JESUS IS JUST ALRIGHT

Session 1: Representations of Jesus

Questions

1.) Describe the attributes or personal characteristics of Jesus according to this song. What values do those represent? Listen to both the lyrics and the overall mood or “emotional landscape” created by the music.

2.) There’s an old saying that God created us in his image, and then we returned the favor. Is this happening in this song? How does the depiction of Jesus in this song reflect its genre, intended audience, or the artist’s background/community?

3.) What is your personal response to the Jesus depicted in this song? Do you agree with the artist’s description? What would you add, remove, or change about the song to make it more closely reflect the way you think about Jesus?

4.) How have your assumptions about Jesus’s attributes, characteristics, or values affected your own faith – positively or negatively? Will this song’s view of Jesus impact the way you think of Jesus?

Click here to visit the main website for Rock of Ages: Jesus in Popular Music, which includes playlists and a searchable database of over 500 songs from all popular genres.

Clay Walker: Jesus Was a Country Boy (2013)

VERSE 1

I stumbled on a preacher, Sunday morning,
All decked out and made up for TV,
Askin' for some money from God's people:
Talking all that high theology.

Well, I might be just an old blue collar:
There's things about the Lord that I don't know.
But I bet he never had a million dollars,
Or wore a lot of stylish fancy clothes

CHORUS

'Cause Jesus was a country boy,
Walkin' down a dirt road, with everything that he owned,
He never met a stranger.
Born in a barn underneath the stars,
His Mama laid him in a manger.
Swimmin' in the river, fishin' for his dinner,
Livin' with the sinners like me.
Makes me think, Jesus was a country boy.

VERSE 2

My Daddy never cared much for religion,
And my Mama worried a lot about his soul.
She'd hit her knees and pray for him on Sunday,
While Daddy hit his favorite fishin' hole.

You see, Daddy was a rebel and a rambler,
But I always knew he loved my Mama so.
An' I never doubted he'd make it to Heaven,
'Cause it ain't who you are, it's who you know.

An' Daddy knew that

CHORUS

Jesus was a country boy,
Walkin' down a dirt road, with everything that he owned,
He never met a stranger.
Born in a barn underneath the stars,
His Mama laid him in a manger.
Swimmin' in the river, fishin' for his dinner,
Livin' with the sinners like me.
Makes me think, Jesus was a country boy.
Oh, yes, and I believe that Jesus was a country boy.

Scott Stapp: Jesus Was a Rock Star (2013)

VERSE 1

He walked on water man. He made that water wine.
And then he drank with people you and me would just cast aside
He did his people good. Just like he said he would.
And in the blink of an eye, he gave a blind man sight

CHORUS

His love was thunder in the sky
His roar was lions in the night
When he spoke he always drew a crowd
His message was his lifestyle
He gave us everything and more
He was the party we've been looking for
Maybe, just maybe.... Jesus was rockstar!

Can I get a witness?

VERSE 2

He brought the dead to life
He rose when called to rise
There was a passion in his eyes and it spread like wildfire

CHORUS

BRIDGE

Father I have sinned a million sins
Save me from this world you put me in
So come on. Come on. Bring Jesus back again.

CHORUS

When he spoke he always drew a crowd

His message was his lifestyle

He brought the fire and the light

He wrote the songs you can't deny

He rocked so hard, I can hear him now

He brought the house down!

James Otto: Soldiers and Jesus (2010)

VERSE 1

Well Granddaddy came home in a B-52
In a pine box covered in red, white, and blue
He was one of the brave and the proud and the few
21 guns helped us say goodbye
I stood there in silence trying hard not to cry
As the preacher he quoted lines written in red
And he folded his Bible in a broken voice he said

CHORUS

There's only two people who’s ever died for me
Laid down their lives just so I could be free
They both went through hell bared crosses and shells
And both got back up again after they fell
They never pick a fight but their there to pick up the pieces
God only knows where we'd be without soldiers and Jesus

VERSE 2

It seems like the news loves to run em' both down
Whenever we need em' they’re always around
So don't hand me a party’s political views
There's left side and right side and then there's the truth

CHORUS

BRIDGE

To me they’re both heroes for the path that they chose
One fights for my life one fights for my soul

CHORUS

OUTRO

Well granddaddy came home in a B-52

In a pine box covered in red, white, and blue

2Pac and Outlawz: Black Jesuz (1998)

INTRO

Searching for Black Jesus, oh yeah
Sportin' jewels and shit, you know what I mean?
Straight tatted up, no doubt, no doubt
Young Kadafi in this bitch, set it off nigga, what?

HOOK (continues through intro)

We believed in You everything You do
Just wanna let you know, how we feel
Black Jesus

VERSE 1

I do my shootin's on a knob, prayin' to God for my squad
Stuck in a nightmare, hopin' he might care
Though times is hard, up against all odds, I play my cards
Like I'm jailin', shots hittin' up my spot like midnight rains hailin'
Got me bailin' to stacks more green

Gods ain't tryin' to be trapped on no block slangin'
No rocks like bean pies brainstorm on the beginnin'
Wonder how shit like the Qu'ran and the Bible was written
What is religion? Gods words all cursed like crack
Shaitan's way of gettin' us back or just another
One of my Black Jesus traps

VERSE 2

Who's got the heart to stand beside me?
I feel my enemies creepin' up in silence
Dark prayer, scream violence demons all around me
Can't even bend my knees just a lost cloud, Black Jesus

Give me a reason to survive, in this earthly hell
'Cause I swear, they tryin' to break my well
I'm on the edge lookin' down at this volatile pit
Will it matter if I cease to exist? Black Jesus

CHORUS

All hail, the pressure no endeavor can fail
Some missin souls turn to hoes when exposed to jail
In times of war we need somebody raw, rally the troops
Like a Saint that we can trust to help to carry us through
Black Jesus, ha ha ha ha ha
He's like a Saint that we can trust to help to carry us through
Black Jesus

VERSE 3

Outlawz we got our own race, culture, religion
Rebellin' against the system, commence to lynchin'
The President ain't even listenin' to the pain of the youth
We make music for eternity, forever the truth

Political prisoner, the two choices that they givin' us
Ride or die, for life they sentence us
Oh Black Jesus, please watch over my brother Shawn
Soon as the sky get bright, it's just another storm

Brothers gone, now labeled a statistic
Ain't no love for us ghetto kids, they call us nigglets
History repeats itself, nuttin' new in school I knew
E'rything I read wasn't true, Black Jesus

VERSE 4

To this click I'm dedicated, criminal orientated
An Outlaw initiated, blazed and faded
Made for terror, major league niggaz pray together
Bitches in they grave while my real niggaz play together

We die clutchin' glasses, filled with liquor bomblastic
Cremated, last wishes nigga smoke my ashes
High sigh why die wishin', hopin' for possibilities
I'll mob on, why they copy me sloppily

Cops patrol projects, hatin' the people livin' in them
I was born an inmate, waitin' to escape the prison
Went to church but don't understand it, they underhanded
God gave me these commandments, the world is scandalous

Blast til they holy high, baptize they evil minds
Wise, no longer blinded, watch me shine trick
Which one of y'all wanna feel the degrees?
Bitches freeze facin' Black Jesus

CHORUS

All hail, the pressure no endeavor can fail
Some missin' souls turn to hoes when exposed to jail
In times of war we need somebody raw, rally the troops
Like a Saint that we can trust to help to carry us through
Black Jesus

VERSE 5

Some say, some day, some how, some way, we gon' fail
And it ain't hard to tell, we dwell in hell
Trapped, black, scarred and barred
Searching for truth, where it's hard to find God

I play the Pied Piper, and to this Thug Life, I'm a lifer
Proceed, to turn up the speed, just for stripes
My Black Jesus, walk through this valley with me
Where we, so used to hard times and casualties

Indeed, it hurt me deep to have to sleep on the streets
And haven't eaten in weeks, so save a prayer for me
And all the young thugs, raised on drugs and guns
Blazed out and numb, slaves to this slums this ain't livin' Jesus

HOOK (continues through outro)

We believed in You everything You do
Just wanna let you know, how we feel
Black Jesus

OUTRO

Searchin' for Black Jesus
It's hard, it's hard we need help out here
So we searchin's for Black Jesus

It's like a Saint, that we pray to in the ghetto, to get us through
Somebody that understand our pain
You know maybe not too perfect, you know
Somebody that hurt like we hurt

Somebody that smoke like we smoke
Drink like we drink
That understand where we coming from
That's who we pray to we need help y'all

Christ for President: Words by Woody Guthrie (1940s), Music by Jeff Tweedy & Jay Bennett (1998)

Performed by Billy Bragg and Wilco

Let's have Christ our President
Let us have him for our king
Cast your vote for the Carpenter
That you call the Nazarene

The only way we can ever beat
These crooked politician men
Is to run the money changers out of the temple
Put the Carpenter in

O It's Jesus Christ our President
God above our king
With a job and a pension for young and old
We will make hallelujah ring

Every year we waste enough
To feed the ones who starve
We build our civilization up
And we shoot it down with wars

But with the Carpenter on the seat
Way up in the Capital town
The USA would be on the way
Prosperity Bound!

Carnivore: Jesus Hitler (1987)

Jesus Hitler, Adolf Christ
Is this the second coming
Or the fourth Reich?
His mother a nun raped by Nazi
Near the end of the second great war
Gave birth to the son who will change the future
For better or worse he's not sure
I am what should never have been
The ultimate abomination
Have I returned to save the Jews
Or to destroy them?
Hear thee my fellow Nazolics
Keep der race pure practice eugenics
And swear to the holy swazafix
I have returned
Reich and roll!
Hess to my left and Hitler on right
Will it be war or peace
Tantalization on his throne of blood
Commands both man and beast
A pair of souls trapped in the body of one
Both prisoners of reincarnation
Torn between good and evil
I have returned for salvage elimination