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Ep. 273 - A Christian Perspective on Taylor Swift · The Living Waters Podcast

• 1:04
  Speaker 1: She's still singing songs that ultimately look inside of herself and finds herself as the anti-hero and then tries to celebrate that, tries to demand the world accept her for who she is.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: And the beauty of the gospel.
• 1:19
  Speaker 1: Because here's the thing, I think those young girls, they listen to that and they sense all of their own insecurities, they sense all of their own depravity and there's this like, wow, can I just be depraved and accepted?
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: Can I demand the world accept me for who I am?
• 1:35
  Speaker 1: But there's something so much more beautiful about the gospel, and the gospel is this is that God, that you are known by God so much more than you could ever imagine and you are more fallen than you could ever imagine.
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: But also, through the cross, you are more loved and forgiven than you can ever possibly imagine and one of the things that ultimately, like she actually sings, you are what you love, which is very Augustinian of her, because Augustine pointed out Augustine, there you go.
• 2:11
  Speaker 1: Augustine pointed out that ultimately, we are primarily loving creatures and the problem, the reason why we sin, is because we love the wrong things at the wrong times in the wrong way.
• 2:22
  Speaker 1: And what the gospel does when God changes our hearts is that he reorders our loves to love God first and then to love our neighbor as ourself, where expressive individualism would be love yourself first and then demand everybody loves you second.
• 2:38
  Speaker 1: That's the false gospel of expressive individualism.
• 2:43
  Speaker 1: I think the gospel we find in the scriptures is so much better, so much more freeing than letting your desires rule your life.
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: Friends, ray Comfort has taught me many things over the course of my life.
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: He taught me how to the course of my life, he taught me how to hurt myself.
• 3:10
  Speaker 2: He's taught me how to break things.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: He's taught me how to evangelize.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: But most importantly, friends, ray Comfort has taught me a fact of life, and that is the most amount of times that a piece of paper can be folded over is how many times, ray.
• 3:33
  Speaker 2: Seven times Folded in half, it is Seven times.
• 3:36
  Speaker 2: And when I asked him this morning just to confirm it, he said, quote seven, yes, seven, maybe eight if you use tissue the size of a football field, possibly.
• 3:47
  Speaker 2: So I know this is new news to Oscar and he's already in disbelief, but, oscar, I want to see if we can prove whether or not Ray is right or wrong.
• 3:57
  Speaker 2: Seven, I got to beat seven.
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you can't.
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: I actually think I have.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: Wait, ray, are you saying that's a guarantee?
• 4:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you won't be able to do it more than seven times.
• 4:04
  Speaker 2: I have to fold this seven times and more than seven times.
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: I have to fold this seven times and half.
• 4:07
  Speaker 2: You can't fold it more than seven is what he's saying, that's one You'll do seven max.
• 4:11
  Speaker 3: You won't even probably get to seven.
• 4:14
  Speaker 2: Okay, that's two.
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: Alright, let's see Oscar's folding skills.
• 4:18
  Speaker 2: Did you used to do?
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: What do they call that?
• 4:20
  Speaker 1: Origami.
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: Three Origami, that's three.
• 4:22
  Speaker 2: No, no, I'm at four.
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: No, you're not.
• 4:24
  Speaker 3: No, you're not, let's step up three Wait.
• 4:26
  Speaker 1: One, two, three, four, Ah cheating Okay four.
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: Can we call you an origamist, Would that be?
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: What is the Mexican?
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: version of origami.
• 4:38
  Speaker 2: I got nothing.
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: Origamios.
• 4:39
  Speaker 3: So that's five.
• 4:40
  Speaker 3: Five, you're coming up to six next.
• 4:42
  Speaker 3: Six Max is seven you may not even be able to do seven.
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: He can't do seven.
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: He's dropped on the floor to try and get rid of the thing.
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: Can you do seven?
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: I got seven.
• 4:53
  Speaker 2: Seven, Try eight.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: Oscar Wow, Seven happened.
• 4:58
  Speaker 2: Ray Comfort was right.
• 5:01
  Speaker 2: Well, it's a well-known fact.
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: It's not mine.
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: So this is like.
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: This is gospel truth, now right.
• 5:09
  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's just never, never fall.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, well, that was seven, and then watch this.
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: Unfold and fold the other way.
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: Eight a nice try, oscar.
• 5:16
  Speaker 2: That was wow.
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: The lessons we learned from ray comfort thank you, it was nothing yeah, now, ray, there was this other thing that you taught me years ago.
• 5:24
  Speaker 2: Um, it's this thing you do, where you can cut a piece of paper, you fold it a certain way and then it spells out the word hell, oh, and then there's a cross.
• 5:33
  Speaker 2: Yes, it's wonderful.
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: That thing is pretty cool, yeah, and it's a little story that goes with it.
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: Have we ever thought of making a track.
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: I think we did no, yes, we did seriously.
• 5:42
  Speaker 3: Many years ago I made a track telling people like I've been here 21 years.
• 5:45
  Speaker 2: Must have been just before you got here.
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: Was it a flop?
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: Not really, just that not many people knew what it was.
• 5:54
  Speaker 2: Let's do it again, right?
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: All right, you know, there's something else that blew my mind this morning, and that's what reminded me of this thing.
• 6:03
  Speaker 3: Ray, what happened to?
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: it.
• 6:04
  Speaker 2: Do I have a brain?
• 6:06
  Speaker 2: I saw these guys.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: I think they were actually in india.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: Ray do a german accent put down that gun never ceases to get me.
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: Uh, but there were these indian guys, and they were actually standing on each other's shoulders.
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: Why?
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: Just for fun?
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: Just for fun, just for fun, because the shoulders were there.
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: Guess how many of them were stacked up.
• 6:32
  Speaker 2: Well, we have to say, like four no, balancing each other, no.
• 6:37
  Speaker 1: Just stack right on.
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: I'm going to say seven.
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: Seven.
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: Let's go, raise maximum number.
• 6:44
  Speaker 1: Oh, I see what you did there I see the connection.
• 6:47
  Speaker 2: There's always a connection Dot com Too early.
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: Oh sorry, but it was seriously insane to see these guys like on each, but they kept getting smaller and smaller.
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: There was a little kid, yeah right, ray was at the top.
• 7:06
  Speaker 3: Yeah, thank you.
• 7:07
  Speaker 3: So the whole lot of them mounted to nine feet.
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: No, it was pretty high, but they were shaking, like all of them were shaking.
• 7:14
  Speaker 2: I'm like, if this keeps going, they're going to.
• 7:16
  Speaker 2: We should try that.
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: So what was it?
• 7:18
  Speaker 3: A circus, or?
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: something I don't know.
• 7:19
  Speaker 2: It was just like one of those quick shorts that was like nine seconds long, If the four of us were going to do it.
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Who would be at the bottom?
• 7:27
  Speaker 1: What would the order?
• 7:29
  Speaker 3: be Strongest, had to be at the bottom.
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: You'd be at the bottom, which would be me Of course You'd be at the top.
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that would be.
• 7:36
  Speaker 2: We should do that One of those.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: Should we Diamonds?
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: Should we do that?
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: It's the short guy that's got the most dangerous job.
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: The short guy's the contortion.
• 7:50
  Speaker 2: You see that, like some of these contortionists, that's crazy.
• 7:53
  Speaker 3: It's insane.
• 7:54
  Speaker 3: They can fold themselves more than seven times.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: Some of them.
• 7:57
  Speaker 3: I bet they could.
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: This is true, but you know you really you look at like even parkour, Like I don't even understand that, Ray, you know what parkour is?
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: No, it's those guys that jump like off high buildings.
• 8:10
  Speaker 3: Oh, I've watched those.
• 8:11
  Speaker 3: Yeah, they're crazy.
• 8:12
  Speaker 2: But it's like, I guess, a science they've learned where they crumple their body or they bend their legs.
• 8:17
  Speaker 3: I could almost do that in my youth.
• 8:19
  Speaker 3: I used to roll down the stairs when I was a kid, deliberately.
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: That's what happened.
• 8:25
  Speaker 3: Deliberately, yeah.
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: What?
• 8:26
  Speaker 2: What happened Deliberately?
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah, because now you do it on accident when you're young, I used to jump over six foot fences with great energy when you're about 11 or something like that, and you can do things like that when you're in your early teens.
• 8:37
  Speaker 3: I still jump fences.
• 8:39
  Speaker 1: You do, I sure do.
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: Actually, no joke.
• 8:41
  Speaker 1: We were leaving something and we were with a group of friends and there was this fence that was meant to divide cars but not people, and there was this tiny little corridor where, like, hundreds of people were piling through and in my mind, I'm like man, I don't what, like I never want to be too old where I don't jump a fence, you know.
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: And so I jumped the fence and I was very proud of myself.
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: I feel the same way about roller coasters Seriously.
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: That's why I keep riding them, oscar.
• 9:07
  Speaker 3: Yes, sir, same way about roller coasters, seriously, that's why I keep riding them, oscar.
• 9:10
  Speaker 1: Yes, sir, did you check what was on the other side?
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: of the fence.
• 9:12
  Speaker 2: It was a pit with crocodiles in it.
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: Just jump a fence wherever, whatever.
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah consequences.
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah consequences.
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: Fences that kill you.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: I did.
• 9:19
  Speaker 1: I pulled a Ray Comfort this morning.
• 9:21
  Speaker 3: Oh, that's neat, that's wonderful, that's terrific, is it, though?
• 9:24
  Speaker 1: I picked up a cup of coffee and I put it in my cup holder in the center console of my car and I got to the office.
• 9:32
  Speaker 1: It was a full cup.
• 9:33
  Speaker 1: I hadn't drank any of it yet and I went to go pick it up and it perfectly flipped over and poured out in my cup holder, which there's no, there's no crack, so it just stayed there in my cup holder.
• 9:45
  Speaker 1: Did you drink it, oscar?
• 9:48
  Speaker 1: I did what any reasonable coffee drinker would do I got a straw.
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: No, so you're saying that the hot coffee permeated the cardboard and made it soft, or something?
• 9:58
  Speaker 1: I think no, I re-comforted it.
• 10:00
  Speaker 1: I picked the cup up and it just like flipped upside down and poured out.
• 10:03
  Speaker 1: Oh, that's wonderful yeah.
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: Oh, that's crazy, but no, you know, thinking of crazy things, you do.
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: You really start realizing that you're aging when you can't do things that you used to just like, relish and love to do?
• 10:18
  Speaker 2: Well, I used to be able to put my leg behind my head.
• 10:20
  Speaker 2: No, you did not.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: I did.
• 10:22
  Speaker 2: I want a picture of you this morning I was thinking about it, did you try it?
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: It didn't get like above my other calf when I was trying to do it.
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: I'm like, okay, it's over.
• 10:31
  Speaker 3: I did a somersault about two years ago.
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: No.
• 10:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I just thought I'd love to do it.
• 10:35
  Speaker 3: Then I spent about the next two minutes trying to get my head together because everything was spinning, which you don't get when you're a little kid.
• 10:42
  Speaker 1: I turned 40 on Sunday and my family started.
• 10:46
  Speaker 1: We started talking we're all pretty competitive and they all started telling me they can beat me in a race.
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: So we went outside and did 50 yard dashes and I beat them all, but I was so exhausted afterwards yeah, I was so exhausted, though.
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's funny.
• 11:00
  Speaker 2: You said somersault, right?
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: I remember when my girls were young and I'd say do a somersault, do a somersault.
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: And one of my daughter' name is Summer, and one day Julia got sad.
• 11:11
  Speaker 2: She goes.
• 11:15
  Speaker 2: I want to do a Julia somersault.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: It was awesome.
• 11:16
  Speaker 2: But no, I used to be able to take my hand and my arm and take it around.
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: I remember that Ow, you're not anymore that hurt.
• 11:26
  Speaker 2: I used to be able to bring it all the way around and grab the earlobe on the other side.
• 11:30
  Speaker 3: I remember you doing that.
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: You remember that right?
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: Yes, yeah, yeah, there's no.
• 11:37
  Speaker 1: Seriously Try it with the other hand.
• 11:39
  Speaker 1: Let me see.
• 11:40
  Speaker 1: I just want to see him do it again.
• 11:42
  Speaker 3: I remember I used to be able to get up when I fell down.
• 11:51
  Speaker 2: I fall and I can't get up.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: Remember those.
• 11:52
  Speaker 2: No, but seriously, like you really start realizing like this is like it's our bodies change, but it frustrates me.
• 11:56
  Speaker 2: I am going to force myself to be able to do that again because I don't want to not be able to do something.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: You feel the same way about things.
• 12:03
  Speaker 3: No, pain changes things.
• 12:06
  Speaker 2: The pain of zw Zwayne.
• 12:07
  Speaker 2: I feel great.
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: I don't know what you guys are talking about.
• 12:11
  Speaker 1: Oscar, welcome to my 40s club.
• 12:13
  Speaker 2: I've only got a couple years left in this club.
• 12:15
  Speaker 2: Ray, do you wish you were 40 again?
• 12:17
  Speaker 3: No, Really no.
• 12:19
  Speaker 3: I wish I was about 17.
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: I'd stop at 40.
• 12:20
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I'd love to be able to go out surfing and be able to breathe at the same time.
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: You really do take youth for granted, man.
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: Anyway, all right, friends, here's another cool, classy comment, another card handed to me in person at that same Focal Point banquet for our brother, mike Fabares.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: This is from Frances Eng.
• 12:44
  Speaker 2: She said Dear Easy and Rachel.
• 12:47
  Speaker 2: Plug for my lovely wife who, by the way, often gets very frustrated because she'll be exercising, listening to the podcast and we'll be talking about her and I'll be like I don't know, throwing her under the bus or something.
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: I can't defend myself.
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: She gets all frustrated, I can't defend myself, all right, anyway, this is from again Frances Ang.
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: She said Dear Easy and Rachel.
• 13:10
  Speaker 2: First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for all of you, because of your faith is proclaimed in all the world.
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: I first heard about Easy at the Adult Bible Fellowship at our church, which is Compass great church, compass Bible Church, when you did the interview with Pastor Kellen.
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: That led me to Living Waters and Rachel's Page, joyful Mothers.
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: Plug for Rachel's Page, joyful Mothers.
• 13:33
  Speaker 2: It's got about 90,000 followers.
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: Wow, crazy.
• 13:36
  Speaker 2: My first episode was Finding Calm Amid your Busyness, or the Busyness of Life.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: That's the podcast.
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: That's what she means.
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: She came to the podcast.
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: That episode changed my perspective on something that God planned, that God had been teaching me and that was.
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: He understood that all the good things were not necessarily the things he ought to do.
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: Kevin DeYoung, that conversation really put it in perspective.
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: The the reminders I needed when I went about doing the things in my daily life.
• 14:13
  Speaker 3: I know, I feel so bad.
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: We often use your quotes in the episode in our Thrive Marriage Group at Compass to stir each other up on toward God's truth in many different subjects.
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: It's incredible how God causes what you guys do to encourage so many probably far more people than you will ever know, until you reach heaven one day.
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: Wow, thank you so much.
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: It was really really a delight to meet you, francis.
• 14:38
  Speaker 2: You were a real blessing, and she gave me a big bag of a bunch of goodies for me and only me.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: Anyway, thank you, francis, it was a delight to meet you and thank you for the encouraging card.
• 14:50
  Speaker 2: Really, really a blessing.
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: All right, friends, time for another radically revolutionary resource Hell's best kept secret book.
• 15:00
  Speaker 2: Ooh, we're plugging the book today.
• 15:02
  Speaker 2: Ray, you know I think the book really gets overlooked because you have so many other books, but you know it's the sermon or the video that's usually mentioned.
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: But, ray, the book is good.
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: It's an overlooked book.
• 15:13
  Speaker 2: It's an overlooked book, an overlooked, overcooked book.
• 15:16
  Speaker 2: We can call your cookbook an overcooked book, but Ray, how's?
• 15:22
  Speaker 2: The Skep Secret is a very important message it used to be called Poured Out for a Thirsty World.
• 15:28
  Speaker 3: Did you know that?
• 15:29
  Speaker 3: Yes, yeah, I did too.
• 15:30
  Speaker 2: Among your 30,000 other titles that you've tried.
• 15:33
  Speaker 2: On that book, we did try it, yeah, but get it, friends.
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: It's got a life-changing message.
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: And this is the expanded edition with Study Guy.
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: And don't forget the Living Waters mug and the Evidence Study Bible.
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: All that Living Waters.
• 15:48
  Speaker 2: That's the old man painful version.
• 15:53
  Speaker 2: Good job, oscar, now that you're 40, you nailed it.
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: You nailed it.
• 15:57
  Speaker 2: All right, friends, enough of the silliness, more silliness.
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: Today we're talking about a Christian perspective on Taylor Swift.
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: Ray, are you a Swifty?
• 16:12
  Speaker 3: No, I'm not.
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: You know what a Swifty?
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: Is yes, I just had to be lusty if you're a Swifty yeah following after Taylor Swift followers, Now friends.
• 16:21
  Speaker 2: Are you guys ready for the hate mail?
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: Oh, I'm ready.
• 16:23
  Speaker 2: Let me tell you, and that's exactly what I was about to say.
• 16:25
  Speaker 3: But let me tell you I'm into some secular music.
• 16:27
  Speaker 3: I Let me tell you and that's exactly what I was about to say, but let me tell you I'm into some secular music.
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: I absolutely love it.
• 16:30
  Speaker 3: So we're not saying you know, play organ music at home by yourself.
• 16:32
  Speaker 3: We're saying you can have the liberty to listen to all sorts of music.
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: Romans 14, 21, 22.
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: A being that condemns not himself and that thing which he allows and myself, and I know a lot of my friends, and Scotty included, absolutely loved the Beatles in the early days, when their music was just so good Makes me instantly remember things that give me instant pleasure.
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: I love Katchaturian, who was just an amazing composer.
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: I love the Blue Danube, which is secular, I don't know how it goes.
• 17:03
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah.
• 17:03
  Speaker 3: Yeah, no Bottom but bottom.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: No, no, hold on.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: Let me tell you my first introduction to that song and I thought it was like made for the movie.
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: But it was something way back when I was young.
• 17:14
  Speaker 2: It was with Jerry Lewis and it was some song where he was boxing or something, or a movie he was boxing and it had that tune.
• 17:20
  Speaker 2: He was like getting punched in the face or punching someone or something.
• 17:27
  Speaker 3: There's also a song called it's a Time to Say Goodbye, oh yeah.
• 17:31
  Speaker 3: It absolutely just gives me Is that, taylor Swift.
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: It's a time to say goodbye.
• 17:38
  Speaker 1: Well, he used to like that song yeah.
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: We were actually filming Las Vegas, one of our programs, and the big fountain behind us and I can't remember what it is, but that famous hotel.
• 17:48
  Speaker 2: Bellagio, bellagio bellagio.
• 17:49
  Speaker 3: They were playing that song and I just about melted oh I remember that right and I think maybe you or someone.
• 17:54
  Speaker 3: That song gets me every time we didn't know what it was and I just had it in the back of my mind.
• 17:58
  Speaker 3: And then I heard it years later and I found out the title and, uh, went and listened to it being played.
• 18:03
  Speaker 3: So, yeah, there is secular music that is absolutely phenomenal and it just makes you think of the greatness of God, makes you feel good.
• 18:10
  Speaker 3: And so we're not condemning all secular music, we're just saying there's some music that's wrapped in the world.
• 18:15
  Speaker 3: We shouldn't even have to address this.
• 18:17
  Speaker 2: Right, yeah, and I think that you know.
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: I'm glad you made that point, ray.
• 18:21
  Speaker 2: You know, we really try to be cautious in what we say when it comes to convictions.
• 18:27
  Speaker 2: We all have different convictions, you know.
• 18:29
  Speaker 2: My wife and I we've had conviction for years that we mainly listen, you know, to Christian music, and it's not because secular music is sinful, but we just made that decision based on, you know, our sense of what we wanted to fill our hearts and minds with what we wanted to recall, right, conver.
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: I had.
• 18:45
  Speaker 3: One of my greatest joys is driving back with you after we did some filming and playing neil diamonds music to you for the first time and you got to appreciate some of that.
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: Oh yeah, I'd never.
• 18:54
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I never really listened to it, it was just make sure, did you repent?
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: um well, I'm still doing penance, okay over that, I've got 30 lashes.
• 19:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I realized I had a neil diamond shaped hole in my heart with diamonds, uh, yeah yeah, so my point is that look we all have different convictions and again, ours is not extreme.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: It's not like we could never listen to a second song, or it's not like we never say, oh, what was that song, I want to hear it, or whatever.
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: But just as the norm, we listen to mainly Christian music, you know.
• 19:25
  Speaker 2: But others have different convictions and that's what I love about the difference between us.
• 19:29
  Speaker 2: And, by the way, friends, mark is not with us today.
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: It's just the three of us, so you're going to have to do without Mark's extraordinary wisdom, but I love the fact.
• 19:38
  Speaker 3: He's at a Taylor.
• 19:39
  Speaker 2: Swift conference.
• 19:41
  Speaker 3: That's where.
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: Mark is.
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: He's a Swifty, but I love the fact that do have different convictions on things that are not consequential, and that there is that latitude within the faith.
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: I love that because if everyone's the same, you should be concerned.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: You have some cultic element going on there.
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: If every single thing is exactly the same, I think the main no one is the same as you.
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: Thank God for that.
• 20:11
  Speaker 2: But it's good that we examine the foundation of things like, hey, is this dishonoring to the Lord, Is this blasphemous, Is this grieving the Spirit?
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: And just to have those broad principles when we examine our convictions and then to each give one another that latitude.
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: But I think there are certain things that we need to step back and look at and say, hey, is this something that is healthy?
• 20:36
  Speaker 2: Is it good, Is it wise?
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: And to challenge each other.
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: You might land in a different place on your convictions, but at least let's sharpen each other and be humble enough to listen.
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: But, Oscar, you said hate mail, and for good reason, because and that's why we're dealing with this today because there's this phenomenon surrounding Taylor Swift that is one of the most bizarre things I've ever seen.
• 20:58
  Speaker 2: I mean, it's almost beyond like a Beatle type mania in that there's this like crazy loyal devotion.
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: I mean someone could say, oh yeah, I don't really like the Beatles hair.
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: Someone would say, oh okay, whatever, but like anything-.
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: You're making me mad.
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, Anything anyone says about Taylor Swift, oh, you're dead.
• 21:18
  Speaker 2: Basically.
• 21:18
  Speaker 1: I heard a pundit.
• 21:19
  Speaker 1: They were about to say something.
• 21:21
  Speaker 1: I don't even know if it was super critical, but they were just gonna make a critique.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: I think the critique was simply that they're not a fan of Taylor Swift and right before they said it they paused and they're like please, guys, I have a family.
• 21:32
  Speaker 1: Like just knowing the Taylor Swift like phenomenon that is behind it.
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: But that gets into.
• 21:39
  Speaker 1: You know somebody, somebody from Medium, wrote an article titled Take Me to Church the Religious Experience of a Concert, and it reminded me of a book that I read years ago called Strange Rites, in which the author made an argument that we have these desires for liturgy and religious experience, that even when people are living in a totally secular world, they're not thinking anything of God, they're still act because they are made.
• 22:07
  Speaker 1: We are all made to worship.
• 22:09
  Speaker 1: Right, that's something foundational that the scriptures teach us as image bearers.
• 22:13
  Speaker 1: We are made to worship God and there's never a moment where an individual is not worshiping.
• 22:21
  Speaker 1: The question isn't whether or not somebody is worshiping.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: The question is, what are you worshiping?
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: And so for many in the secular world, the concert going, music festival experience is a form of a religious experience.
• 22:37
  Speaker 1: As they go off and buy tickets and travel to locations, it's often like a pilgrimage when they gather and they talk to other people that they've never met before about the music, the exchange, mythological.
• 22:52
  Speaker 1: You know who is this song about?
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: Was it about this ex-boyfriend or that ex-boyfriend?
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: When you get in front of that stage and you lift your voices and you sing together.
• 23:00
  Speaker 1: The author of Strange Rites pointed out.
• 23:01
  Speaker 1: When we sing communally the author of Strange Rites pointed out when we sing communally, what we're actually doing is affirming truths in the hearts of the people around us.
• 23:11
  Speaker 1: And so when I stand and I sing all glory be to Christ, my voice to me matters less than the voices I hear around me.
• 23:20
  Speaker 1: They're infusing truth into my heart when they my congregation is singing all glory be to Christ and I'm in that congregation.
• 23:29
  Speaker 1: So when you go to a concert no matter whose concert, and everybody lifts their voices and sings together, we are infusing some narrative into our hearts.
• 23:40
  Speaker 1: In other words, why is there this fanatic adoration, protection of Taylor Swift, of what it does?
• 23:50
  Speaker 1: It's not just her, sometimes it's other figures as well.
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: It's because it is, it's a form of, like this religious experience to follow to, to go to the concert.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: It's a, it's a liturgy and we protect.
• 24:00
  Speaker 1: We protect the things that we love.
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: Wow, that's so, so true, oscar, and well put.
• 24:06
  Speaker 2: And you know and again I love what you had said right, like music, it has, you know, certain elements in it and resonates with the heart.
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: And that's why there's some songs that are beautiful.
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: They're not crass, they don't have profanity in them, they're not based in humanistic philosophy, they're about, you know, about love or beauty or whatever.
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: But then it drifts into other areas and that's what we're going to talk about.
• 24:28
  Speaker 2: But, ray, music is powerful.
• 24:32
  Speaker 3: Very powerful, especially lyrics.
• 24:34
  Speaker 3: They carry a message Super Bowl, you'll pay millions of dollars just to have 30 seconds into someone's brain.
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: Why would they do that?
• 24:44
  Speaker 3: Because they know we can be influenced so easily.
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: So lyrics and music can either send us to the glory of God or somewhere else.
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: I remember years ago when I was in drug prevention work I may have mentioned this before, I don't know, tell me if I have where I studied the lyrics of some rock groups and I was horrified, like the Dead Kennedys, a very popular group years ago.
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: The lyrics of one of their wholesome songs was I kill children.
• 25:12
  Speaker 3: I love to watch them die, kill children, make their mums cry, crush them under my car.
• 25:14
  Speaker 3: I love to hear them scream, feed them poison candy, spoil their halloween.
• 25:16
  Speaker 3: Wow, that song.
• 25:18
  Speaker 3: That's one of their songs.
• 25:19
  Speaker 3: And so I I went to the media and I says I want to put some advertisements on television, um, warning parents about the lyrics of some heavy metal rock music because they're so bad.
• 25:28
  Speaker 3: I told them and they said okay, and they let me do it because of my high profile in the drug prevention center in the city and across the nation in those days.
• 25:37
  Speaker 3: So I said okay, but they said you can't quote the lyrics because you're violating copyright, and so I couldn't do anything.
• 25:44
  Speaker 3: Anyway, I went ahead and made the advertisements and just said please read the lyrics of your kids, what they're listening to, because some of them are really bad.
• 25:52
  Speaker 3: And then I was sitting in my car just after they were broadcast and I thought this is going to make some people really mad, and a guy walked right in front of my car.
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: He turned around and stared at me really intently.
• 26:02
  Speaker 3: Then he came around to the driver's side and really intently.
• 26:08
  Speaker 3: Then he came around to the driver's side and I wound down the window and he got his fist, pulled it back and threw $20 into my lap and he walked off.
• 26:12
  Speaker 3: And so I'll never forget that, that experience.
• 26:16
  Speaker 2: But, yeah, taylor Swift's lyrics, her latest album, which is called Tortured Poets Department, and by the way, Ray, if I can give a disclaimer for any parents that are listening now, this is a little disclaimer.
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: We know a lot of youngsters listen to this podcast, actually, which is such a blessing to us but you need to discern right now if you may want to pause the podcast or have your kids go in the other room or whatever, because we are going to read some lyrics.
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: We're not going to say the filthy words, but we're going to maybe say the letter they start with.
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: But it's important again for you to hear these things as parents, because we know there are some of you that are listening and your kids listen to Taylor Swift and maybe innocently.
• 26:53
  Speaker 2: So, right, you haven't really listened to the music, you don't know the nuances of what she's saying in some of her even more recent songs and even some of the past.
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: So we just want to give that disclaimer.
• 27:03
  Speaker 2: I'm going on a little bit to give you time to get your kids out of the room or to pause this Perhaps you could sing just for 30 seconds.
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 27:12
  Speaker 1: Whoa, who just hit, play on the Taylor Swift album All right right.
• 27:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and it's not just her immodesty, because she's incredibly immodest when it comes to her gestures on stage, relatively immodest when it comes to her gestures on stage, but uh, and the tortured poets department track to who's going to hold you?
• 27:29
  Speaker 3: Hold you like me?
• 27:30
  Speaker 3: Nobody.
• 27:31
  Speaker 3: No, f body, nobody.
• 27:34
  Speaker 3: This is Taylor Swift, someone who professes to be a Christian.
• 27:37
  Speaker 3: God gave um, god saved the most judgmental creeps who say they want what's best for me, sanctimoniously performing soliloquies.
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: I'll never see she's pro-abortion very strongly.
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: She came back.
• 27:50
  Speaker 3: Sorry, she said in one of the lyrics.
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: This is the second track.
• 27:53
  Speaker 3: We came back when the heat died down, went to my parents and they came around.
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: All the wine mums are still holding out, but F and she says the word M, it's over, wow.
• 28:06
  Speaker 3: So this is.
• 28:08
  Speaker 3: There should be no argument.
• 28:10
  Speaker 3: Just don't listen to Taylor Swift.
• 28:11
  Speaker 3: It's of the world, it's horrible.
• 28:14
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah.
• 28:15
  Speaker 2: And you know it's interesting, oscar, what you said earlier about that man who said man, I have a family.
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: But yeah, I mean, I was at a Christian in a Christian setting and there were young people and I brought up Taylor Swift because it's like you almost have to these days because it's such a weird little cult following and you could just see some of the girls squirming and some of the guys started Did you get beat up Pretty much close to it?
• 28:42
  Speaker 2: But some of the guys started looking at the girls and like kind of snickering, like oh cause.
• 28:45
  Speaker 2: I said, look, and I know I know you guys are going to hate me for this, but let me be honest with you and it was like you could just tell, like so.
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: So there is this, this thing that's going on, and there is this image, I think still held by some parents, that she's just a squeaky, clean, nice, innocent, you know, woman and that's just not the case.
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: Maybe there was a time, way back when Well, she's in her thirties now, yeah, but way back when she was young.
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: I mean, she was, she was a start like 18, 19.
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: I think she was really young and sweet, christian Beck.
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's how it always starts with a lot of these musicians.
• 29:16
  Speaker 3: With Elvis.
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, but but, oscar, do you think these days, like there's almost an intentional agenda by their labels or their publicists to like get them to do?
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: Because it's like almost everyone remember Britney Spears shaved her head and started doing these crazy things.
• 29:32
  Speaker 2: Justin Bieber, he started, like you know, doing crazy stuff with his car getting arrested.
• 29:38
  Speaker 2: And Madonna she was weird.
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: Yeah, madonna, I mean all these it like seems like they start doing something, maybe to get more accepted and edgy with the older kids, or what do you think?
• 29:49
  Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it's certainly a great model if you're looking at it, If I'm looking at it from like a secular marketing perspective.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: So I don't even wanna talk conspiracy theory.
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: Let me just look at, let me put my marketing hat on here and put it like this Like if I can get you to listen to somebody, if I throw cuss lyrics, if it's vulgar right at the front, that immediately cuts out a mass audience, right, which is younger generations or parents that are concerned about that.
• 30:19
  Speaker 1: But if the first pieces of product that I put out there are squeaky clean, they sound more conservative in nature, they're about silly things, you know, et cetera, et cetera, then I capture a particular audience.
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: And once you get a loyal the quote is the important thing is once you get a loyal fan base, that fan base will I'm using air quotes mature alongside of you.
• 30:46
  Speaker 1: You will go from PG to PG-13 to mature audience only Because you're connected to the personality, right, that's exactly right, and so I think you know I don't need to be, I don't need to spin a conspiracy theory here.
• 30:57
  Speaker 1: I would just tell you if I'm a record label thinking about marketing the next 18 year old yeah, the first few albums.
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna want it to be super squeaky clean.
• 31:13
  Speaker 2: And then after that, we brought in our horizons a bit.
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: Wow, well, let me read this from billboardcom this is this actually surprised me.
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: Who's the guy, bill?
• 31:16
  Speaker 2: But he was bored, yeah, so he started a website, dot com.
• 31:21
  Speaker 2: Um, yeah, oh, I didn't even.
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: I didn't even do the resource of the day.
• 31:25
  Speaker 2: Wow, we'll have to get back to that awkward.
• 31:27
  Speaker 2: Awkward because you said dot com and it reminded me.
• 31:31
  Speaker 2: Um, yeah, so the lord says taylor.
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: Swift has always been explicit in her songs, delivering crystal clear messages with uber specific details, and in the last five years, she's also been explicit in the parental advisory definition of the word, meaning she's now comfortable dropping an F-bomb here and there.
• 31:49
  Speaker 2: When Swift released her sixth studio album, reputation, in 2017, her return to music after three years was a triumphant one, as she took control of her own narrative and cemented her transformation from America's sweetheart to proudly feminist idol.
• 32:04
  Speaker 2: And her declaration in the album cut I did something bad that if a man asks SH, then I owe him nothing formally marked her drive into the world of cuss words With Lover in 2019 came the line.
• 32:19
  Speaker 2: I'd be a B-I-T-C-H, not a baller from the man.
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: But Swift's first explicitly explicit track did not arrive until her pandemic era 2020 sisters album, folklore and evermore, opening the former with the line I'm doing good, I'm on the new sh was just the start.
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: Iconic lyrics like what a shame she effed in the head.
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: She's effed in the head, they said, follow shortly after On her 10th studio set, midnight's.
• 32:49
  Speaker 2: The lyrics have become more colorful than ever.
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: The 13-track project includes six explicit songs with the curse words ranging from hell to FN to one we surely did not have on our bingo card, and I won't even do this one because it's so bad.
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: So guys.
• 33:08
  Speaker 3: It's interesting how the world describes these that colorful.
• 33:12
  Speaker 2: Yeah, no, it's filthy, yeah, colorful.
• 33:14
  Speaker 2: You know she's getting edgy she's.
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: But, christian, listen, this is what your kids, if they're listening to her, are listening to.
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: This is what you're paying for when you're sending them to her concert, when she's gyrating on stage, dressed very sensually, using curse words, and now she's drifting into directly blaspheming God.
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: And this is where the concern again heightens even more Witchcraft and things like that, what's that Witchcraft?
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, and we'll get into some of those here.
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: But, ray, some people like have this mindset of what's the big deal?
• 33:56
  Speaker 2: My kids are going to hear cuss words all around in society anyway, so it's fine.
• 34:00
  Speaker 2: Why make a big deal out of?
• 34:01
  Speaker 3: it.
• 34:01
  Speaker 3: Yeah, what book are you reading?
• 34:03
  Speaker 3: You know you're reading the scriptures.
• 34:04
  Speaker 3: You say whatsoever.
• 34:05
  Speaker 3: Things are pure of good report.
• 34:06
  Speaker 3: Think on these things.
• 34:07
  Speaker 3: Where's your fear of God?
• 34:08
  Speaker 3: You know God says be careful what comes out of your mouth, be careful what's in your heart.
• 34:13
  Speaker 3: And so if you've got that sort of attitude, how do you know you're saved?
• 34:16
  Speaker 3: Why do you take the label Christian if you're not prepared to live up?
• 34:22
  Speaker 1: You know, I wanna.
• 34:23
  Speaker 1: I think it's.
• 34:25
  Speaker 1: I love the important reality of looking at the curse words and that being a reason to stop listening.
• 34:33
  Speaker 1: I think another way of approaching this, too, is what is the story that is being told?
• 34:40
  Speaker 1: What's the narrative?
• 34:42
  Speaker 1: We are narrative driven creatures.
• 34:46
  Speaker 1: We tell stories.
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: It is in our nature and we come to understand truth about ourselves and the world around us through story.
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: God reveals himself through a story.
• 34:56
  Speaker 1: The Bible isn't just a bunch of one-liners for us to get to know God.
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: It is the story of God reconciling the world to himself.
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: It is in our nature to come to understand things about ourselves and the world through story, and so it's beyond the language, right, the foul language, and it's more to me about what is the story that she's saying, and one of the things that I try to do in the way that I interact with culture and I borrow this from Acts 17, which is Paul he listens to the poets of the age and he finds areas in which they may be longing for God or he finds areas in which they are contradicting the better story, the greater story of God reconciling the world to himself.
• 35:43
  Speaker 1: And so when you look at like, I try to look at Taylor Swift through that lens, and it's You're suggesting in Taylor Swift tracked.
• 35:51
  Speaker 1: Well, actually I'm gonna reference oh, Taylor Swift tracked.
• 35:56
  Speaker 3: I see what you did there A million dollar bill.
• 35:58
  Speaker 3: Taylor Swift tracked With the youth.
• 36:02
  Speaker 1: So one of the things that you know, looking at the song that you guys were quoting Guilty as Sin in her newer song.
• 36:09
  Speaker 1: Someone pointed out that Taylor Swift, throughout her entire career, has been longing to throw caution to the wind, to express herself, whether that means self-satisfaction or self-sabotage.
• 36:22
  Speaker 1: And Swift this is what they say Swift's speculation touch on a deeply human dilemma what should we do with our desires and what do our desires do to us?
• 36:35
  Speaker 1: How does our desires shape who we are?
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: Final quote from this article she longs for what she feels internally to cohere with the external world, to be consummated in relationships.
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: But desire cannot satisfy.
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: Human beings cannot live on desire alone.
• 36:59
  Speaker 1: And that's the key here is that, ultimately, if you sit back and you listen to Taylor Swift songs, she is singing expressive individualism.
• 37:07
  Speaker 1: This is a phrase that we've used on this podcast before.
• 37:10
  Speaker 1: The narrative of our day, the false gospel of our day, is look inside of yourself, you be you, you do you and demand that the world adjusts according to who you find in your own heart.
• 37:24
  Speaker 1: And the problem is is what has that led to for the life of Taylor Swift?
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: In one ways, you can think well, she's like a multi-billionaire, she's dating a star.
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: She's got all these fans and worshipers.
• 37:37
  Speaker 1: Or you can look at it as she's a 30 something year old woman still singing 15 year old breakup songs.
• 37:43
  Speaker 1: She's still singing songs that ultimately look inside of herself and finds herself as the anti-hero and then tries to celebrate that, tries to demand the world accept her for who she is.
• 37:58
  Speaker 1: And the beauty of the gospel cause.
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: Here's the thing.
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: I think those young girls, they listen to that and they sense all of their own insecurities, they sense all of their own depravity.
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: And there's this like wow, can I just be depraved and accepted?
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: Can I demand the world accept me for who I am?
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: But there's something so much more beautiful about the gospel, and the gospel is this is that God, that you are known by God so much more than you could ever imagine and you are more fallen than you could ever imagine.
• 38:33
  Speaker 1: But also, through the cross, you are more loved and forgiven than you can ever possibly imagine.
• 38:43
  Speaker 1: And one of the things that ultimately, like she actually sings, you are what you love, which is augustinian of her, because augustine pointed out augustine, there you go.
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: Augustine pointed out that ultimately, we are primarily loving creatures and that the problem, the reason why we sin is because we love the wrong things at the wrong times, in the wrong way.
• 39:03
  Speaker 1: And what the gospel does when god changes our hearts is that he reorders our loves to love God first and then to love our neighbor as ourself, where expressive individualism would be love yourself first and then demand everybody loves you second.
• 39:19
  Speaker 1: That's the gospel, that's the false gospel of expressive individualism.
• 39:23
  Speaker 1: I think the gospel of, I think the gospel we find in the scriptures is so much better, so much more freeing than letting your desires rule your life.
• 39:34
  Speaker 1: Oh, that's great, oscar.
• 39:36
  Speaker 2: I loved what you shared because, as you were sharing it, I was envisioning like a dad or a mom sitting down with their child and explaining to them why it's not wise to listen to Taylor Swift, why it's not good because of the clash of worldviews, you know, and what's drawing their hearts away from the Lord toward idolizing a woman who's giving really a non, you know, an unbiblical and anti-Christian worldview message, you know, and I love that, because we have to have that tenderness in us as we're explaining this, you know, and we also have to remember that we love Taylor Swift.
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: You know, this is not a let's bash Taylor Swift because we can't stand her.
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: We're Christians, our heart should be for every person and look, taylor Swift might, she might listen to this.
• 40:25
  Speaker 2: Who knows?
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: I mean we someone just liked one of my posts on Instagram that has 2 million followers.
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: We've had, we've had athletes and, and you know, uh, professional athletes and and and celebrities who've come in contact with our, with our material, and so I hope she would hear this and I hope she would know that we love her and care about her.
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: It's not just about warning people about her.
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: It's warning her to flee from the wrath to come and to come into the arms of a Savior who could truly transform her life, the one who I think she has a misconception of and at some point, maybe from the very beginning, but had a twisted perception of who he is and what the gospel is.
• 41:05
  Speaker 2: But, ray, I do want to say also too and I like how you highlighted that, oscar that it goes beyond, just like the words or the profanity, because there's more as well.
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: But that matters too, ray, right, because again, we have to remember that this is entertainment, like.
• 41:22
  Speaker 2: There are times where I will force myself to listen to some profanity and something that I'm listening to for a redemptive purpose.
• 41:30
  Speaker 2: Maybe it's research for the podcast, maybe it's I'm trying to understand something, maybe it's a news story or whatever, and I don't like it and it bothers me, but I can push myself.
• 41:40
  Speaker 2: It's not for entertainment, it's not just for leisure and pleasure.
• 41:43
  Speaker 2: But, ray, that's what some people are doing.
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: They're listening to her.
• 41:46
  Speaker 2: Drop the F-bomb, use these filthy words, the one that I couldn't even repeat.
• 41:49
  Speaker 2: It's so bad that corrupts and it's contrary to God's word.
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: And out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks and every idle word that a man speaks he'll give account for it.
• 41:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and Scripture says love, not the world, neither the things that are in the world.
• 42:02
  Speaker 3: If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in them.
• 42:04
  Speaker 3: And so if you've got something you love because it gives you pleasure, but you know it's not pleasing to God, you're doing something really bad.
• 42:11
  Speaker 3: You need a change of heart.
• 42:13
  Speaker 3: I love you know we get so used to Psalm 23,.
• 42:16
  Speaker 3: The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want and we can jump over what it's saying the Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want.
• 42:31
  Speaker 3: That gnawing want for pleasure, which supersedes righteousness, no longer attracts me.
• 42:33
  Speaker 3: I don't want that anymore, because God's changed my heart, so I thirst after righteousness, and that's what these young people need.
• 42:37
  Speaker 3: And parents, you may think there's nothing wrong with letting your kids listen to music that's founded in rebellion against God, but when they rebel against you and against God, then you're going to look back and say where did this poison come into our Christian home?
• 42:49
  Speaker 3: And it'll trace it back to this.
• 42:52
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and again, words have power.
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: Like a lot of people have the philosophy of oh, it's just, I don't listen to the lyrics, I just love the music.
• 42:58
  Speaker 2: That's hogwash.
• 43:00
  Speaker 2: The music is getting in your heart and brain.
• 43:02
  Speaker 2: Do you ever find yourself singing the songs?
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: You're listening to the music, you're memorizing the lyrics and replaying that again.
• 43:08
  Speaker 2: You know like again we've talked about it.
• 43:10
  Speaker 2: Someone may watch a movie, maybe once, twice, five times, Maybe they're a fanatic 10, 20 times, but a song you might listen to a thousand times or more over the course of your lifetime and those messages get into you.
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: They begin to impact your thinking and your mind.
• 43:24
  Speaker 3: I can remember 40 years ago, scripture and song, instant scripture, screeds of it come back because it came in the form of music scripture and song, yeah, and that's what we should be filling your head with.
• 43:37
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean they do that right.
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: They teach kids the alphabet with a song.
• 43:43
  Speaker 2: I mean you can learn the names of the states or presidents or whatever and you can get it quicker.
• 43:45
  Speaker 2: There's something about music in the human heart there's stories of.
• 43:48
  Speaker 1: I was just reading the story recently of this guy who had dementia and he had lost all of his memories.
• 43:53
  Speaker 1: An older man, but whenever the family would sing hymnals to him, it was like he came back to life in the midst of hearing that song, isn't that?
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: amazing.
• 44:03
  Speaker 2: I've heard stories like that.
• 44:04
  Speaker 2: It's universal, yeah.
• 44:05
  Speaker 2: And again, here's some of the content of some of the songs in terms of blasphemy.
• 44:11
  Speaker 2: This is from a song called False God, but we might just get away with it.
• 44:15
  Speaker 2: Religion's in our lips.
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: Even if it's a false God, we'd still worship.
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: We might just get away with it.
• 44:21
  Speaker 2: The altar is my hips.
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: Even if it's a false God, we'd still worship this love.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: We'd still worship this love.
• 44:29
  Speaker 2: I mean, that's some serious stuff, right there.
• 44:31
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: I'm glad you gave a sort of our version of an explicit warning.
• 44:37
  Speaker 1: Yeah, you know, hopefully some parents will listen to this and go.
• 44:41
  Speaker 1: Okay, I think in my situation now I would like my kids to listen to this, or here's tools and resources for me to be able to have a conversation.
• 44:49
  Speaker 1: Another aspect of this, too, is it's very clear here that Taylor Swift is using religious verbiage to talk about her sexuality and religion.
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: I love the way someone put it.
• 45:03
  Speaker 1: They said the Christian tradition celebrates.
• 45:06
  Speaker 1: I love the way someone put it they said the Christian tradition celebrates fulfillment of sexual desires see Song of Songs but not as the ultimate human value or even as necessary for human flourishing.
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: Consider Christ being a human is so much more than either the suppression or actualization of sexual desire.
• 45:24
  Speaker 1: Christianity teaches the necessity of self-denial.
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: That's the thing.
• 45:29
  Speaker 1: That's important is that there are so many people out there looking for identity, looking for value and looking for worth in their sexuality and their politics and consumerism.
• 45:41
  Speaker 1: And man, if you're listening to this, you already know the road that that takes you down.
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: It is a dead end, it makes you bankrupt and it makes you longing for more.
• 45:55
  Speaker 1: There is no ultimate fulfillment found in sexual desire.
• 45:59
  Speaker 1: The ultimate fulfillment that you are looking for is being reconciled to your creator through the death and resurrection of Jesus.
• 46:07
  Speaker 1: Amen, amen.
• 46:08
  Speaker 2: Oscar, yeah and um, you know, and I think that for you, parents that again are listening and you want, you want true understanding, without going searching.
• 46:19
  Speaker 2: I'll give you a few more examples.
• 46:21
  Speaker 2: This is from a song of hers called guilty of sin.
• 46:23
  Speaker 2: What if I roll the stone away?
• 46:25
  Speaker 2: They're going to crucify me anyway.
• 46:27
  Speaker 2: What if the way you hold me is actually what's holy?
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: I mean man and again, and she's, you know all of her, a lot of her songs she'll.
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: She'll talk about promiscuity, but in contrast to the Song of Solomons that you referenced, oscar, that's talking about holy, you know, sexual activity within the confines of marriage.
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: And a lot of what she and others like to promote is fornication or adulterous things.
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: And this is another song called the Prophecy, using references to the Garden of Eden and the changing of destiny.
• 47:01
  Speaker 2: He says I got crushed like Eve got bitten oh, was it punishment?
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: And it continues change the prophecy.
• 47:08
  Speaker 2: Don't want money, just someone who wants my company.
• 47:12
  Speaker 2: Let it once be me.
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: What do I have to speak to about if they can redo the prophecy?
• 47:20
  Speaker 2: Another one the album continues with a song but Daddy, I Love Him.
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: And this uses like rebellion, explicit language, describes two female heroines of the faith nothing more than church gossips.
• 47:33
  Speaker 2: And again, I got this from an article.
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: It says I just learned these people only raise you to cage you, sarah's and Hannah's in their Sunday best clutching their pearls, sighing.
• 47:44
  Speaker 2: What a mess.
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: I just learned these people try and save you because they hate you and maybe some of it is like you said, oscar, some of her experiences and things like that.
• 47:56
  Speaker 2: But it just has that bent.
• 48:03
  Speaker 2: Someone on Facebook wrote this is a worship leader named Sean Fjot.
• 48:08
  Speaker 2: He said almost half the songs of Taylor Swift's new album contain explicit lyrics, make fun of Christians and straight up blaspheme God.
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: And so, yeah, I mean there's just so much.
• 48:20
  Speaker 2: I can go on and on with different things.
• 48:24
  Speaker 2: This one here says God saved the most judgmental creeps who say they want what's best for me, sanctimoniously performing soliloquies.
• 48:32
  Speaker 2: Oh Ray, you shared that one already, I think, and it can change the beat of my heart when he touches me and counteract the chemistry and undo the destiny.
• 48:41
  Speaker 2: You ain't got to pray for me, me and my wild boy and all of this wild joy.
• 48:46
  Speaker 2: If all you want is gray for me, then it's just white noise and it's just my choice.
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: And on the choice issue, again very pro abortion and that sort of thing.
• 48:59
  Speaker 2: So, anyway, we could go on and on, friends, but I think you get the picture.
• 49:03
  Speaker 2: I think you understand where we're coming from on this.
• 49:06
  Speaker 2: We raised this.
• 49:07
  Speaker 2: There's a lot of different artists we could talk about, of course, but there is a phenomenon and it's going on and a lot of Christians still haven't caught up with where she's at, and so they're letting their kids listen to this, and maybe you're an adult who's listening to her.
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: Our encouragement to you is to really give this some thought and examine your heart and ask yourself does this honor the Lord?
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: Is this glorifying to God?
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: Do I want to get these kinds of thoughts in my heart and mind, or do I want to go the extra mile to guard myself?
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: And, like Ray said in Philippians 4, right, whatever things are.
• 49:39
  Speaker 2: Pure, true, lovely, good report.
• 49:41
  Speaker 2: These are the things we need to meditate on, especially when it comes to non-essential entertainment.
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: There you have it, friends.
• 49:52
  Speaker 2: I didn't mention it at the beginning, but I should Wait.
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: Oh, I did.
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: Was it Hell's Best Kept Secret book?
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: Yes, that's right.
• 49:57
  Speaker 2: Or was that the other episode?
• 49:59
  Speaker 2: No, this was it.
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: Oh, was it?
• 50:01
  Speaker 2: We just didn't dot comment.
• 50:02
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, we didn't dot comment, so it?
• 50:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah, that's right, we didn't dot comment, so make sure to check it out.
• 50:10
  Speaker 2: Friends at Living Waters, was that kind of a little bark?
• 50:12
  Speaker 2: I don't know, that was something else.
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: Remember the Living Waters mug, the Evidence Study Bible?
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: Yeah, alllivingwaterscom.
• 50:16
  Speaker 2: And friends, don't forget, please, to subscribe and like.
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: Tell people about the podcast and podcast at livingwaterscom with your thoughts.
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: We'll be reading some of those again real soon.
• 50:27
  Speaker 2: Thank you for joining us, friends.
• 50:28
  Speaker 2: We'll see you here next time on the Living Waters podcast.
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: Was that you, ray, trying to mimic me?
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: Oh, it was too Nice try.
• 50:36
  Speaker 2: The one podcast you can't wait to turn off.
• 50:41
  Speaker 2: Please don't send us hate mail about Taylor Swift.