I have a confession to make. I have illegally downloaded music from some of my favorite Christian hip-hop artists using apps on my previous phone and an app on my previous computer. Stealing is a grave sin. One of the Ten Commandments says, “You shall not steal.”

Lately I have been convicted about the music that I have stolen in the past. Yes, stolen is the right word to describe it. Last week I deleted over 900 songs from my iTunes, about 850 of which were Christian hip-hop songs.  When I was clicking “delete” on those songs and albums, I was thinking to myself, “Are you really doing this? This is crazy!” I deleted a ton of great songs and albums that I have listened to many times.

Though I haven’t illegally downloaded a song in almost a year, that does not change the fact that I had done that in the past. Since I have stopped stealing music, there have been many great albums that I have wanted to get but have not been able to for various reasons. I had $1,000 worth of songs that I did not pay for. Of most of those songs and albums that I deleted, I will never end up purchasing them. Here is a theoretical situation… Imagine a jewelry thief gives up their sin of stealing and says, “God, I am not going to steal anymore,” but keeps all of the jewelry that they have stolen in the past… That is ridiculous, but that is what I had been doing. I am not going to do that anymore.

I challenge every reader to join me and delete all of the songs that they have stolen, whether that is five songs or two thousand songs. If you really want to listen to the song but don’t want to purchase it, you can listen to it using online streaming services and sites such as Spotify. You might argue that artists make very little money from streaming services from Spotify, but that is an excuse; they make no money from you stealing their songs and albums. God is not okay with you stealing music if it has a Christian message.

What will you do? Choose wisely.

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