I came across this song "Destructor" last week and was a little disturbed by two particular lines in it (amongst many). The first line is "To the way you hated your son when you hung all the sins of the world".
Now, I'm semi-familiar with hard-core Reformed theologians but i have NEVER heard one insist that one member of the Trinity hated another member at any time. I believe to suggest that the Father hated the Son could very well be the h word (heresy) (which is a term that I use with great caution). I would love to hear others thoughts on this however.
The second line is, "God will have his glory one way or another". This picture of God is so pathetic and petty I can hardly believe it. "One way or another, even if things hadn't worked out like I planned it, even if I have to violently destroy everyone to prove myself I'm going to get my glory!" Sounds like the caricatured god of Islam.
I believe in God's judgment and in justice but I believe this makes a mockery of justice in it's simplification. He's a tiny, vindictive, violent terrorist who's out to get glory no matter what the cost! That sounds very different than the God that I see in Scripture.
Here is the full song...
"From the first time you flooded the earth.
To the last time you burned off the curse
To the way you hated your son
When you hung all the sins of the world
Heaven will disappear with a roll
The host of God will come to destroy
Sin is a declaration of war
God will have his glory one way or another
In reverence we come to Your throne.
Indebted to Your holy Son
The ripe vine of the earth will be crushed.
And your light will shine over the world."
19 comments:
I am almost scared to ask where this song came from.
haha, it's a song that apparently is sung (or has been) at a church that has the initials of M.H. :)
I figured. Well I still like the teaching. ;)
Dustin - I'm Reformed and I feel the same way. As far as the theology of the song goes, I think the idea of the Father hating the son is tied to a certain way of understanding Jesus' words from the cross, "eloi, eloi, lama sabacthani." I don't know enough about the text to know if that's a fair interpretation, but I'm a little nervous about that phrasing of it. I think the idea is that God hates sin (which needs nuance but is a biblical concept) and Paul says Christ became sin for us (somewhere in 1st or 2nd Corinthians). So, if you set that up as a syllogism, God hates sin -> Christ became sin for us -> the Father hated the Son.
There's a lot about that formulation that makes me really uncomfortable, but I think I see where they're getting it and, strictly speaking, it might not be entirely inaccurate.
As far as God having his glory one way or another... that line makes me really uncomfortable, but again, I think it could be defensible biblically. In Philippians Paul writes that one day every knee will bow and every tongue confess. Again though, I'm really uncomfortable with the image of God being presented here because I think it needs to be nuanced a lot because I don't think the biblical picture of God's wrath is God as an angry teenager wanting to throw with anyone who rubs him the wrong way.
~jake
ps I'd love to hear a bit more about your reasons for not being reformed. I'm a very reluctant reformed guy who feels a real disconnect between certain expressions of reformed theology and biblical teaching so I'd really enjoy talking to someone who seems to be in a similar place :).
jakemeador@gmail.com
Dustin, I also love going to other church's websites and theologically analyzing all of their songs until I can find something worthy of a blog post! Right now I've got a gnarly excel spreadsheet going with crap loads of heretical lyrics from churches in my area.
If you ever want to do a live blog listening party I would totally be down. We could go alphabetically, starting with the Anabaptists, Anglicans and then Arminians. Or we could go chronologically (http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/0c/Protestantbranches.svg)
Let me know!!!
It's great when people troll but don't leave their name.
haha, thanks anon. that was funny.
This is gross.
"Ultimate fighting Jesus with a tattoo on his leg" makes more sense now that I realize His Father hated him...
even if you take out the messed up theology, this is just a bad song. i'm sorry to whoever wrote it. i don't mean to hurt your feelings. i just don't think it's written well. and what a title!! so hardcore! i feel like ACDC should be singing this song.
maybe i could write verses three and four - determinism and chauvinism, respectively. i don't want to be too harsh, but it's like the musical equivalent to sleeveless denim.
I think some of our Reformed friends would take issue with the song too. The only thing I can think of as to why someone would write about the Father hating Jesus would be to use the term to mean he rejected him. At the risk of sounding too seeker sensitive I think that the songs we use should be more or less self-explanatory because if we don't understand what we're saying than I don't see how we could really be worshiping.
Dan nailed it.
The "young, restless, reformed" group is, in my opinion and based on experience, just as diverse and eclectic as any other emerging (pun intended) group. It's not as obvious because we have a few guys who tend to be a lot louder than some of the more moderate voices, but we're still there :).
Yeah, no doubt. you both make a good point. I think the title of my blog post wasn't quite fair. I shouldn't pin this one song on the Reformed tradition knowing that many in the tradition would find fault with it, but I should have gone with, a "reformed" inspired song.
@kelly- that would be my good friend brian. i told him and he said you didn't hurt his feelings...
on another note..bad boys 1 and 2???
when are the mariners just going to blow up their team and start from scratch. true, they don't have a whole lot of value on their team right now...but if they trade washburn and ichiro and putz, they should be able to get some nice young players.
bad boys 2
fine contribution to the discussion Devin. thanks!
How can you guys be surprised that this song came from a church led by Driscoll?
I mean, he has some lame Metallica rip-off song on that one video he did standing in the graveyard and all.
Why do I have a vision of Trogdor reading the lyrics of Destructor?
Thanks for sharing the song... I love it!
Your review is a bit one dimensional and short sighted. Admittedly this is not a traditional/contemporary worship song. If it were revised a bit it would be excellent because it shows another side of God that is often not considered, at least not in musical worship.
The song makes sense from a certain perspective. When Jesus 'became sin', he became the thing that God hated the most. Thus he was able to pour out his wrath and forsake him on the cross, as scripture says.
God's glory 'one way or another' is also perspectival. If we all get what we deserve God is glorified because he is just. But he is also glorified by his mercy and grace. So God is glorified by Christians accepting his grace, and by his wrath on those who reject it because he is just.
There is plenty to criticize here but it only takes an ounce of effort to reconcile the lyrics to scripture.
Does this make a good worship song?
I could never get away with singing this song at my church. It would require too much explaining, and people just dont listen in complete sentences. No matter how much you try to explain a controversial statement too many people wouldnt hear you after said statement.
Just because its scriptural doesnt make it conducive for worship, for example: I would never sing a song about Lot and his daughters, or Noah being drunk and naked, no matter how much it makes a point of God getting glory.
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