts, something in you changes. You begin to trust that the dissonance still belongs in the song.
I think I connected with the book because I was sad, and the issues of my life just didn’t feel like they were resolving. I had just been married, and Libby and I were not doing well in life. Our marriage was possibly not going to make it, and all of the hurts of being sexually abused as a child were front and center. I was a new dad to 2 kids, and wondering if I was going to be a single dad…truth is I was never going to leave Libby, but I was afraid she was going to leave me. I was following Jesus, I loved Jesus, I wanted to be more like Jesus, but I was living in the real world, and the real world was letting me down, or maybe I was letting it down, but I was slowly finding my way.
I think in that lowest point I was learning that when the music fades, when faith feels unresolved, God is still composing something beautiful beneath the surface.
The Psalms, the prophets, and the teachings of Jesus all echo this rhythm — a pattern of spiritual reorientation. When we lose the melody, when life feels offbeat, we come back through three simple steps:
Be Still
Draw Near
Find Hope
They’re not revolutionary concepts, but lived out, they are revolutionary practices.
1. Be Still — Turn Down the Volume
Psalm 46:10 says, “Be still, and know that I am God.”
We live surrounded by noise — playlists, podcasts, notifications, conversations, chaos. We are addicted to sound because silence makes us uneasy. It forces us to face the questions we’ve been avoiding.
But sometimes the noise outside keeps us from noticing what’s happening inside.
When life slows down, when the music fades, we start to hear that deeper question: “God, are You still here?”
And the answer, always, is yes.
In 1 Kings 19, the prophet Elijah experiences this firsthand. He’s exhausted, disillusioned, ready to give up. He hides in a cave, and God passes by. There’s a powerful wind — but God isn’t in the wind. There’s an earthquake — but God isn’t in the earthquake. There’s a fire — but God isn’t in the fire. Then, a gentle whisper.
God was in the whisper.
Our culture prizes the loud, the spectacular, the dramatic. But God’s presence is often quiet, subtle, unhurried.
Even Jesus withdrew to quiet places to pray (Mark 1:35). If the Son of God needed silence to hear His Father’s voice, how much more do we?
Stillness isn’t just about stopping noise — it’s about making space for presence.
2. Draw Near — Make Room for Something Real
James 4:8 says, “Draw near to God, and He will draw near to you.”
When the music fades, when the emotion is gone, we often assume God has left. But maybe silence isn’t His absence — it’s His invitation.
When the lights dim and the performance stops, authenticity begins.
The woman at the well in John 4 discovered this. Jesus told her that true worshipers don’t worship on a mountain or in a temple, but “in spirit and in truth.” In other words, true worship doesn’t depend on place or performance but on presence.
God isn’t waiting for us to sound impressive. He’s waiting for us to show up honestly.
Psalm 34:18 reminds us, “The Lord is close to the brokenhearted and saves those who are crushed in spirit.”
Romans 8:26 adds that even when we can’t find words, “the Spirit Himself intercedes for us with groans too deep for words.”
Sometimes the truest song from the Spirit isn’t sung with words at all. It’s the cry of the heart that still believes God is good, even when life isn’t.
That’s the paradox of Christian worship — it’s not the absence of pain that creates praise; it’s the presence of hope in the midst of it.
3. Find Hope – Your Song in the Struggle
Psalm 42 records the cry of a soul in turmoil: “Why, my soul, are you downcast? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him.”
Notice that phrase — “I will yet praise Him.” That’s future tense. It’s faith that sings through the struggle.
Acts 16 tells the story of Paul and Silas, beaten and imprisoned for preaching the gospel. Their feet are in chains. Their future is uncertain. And what do they do? They start singing. Not because their circumstances changed, but because their God hadn’t.
And as they sang, the prison doors flew open.
Faith doesn’t pretend life is easy. It doesn’t deny pain or confusion. Faith is the decision to keep singing anyway — to say, “Even here, even now, God is worthy.”
That’s what songs from the Spirit really are: faith finding its voice in the valley.
Philippians 4:6–7 reminds us:
“Do not be anxious about anything, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.”
Peace doesn’t come from the absence of struggle, but from the presence of God in the struggle.
Maybe today you feel like the music of your life has faded. The melody that once carried you feels distant. You’ve lost your rhythm.
But even now, God is still composing. The silence you feel might just be the pause between verses — the place where something new begins.
C.S. Lewis once said,
“God whispers to us in our pleasures, speaks in our conscience, but shouts in our pains.”
– C.S. Lewis
Maybe what feels like divine silence is actually divine composition — God shaping a deeper song in you, one that only suffering could write.
And when you come through it, your song will have a beauty that only comes from brokenness.
Application
The invitation of Ephesians 5 and Colossians 3 is simple: let the message of Christ dwell richly among you. Let His Spirit rewrite the playlist of your heart.
That doesn’t mean you can only listen to Christian music or avoid every secular song. It means you live intentionally — aware of what’s shaping you. You recognize that every lyric, every story, every rhythm is forming your soul toward something.
Ask yourself:
What songs are setting the rhythm of my days?
What voices am I allowing to define my worth, my view of love, my hope?
And how can I tune my heart back to the song of the Spirit?
God doesn’t call us to silence the world’s music entirely. He calls us to let His song be louder.
When the Music Fades
That’s the heart of this message. When the noise fades, when emotions quiet, when the stage goes dark — Do we still draw near? Do we still sing?
Because the goal of worship isn’t to feel something; it’s to become someone — someone shaped by the Spirit, tuned to grace, anchored in truth.
So maybe today, your invitation is simple:
Turn down the volume.
Draw near to God.
And find your song (hour hope) in the struggle.
Because even when the music fades, the Composer is still at work.
And one day we’ll see that every note, every pause, every ache had a place in the song he was writing.
Until then, keep singing.