A therapeutic utopia is not the freedom of God's children

Coldplay's performance at Glastonbury in front of 100,000 people was mesmerising. But it was not the liberation it desired to be.

Photo by Pavol Svantner on Unsplash

Watching the BBC’s recording of Coldplay performing to an endless sea of people at Glastonbury was like watching a modern worship service. They almost seemed to rehearse a utopia. But their liturgy grasping at the affections was not the liberation of all things. It was a showcasing of the best a therapeutic-self can hope for. 

There were endless fireworks, bass drops, an ever-youthful Chris Martin, playful false starts, confetti canons, and don’t forget the light up wristbands–from a multitude almost innumerable. An appearance from guitar-wielding Michael J Fox—who thanks to his performance in Back to the Future ostensibly inspired the whole idea of Coldplay—capped out the evening. 

For a Gen Y like myself who grew up with songs such as Yellow and The Scientist as a coming of age soundtrack, even streaming the performance was a dizzying mix of nostalgia and familiarity.

Music’s limited grace

As a celebration of human artistry, it was outstanding. Martin Luther once said: ‘Music is a gift and grace of God, not an invention of men. Thus it drives out the devil and makes people cheerful. Then one forgets all wrath, impurity, and other devices.’ 

As something more than music, it should be understood—decoded. But how? 

The key is found in deciphering Chris Martin’s short homilies, peppered throughout the show. Probably they were tightly rehearsed. But they sounded spontaneous—free and breezy. They explain something of the deeper significance of the band’s ethic—as well as the spirit of the age they are plugged into. 

At one point Martin asked the crowd to raise their hands towards the stage (benediction like). “Now,” he said, “we’re gonna send a big Glastonbury love thing. OK, for five seconds, we’re gonna send it out … Send love out into the world. You can send it to your grandma, you can send it to Israel, you can send it to Palestine, you can send it to Myanmar, you can send it to Ukraine, you can send it to peaceful Russians.”

Hands and fingers shimmied and then fireworks.

In another sermonette, he thanked the crowd for: “giving us and me restored faith that most humans can gather together very peacefully with all different flags, all different colours, all different genders, sexualities, ages, everything, and just sing and have a good time and ice cream. There’s no fighting; nothing like that. So thank you for being inspiring to us, and hopefully we’re sending all this out into the world all together as a beacon of togetherness. In a time when it might seem like that’s impossible, you just proved that it is. So that’s amazing. Thank you.” 

Perhaps we also saw something of the band’s modern spirituality in their new song ‘And so we pray’. Like other Coldplay songs, it carries Christianesk themes while remaining vague. They invited a Palestinian singer up with them in what has been seen as a political gesture. The lyrics asked someone (A deity? Oneself? Others?) for a better future. 

A new-old-failing vision

Coldplay’s vision is not fresh. It’s reminiscent of the calls for world peace from Grammy and Oscar winners, miss Universes, sporting stars, and the like. We will see this spirit in full flight soon at the Paris Olympics. Amidst some inevitable boycotts, doping scandals, and controversies, we will be given an international ethos–all flags flown together indicating some kind of possible unity. 

In the throes of such catharsis, those of us feeling very good can easily forget the darkness. The wounded, the victims, the hostages, the starving, those with compromised health, the deaths, and the brokeness of the human condition. These people know reality’s sharpest edge. 

The problem is not so much the promise of a bright future held out. That, we can all agree, is desirable for all. The problem is the how. How can such a future come? The Beatles and John Lennon sang ‘All you need is love’ and ‘Imagine’. Then Lennon was murdered. Where do we find the promised brotherhood of man? Where are all the people sharing all the world?

The secular vision of utopia is varied. For some it is the acquisition of wealth that brings a bubble of security and happiness to you and yours. It’s not hard to see why many grab hold of that idea in gated communities awash with opportunities for comfort. 

For others the vision comes through fighting for justice. Some of our culture’s elites even periodically leave stages and ivory towers, to advocate for the downtrodden in refugee camps, or lacking sanitation or political stability. We can think of an array of public figures who’ve graced UNHCR ads, and played benefit concerts. But then, it is probably back to the many mansions of this present age for a shower and a Nescafe. 

Bono once recalled of his friend, the late Australian biker-come-evangelist, John Smith:

In our last meeting he spoke truth to me, gave me a hell of a hard time, thought I had gone soft and become too comfortable around the powerful. Thought I was living too well. He was probably right. I still think about it. I hope the Archangel Michael is not wearing Gucci loafers, he’ll be getting it in the neck from our John the Baptist Smith if he is.

We should face the uncomfortable fact that a utopian vision sought by us in our strength, will in the end be unachieved.

For example:

• Where will the aggrieved go with their pain? The person whose relative has been taken or killed by an enemy, will not have time for spirit-fingers no matter how many there are.

• Where will the suffering go for healing? Benefit concerts and wristband seas, will scarcely let the pain up, even for a moment.

• Where will the dying go for immortality? Cynically they’re schooled to be pragmatic: hope for what’s possible, not what’s not. And yet what makes us so sure?

The life which has appeared

The beauty and truth of the Christian gospel, is that it is not a promise of a therapeutic tomorrow. Nor is it about what we can do. Christian liturgy is not an ode to human emotions, or human-achieved unity. We don’t raise our hands to send our love. We raise empty palms as beggars to receive the love of God. We do not jump to the beat of humanity’s capacity. We fall to our knees at the reminder of our spurning of God’s intentions, and rise in the healing grace of a Saviour.

For exhausted people tired of scanning the cosmos for answers, Jesus’ hope knocks on the door of our hearts. “The life appeared; we have seen it and testify to it, and we proclaim to you the eternal life, which was with the Father and has appeared to us.” (1 John 1:2).

A modern hope looks to the now and asks what we can salvage of our global or individual happiness. Christ looks at this world and plans to transform it. Jesus sees the haywired reality at the heart of all things—a thing broken by the human condition itself. That is why he—the creator—took on human flesh. In doing so he rewired the system from the inside out. Living the life we could not, and dying the death we should have, he hit reset on reality.

Through his vicarious death for humankind’s wrong, we find a place for our deepest brokenness to be healed. He is the hero who goes before humanity, offering a new peace with God. He does this from the side of God and the side of humanity—as the God-man. With the new vertical peace he brings, comes a new horizontal peace. Through Israel’s international Messiah, humanity can leave justice in the hands of God. In him, will the vision of a new future be revealed:

He will judge between the nations 

and will settle disputes for many peoples.

They will beat their swords into plowshares 

and their spears into pruning hooks.

Nation will not take up sword against nation,

nor will they train for war anymore.

(Isaiah 2:4)

If that vision rests on our shoulders, we will think we’re the clever ones who can solve the greatest dilemmas. Perhaps with a concert. Perhaps, as history shows, with bloody revolutions.

As Jerry Seinfield said to a pro-Palestinian heckler at his show in Sydney: “Tomorrow, we will read in the paper, ‘Middle East 100 per cent solved, thanks to a man at the QUDOS Arena stopping Jew comedian’.”

The Christian apostle John, having recognised Jesus as the long-promised Saviour said: ‘We proclaim to you what we have seen and heard, so that you also may have fellowship with us. And our fellowship is with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ’ (1 John 1:3).  

Fellowship goes up, before it can go out. That is the pattern God invites us into.