Looney Tunes: "That's What Faith Can Do"

If a person communicates a message while maintaining a position of influence, he or she is a teacher. As Christians, we are called to evaluate and discern the teaching that we hear (Phil 1:9, Heb 5:14, 1 Jn 4:1). Therefore remember as the forthcoming songs and messages are examined in this series, the person originating the teaching is not being judged, but the teaching itself. Nothing is more important than the truth and fighting for it is worth the effort.

_______________________

One of the most popular songs in 2009-2010 in the Christian music world was "What Faith Can Do" by Kutless. The song was number one on the Billboard Christian songs chart and was number two overall ranked Christian song according to Billboard's 2009 analysis.


The song is a story of the power of faith. Its thesis is that you, the Christian, are stronger than you even know. Faith can make miracles happen, it can make prayers get answered, it can make a heart brand new. Faith can literally do those things.

I disagree.

Faith is a passageway by which God's power works -- it is not powerful in and of itself. 

Hebrews 11 is the most popular chapter on faith in the entire Bible and it tells us a lot about what this word means. For instance, it says, 

"without faith it is impossible to please Him, for whoever would draw near to God must believe that He exists and that He rewards those who seek Him," (v. 6)


This is essentially what I mean when I say that faith is the passageway for God's power: He requires that we have faith -- not in ourselves -- but in Him.

Looking through Hebrews 11, we see that those who had faith in the Bible had faith to obey God (too many references to list, basically the whole chapter). That is not what is taught in "What Faith Can Do." 

So what is the song teaching?

In this song, Kutless teaches that we have the strength and the power to determine our own destiny. We cause our own miracles, we are the reason our prayers get answered, we change our own hearts, and we will cause ourselves to find our own way. 

The song is all about autonomy.

God wants us to have faith -- faith in His commands and His will for our lives.

This song dangerously encourages the listener to believe in himself without making one mention of God. Seriously. In the image below, I have put the song "What Faith Can Do" side by side with "All I Have is Christ" by Sovereign Grace Music. In red I have highlighted the specific actions described in the song. Kutless focuses on man completing the action, whereas the other song emphasizes Christ. 

I have put all of the references to God (nouns and pronouns) in bold. 

I don't think a lot more needs to be said about the error made by this influential band. It is so sad how the biblical theme of faith was distorted and taught wrongly to Christians. 

If there are any objections to this analysis, please feel free to start a discussion below.

Our goal is to exalt Christ and to obey His commands!