Someone recently made a comment online that got me thinking.

The person was essentially saying that life had become too serious to be listening to Limoblaze.

There are certain moments when you are going through something difficult and suddenly the music you want sounds different. You want the song that your mother used to play. You want the old Yoruba worship song you heard during morning devotion. You want something that feels like prayer.

But the more we thought about it, the more we realised that there is an assumption hiding inside that conversation.

Why do we sometimes treat afrogospel as music for good vibes, christian parties and dancing, while reserving older gospel music for serious spiritual moments?

AfroGospel is gospel music too.

And if a song is carrying the message of Christ, then the fact that it has an Afrobeat-inspired production does not suddenly make it incapable of ministering to someone who is hurting.

There are afrogospel songs that make you dance, and we love those songs.

But there are also songs that make you sit down, close your eyes and pray.

Some songs are declarations of faith. Others remind you of Scripture when you are struggling to remember it for yourself. Some songs are full of words about God’s goodness, His protection, His promises and His faithfulness.

That is one of the reasons we have previously written about AfroGospel songs for spiritual warfare. There are songs that can help you pray, declare God’s promises and remind yourself of what Scripture says when fear and discouragement become overwhelming.

(You can read our article on AfroGospel Songs for Warfare here.)

But what about the older, traditional songs?

That old Yoruba gospel song you went back to because life became serious?

Depending on how we define afrogospel, it may actually belong in the conversation too.

African gospel has always borrowed from the sounds, languages and musical traditions around it. Yoruba praise and worship, highlife gospel, indigenous gospel and contemporary afrogospel all exist within a much larger history of African Christians using the music around them to express their faith.

We will get into that properly in our next article because there is actually a bigger question here:

What exactly makes a song afrogospel?

Does singing about Jesus over an African rhythm automatically make something afrogospel?

Does the artist have to intentionally identify with the genre?

Does the production matter more than the message?

We have thoughts.

But for now, we want to return to the original question.

When life gets hard, you do not necessarily have to abandon the afrogospel songs you enjoy.

Put on the song that reminds you that God is still good, play the song that helps you pray, and sing along to the song that puts Scripture back into your mind.