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The second L is lyrics, the most common way to define Christian music. Seems simple enough. A song clearly expressing a Christian worldview lyrically must therefore be Christian music, right?

Not so fast. Now we're back to U2, Sinead O'Connor, and countless others. How, for example, do you handle "Heaven," the prayerful 2004 hit by Los Lonely Boys? They're not considered a Christian band, but there's no mistaking the faith-based hope and sincerity of the song's lyrics. When Salvador, a popular Christian band, covered "Heaven" on their own album, that pretty much established it as a "Christian" song.

Over the years, Christians and non-Christians have recorded covers of hymns ("Amazing Grace"), gospel standards ("Oh! Happy Day"), and spiritual pop songs ("40"). Sometimes a non-believer will even write an original song inspired by Christian beliefs—or else open to interpretation as such. (Incidentally, this became the basis for our Glimpses of God series.) Faith and God are not subjects exclusive to Christian music, hence why a lot of people don't rely on lyrics alone as criteria.

Plus, plenty of established Christian artists have sung about general themes. Michael O'Brien's album Something About Us is a collection of love songs to his wife. You won't find any spiritual references—lyrically, it's no more "Christian" than Frank Sinatra or Tony Bennett, and there's no obvious reason to shelve it in the "Christian" section of a mainstream record store. But last I checked, Christians fall in love (and as O'Brien pointed out, Song of Solomon is all about romance). And in this case, the album was considered "Christian" because of who is singing the songs, not for what was being sung. If we cover an album like this, then why not any pop album of love songs?

Our third L, lifestyle, is arguably the clincher of the bunch. If the artist is a practicing Christian, you'd think that would be a clear-cut deciding factor. Except, of course, it's not enough for artists like U2, Moby, Scott Stapp, and Sufjan Stevens to be fully embraced by the Christian culture. They get accused of not letting their light shine through their music, "selling out" to make more money by concealing their beliefs.

Or else such artists get filtered by the lens of legalism. How can they possibly be "Christian" when they went through a divorce, used profanity in an interview, appeared on a secular television program, or voted for a Democrat? I doubt any of us could hold up to similar scrutiny. Do our individual failings prevent us from being Christian artists? Do only perfect people make Christian music?

We all sin and fall short of God's glory (Romans 3:22-24), and most of us understand the difference between right and wrong. But the definition of "practicing Christian" varies from person to person, making the "lifestyle" criteria a particularly sticky one.

Should we recognize that Christian artists stumble like any of us? Or should they be held to a higher standard, like pastors? And if so, then how far do we dig into a person's life before we're satisfied that they're "Christian" enough? Lifestyle is the grayest of the Ls because try as we might to evaluate the sincerity of a heart, all that can be done is compare an artist's words and actions with God's Word, and see if they're congruent.

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