The American Christian rock group Skillet was founded in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1996. Currently, Jen Ledger (drums, co-lead vocals), Seth Morrison (lead guitar), husband-and-wife team John Cooper (lead vocals, bass), and Korey Cooper (rhythm guitar, keyboards, backing vocals) make up the band.
Eleven studio albums have been released by the group; two of them, Collide and Comatose, have been nominated for Grammy Awards. As of June 29, 2020, the RIAA had certified two of their albums as Double Platinum and Platinum, respectively, Comatose and Awake and Gold for Rise and Unleashed. “Whispers in the Dark” and “Comatose” are certified Platinum, while “Monster,” “Hero,” “Awake and Alive,” and “Feel Invincible” are certified Multi-Platinum.
John Cooper, the frontman and bassist of the Grammy-nominated band Skillet, thought that everyone in his circle shared the same core Christian beliefs—such as the deity’s exclusivity, His death and resurrection, and a biblical perspective on morality and sexual ethics—when he first appeared on the Christian music scene in the mid-1990s.
Skillet Band Controversy
However, Cooper claimed that he started to see changes in the Christian music industry in 2012. He observed that, rather than relying on Scripture, his friends were responding to societal challenges by gravitating more and more toward progressive theology out of passion and a desire for acceptance.
He recalled, “I just didn’t understand what was happening.” “I was unaware of it. And I thought, “What’s going on?” In an attempt to comprehend how his CCM classmates had become so engrossed in liberal theology, Cooper—who is married to bandmate Korey Cooper—read many volumes on history, theology, philosophy, social science, and critical theory during this time.
“All of this is the same liberal theology that we faced a century ago, and it’s the same kind of anti-Dominionism that Spurgeon opposed during the downgrade,” I thought to myself. It simply keeps coming back, and now is the moment to combat it,” he declared.
Cooper, a 47-year-old father of two, is the first to admit that others sometimes view him as a bit of a “firestarter.” He frequently uses his position to discuss contentious topics from biblical — and frequently unpopular, he said — standpoints, such as abortion, post-modernism, sexual ethics, and deconstruction.
He said, “I think we are truly at a really important crossroads about the gospel that we hand down to our children in the faith of Christianity.” I had no idea that’s what this was. How is that gospel going to be preached? What definition of Christianity will there even be? What will the foundation of the faith be? I started speaking up so daringly about things because of this.
“Skillet, my band, has five million Facebook friends, three million YouTube subscribers, and a million Instagram followers. Furthermore, no well-known Christian publisher will take up my work for publication,” he added. I mean, I have a big platform, right? refused to publish it.
However, it’s not because I said something too bizarre; rather, it’s because I said things too conventionally. Thus, the same publishers will print heresy, sell fewer books, and make less money by publishing someone far less well-known than myself.
However, they won’t print a book for me that only discusses topics that are uncontroversial for any evangelical group with the lowest common denominator. original sin, the reason for Jesus’ death, the reason you can’t rely on your feelings, the Bible’s authority as God’s Word, the Bible’s divinity, etc. Although this is not contentious, it is at this moment.
The vocalist of “Standing in the Storm” stated that he thinks there’s a change in Christian music happening not just with the performers but also with the people running the labels and radio stations.
“We would lose forty percent of the industry tomorrow if I said today that we were going to create a lowest common denominator creed that you had to adhere to to play Christian music. And I venture that just thirty percent would remain if you included sexual ethics in it. I estimate that 30 percent of the industry adheres to what would be considered conventional biblical sexual ethics. That’s my estimation,” he emphasized.
Drawing from his decades of experience in the CCM industry, Cooper said that hymn writer Keith Getty was “one hundred percent accurate” when he told CP that many Christian songs are created by people you wouldn’t trust to be your kids’ Sunday school instructors.
Now, just to be clear, he said, there are some incredible people there as well—friends of mine who I admire and find inspiring.
