Chris Renzema is a contemporary Christian artist who blends indie rock and folk into his music style. He has over a million monthly listeners on Spotify, with numerous albums that have resulted in his blooming career as a Christian artist. In his most recent album, “Manna,” Renzema has broken away from the therapeutic efficacy commonly found in contemporary Christian worship music. Listening to the album will not leave Christians emotionally charged feeling like God will poof their problems away. It will leave them feeling affirmed in their human experience of faith. “Manna” is written for the cynic, skeptic and stalled out in faith.
Renzema plays with almost every theme that bounce around the typical doubting Christian’s head. He writes lyrics about depression, emotional distance from God, heroes of the one’s faith go down in scandal and desires one perceives they should have in contrast to the realities of faith.
The album’s opener “Not Giving Up On You” is the most emphatic piece of “Manna.” It serves as an upbeat purpose statement for the album. In essence he is saying that no matter what follows this song, be it doubts or brokenness, he is not giving up on God.
Following his purpose statement, “Hereditary” serves as more of a thesis for what the album will be thematically. With somber guitar and harmonica, Renzema lays out the human condition of rebellion that separates us from God and our need for Jesus to break us free from our lineage of sin.
The body of this album is a story of dissonance between the beliefs of Christian faith and the lived feelings Renzema has had. First, in “Holy Ghost” he shares a memory of going to a revival “wanting to feel God reaching out.” However, when it was his turn to be slain by the spirit the result was anticlimactic. “I swear I believed, but I didn’t lock my knees, was the only one left standing wondering what was wrong with me.” For the listener who has been left dry-eyed with hands by their sides at praise and worship perhaps this line resonates. He writes a chorus for the skeptical Christian; “Doesn’t mean I’m not hopeful just means that I’m a cautious believer. It’s the craziest this after all I’ve seen, well I still want to believe, yeah that Holy Ghost keeps haunting me.” This is a song that recognizes the work of faith on the human end and the persistence of the Spirit on the transcendent end.
Next, instead of a song about neutrality where he perceives there should be euphoria, he writes a song about depression and faith. “God & Prozac” is a rare Christian song that plays with a biological origin for depression, use of medication, a good gospel and the difficulty of holding those things together. He writes “Hung up on this heartbreak and the distance between, the way that I’m feeling and what I believe. Just gotta know that you’re with me, yeah I really do, but these feelings just need some help to break through.”
The back half of this album is for the stagnant believer who is in year 20 of the wilderness. “My Heart is a Stranger” and “Manna” are two songs explaining the fatigue Christians may feel waiting for changes in self or circumstance. The former Renzema sings, “I get so lonely waiting for the sun to rise up in the morning waiting for something to change and I don’t know, is it ever gonna go? Or is this just the way I am?” The latter, “After all these years I’ll still praise your name, cause even when I’ve lost my taste for manna, it comes from heaven all the same, every day.”
The closing of this album is particularly unique. Again, Renzema does not leave listeners feeling like triumphant conquerors, he leaves them as somber and grace-dependent. He ends this album with an instrument titled “…I Still Love You…” It features majestic brass echoing the chorus of the song “Manna”. It is a wordless song that say “God, I know I’ve said a lot of things with this one, but I still love you and need you.”
