Lyrical Analysis - Justin Bieber's "Pray"

Welcome to Lyrical Analysis, where I say things that are probably going to get me in trouble.

Folks... Bieber made a "Contemporary Christian" song. If you aren't slamming your head against the keyboard yet, perhaps you didn't read that correctly. Bieber made a "Contemporary Christian" song.

At least, that's how it's marketed. But let's list things that are never mentioned in this song.

God
Jesus
The Bible
Christianity in any way
The cross
Any sort of Bible story
Any sort of notable Christians of the past two thousand years
Any sort of "beliefs"
Did I mention GOD AND JESUS?

Yeah. So basically, this song is Bieber saying the word "pray" a lot, and hoping Christian audiences will love it. So on that note, let's dive right in to, "Pray".

"And I Pray..."

...That this song won't suck...

"I just can't sleep tonight/Knowing things ain't right/It's in the papers/It's on the TV/It's everywhere that I go/Children are crying/Soldiers are dying/Some people don't have a home"

Oh great, it's going to be a guilt song. You know what I'm talking about. One of those songs that talks about how bad things are around the world, and how I should be ashamed of myself for lounging around listening to music while some kid in Africa starves to death. I hate those songs.

Now don't get me wrong, it is certainly a very sad world we live in. But I don't need a song to tell me about it, and try to guilt me into doing something.

First of all, guilt is just a scare tactic. Guilting someone into doing something is no better than threatening them. You see, threatening someone forces them to do something because they fear for the immediate consequence of not doing it. If they don't do it, you may beat them up, or cause some other sort of issue for them.

Guilt, however, is invoking the fear of the consequence of inaction. For example, guilt, in this way, is causing someone to fear that some child will starve because they didn't take the action to stop it.

Now, at first you may think that this tactic, while not the most ethical, is at least efficient. It gets things done, at least.

There's a line in the movie Inception (If you haven't seen it yet, why not?), "I think a positive emotional response is more effective than a negative one." This line perfectly sums up the flaw with guilting someone into action. Guilt is a negative emotion. You can't guilt someone into really giving their all. You just can't do it. Inside, although they may be doing good, they won't really be putting their heart into it.

It's not enough to guilt someone into doing something. You have to make them want to do it. And that is a lot harder.

You see, if someone legitimately wants to do good, they will be a force to be reckoned with. They'll be more effective at everything they do, because their heart will be in it. They'll want to do what you want them to do, every bit as much as you want them to do it.

So I don't care who it is, guilt songs are not a good thing. They're a scummy scare tactic.

We're two lines in, and I've already done one full blown rant. I knew this would be a good one to finish Bieber Week with.

"But I know there's sunshine behind that rain/I know there's good times behind that pain/Can you tell me how I could make a change?"

Donate the proceeds of this song to charity. Boom.

Correct me if I'm wrong in the comments, as I said, I don't follow Bieber, but scanning the Wikipedia article on this song, I don't see anything indicating he did.

Edit: Alright, I've since been informed that he does in fact donate large amounts of money to charity quite frequently. Fair enough, like I said, I don't follow Bieber, I wouldn't know.

"I close my eyes and I can see a better day/I close my eyes and pray"

References to God in this song so far: 0
References to praying: 2

"I lose my appetite/Knowing kids starve tonight"

Let me translate this lyric from guilt-song-talk into normal speech.

"IF YOU LIVE IN ANY SORT OF COMFORT YOU SHOULD BE ASHAMED OF YOURSELF!"

"Am I a sinner/'Cause half my dinner/Is still here on my plate?"

Bieber would have you believe the answer is yes.

Seriously, this ticks me off. This is basically implying if you have any disposable income, have more food than you can eat, or have any luxury items whatsoever, you're somehow doing something WRONG! Well you know what Bieber, you're marketing this as a "Contemporary Christian" song, tapping into your "beliefs", so I have NO PROBLEM pulling out the scripture on you:

(From John 12, NIV, Verses 1-7)
"Six days before the Passover, Jesus came to Bethany, where Lazarus lived, whom Jesus had raised from the dead. Here a dinner was given in Jesus’ honor. Martha served, while Lazarus was among those reclining at the table with him. Then Mary took about a pint of pure nard, an expensive perfume; she poured it on Jesus’ feet and wiped his feet with her hair. And the house was filled with the fragrance of the perfume.

But one of his disciples, Judas Iscariot, who was later to betray him, objected, “Why wasn’t this perfume sold and the money given to the poor? It was worth a year’s wages.” He did not say this because he cared about the poor but because he was a thief; as keeper of the money bag, he used to help himself to what was put into it.

“Leave her alone,” Jesus replied. “It was intended that she should save this perfume for the day of my burial. 8 You will always have the poor among you, but you will not always have me.”"

Did you catch that? If not, perhaps I should give you that same passage in MUSICAL FORM!



For those still not getting it, Jesus was relaxing after all the stress of, y'know, living a perfect earthly existence, when Mary Magdalene anointed him with expensive perfume. Judas Iscariot (the same man who would later betray Jesus) said that Jesus was wrong to enjoy the perfume when there would be poor people starving to death. (The same thing Bieber is saying RIGHT NOW.)

Judas said they should sell the perfume and donate the money to the poor (although in truth he just wanted to take the money for himself). How did Jesus respond? By telling Judas that no matter what, there would always be poor people, and that while it's good to want to help the poor, there's nothing wrong with enjoying what YOU have.

In other words Bieber, no, you are not a sinner because half of your dinner is still on your plate. You may be an idiot for asking, but stupidity is not a sin.

Wow, two full blown rants, and we're only halfway through the song.

"Ooh, I got a vision/To make a difference/And it's starting today"

Great. Tell me what it is, and we'll get started on it. Hello? Bieber? Just tell me this so called plan you have. Nothing? Ok.

"Because I know there's sunshine/Behind that rain/I know there's good times/Behind that pain/Heaven tell me I can make a change"

Did you catch that? He's praying, not to GOD, but to HEAVEN. Because saying the word GOD would be too controversial and might hurt sales from the athiest audience. Screw. This. Song. I haven't heard such a messed up perception of what "prayer" is since that episode of Doctor Who where Amy Pond is praying to Santa.

"I close my eyes/And I can see a better day/I close my eyes and pray"

Ok, I have no idea if Bieber is really a Christian or if he just thought this would be good publicity, that's not my place to judge, but assuming that he is, he may be better off opening his eyes and reading the bible, judging from his previous question. Completely serious here.

"I pray for all the brokenhearted/I pray for all the lives not started"

Oh I'm not touching that line with a fifty foot pole.

"I pray for all the lungs not breathing/I pray for all the lives in need a break(?)"

1. That doesn't rhyme.
2. That REALLY doesn't rhyme.
3. You dropped the word "of".

"Can you give 'em one today?"

Break them off a piece of that Kit-Kat bar. C'mon man.

And then, like so many other crappy Bieber songs, we get a minute and a half of the chorus again. Ugh. Despicable.

What a shameful song! I understand that the world is in a bad shape right now, but writing songs like THIS and telling people the BLATANT LIE that it's immoral to live in comfort when someone else is worse off than you is just shameful. This song, quite simply, sucks. Everything about these lyrics is stupid, and obviously trying nothing but to give everyone listening to it a guilt trip, which irritates me to no end, especially knowing that Bieber probably recorded this song in a studio that's more luxurious than the homes of most of the people listening to this song.

This kind of drivel is exactly the problem with so called Christian music. I like Five Iron Frenzy. I like Relient K. I like a lot of other Christian artists, who certainly do NOT sound like this, and who actually sing about CHRISTIANITY!

And thus concludes Bieber week. That's right folks, I survived. 7 Bieber songs in 7 days. And all of them were terrible.

Due to positive feedback for Bieber week, I've decided to try to turn Lyrical Analysis into a weekly feature here at Wherein I Rant About the World. Not just about Bieber of course, there are LOTS of terrible songwriters out there just begging for me to decimate their lyrics. The Black Eyed Peas, Ke-DollarSign-Ha, 3OH!3, none shall be safe from my wrath.

So tune in next Saturday for the first weekly installment of "Lyrical Analysis"! I'll be covering a song worse than any song Bieber has ever made! Yeah folks, it's possible.

Speech and Life - The Blog Version

Ok, so. For the past few weeks, my youth group has been having student led weeks, where the students prepare everything from the worship music, to the game, to the message. This week was my groups turn.

Overall we spoke on the first 1 Timothy 4:12, "Don't let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example to the believers in speech, in life, in love, in faith, and in purity."

My subjects were Speech and Life. This is (roughly) what I said about them. Well, actually, this is the long winded version, since I had to cut some things for time.


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Setting an example to believers in speech starts with simply speaking. You may not necessarily be talking about God and religion. However, If you don’t say anything about being a Christian or about God we can’t expect anyone to hear it. Psalm 19:3 says "There is no speech or language where their voice is not heard." If no one had ever told me I could have a relationship with Christ I would have never known I could have one. I'm not sure how many of you are familiar with the talk show "Jimmy Kimmel Live", which is obviously not a Christian show at all, but it had a special episode after the series finale of Lost last week. In this show, he said something I found quite interesting...



I would hope everyone in this room knows that is not what Christianity is. The bible actually says that no one can get to the bible through works. There is no amount of good you can do to work your way to heaven. You can save lives, deliver babies, solve world hunger, and cure cancer, but at the end of the day there's only one thing that really matters. Have you asked Jesus to forgive your sins? If you have, then no matter how much, or how little good you do, you will be saved.

You have to have bravery to get out there and say that kind of thing to people though. It’s not always easy, like right now I wish I was in the back of the room putting up slides in my comfort zone. Because my comfort zone is, well, comfortable. But, God has not called us to be comfortable. As Christian we have to do hard things. And sometime the hard thing can be as simple as telling your friends about Christ. I have to wonder how it would have changed if anyone had ever told Jimmy Kimmel what Christians ACTUALLY believe? Now, maybe he would never have been saved, but what if he had said what we ACTUALLY believe, up there on national television, broadcasting to millions of people? A lot of good could have come out of that.

So now that we know we have to speak, what should we say? Does it mean we have to speak of Christ all the time? We all know that’s impossible. But a lot of the time, it's less about what we say, and more about what we don't say.

1 Peter 3:10 says “For whoever would love life and see good days must keep his tongue from evil and his lips from deceitful speech.”

We can't just be swearing and cursing, and making crude jokes left and right. How easy it is to write it off as "I'm just with my friends, I can say what I want. These guys know me." But we need to be careful all the time. Even people we know judge us by what we say when we are around them.

But, it’s more than that, you never know who else is listening. Speech is a big responsibility. As Humans, speech is our main way of expressing emotions and thoughts, from the simplest ones such as "I am hungry." to much more complex ones such as "I feel hurt because I feel what you did was betraying me, and I don't know if I can trust you any more." What you say, good or bad, people judge you by. And if you aren't swearing and aren't saying bad things then they will have a completely different impression of you, than if you are.

But more importantly, as Christians we need to think about how our speech represents Christ. If we have presented ourselves as believers in Christ people will be watching us and what we do will affect their impression of us. People will think of us as hypocrites, and by extension, all Christians as hypocrites if we say we believe one thing and speak another way.

I know this will shock absolutely everyone in the room but... I play a lot of video games. In fact, I've even been known to play some video games ONLINE. I know, it's shocking.

It took a long time for me to convince my parents to let me use voice chat in the video games I play, for obvious reasons. When I did finally get to do voice chat I felt a large responsibility to not speak in a way a Christians shouldn’t . No, I wasn’t waving a flag and telling everyone I was a Christian. In fact, a lot of them never knew for month, or even years that I was a Christian. However, over time I said things in simple conversations like “I can’t raid on Wednesday night I have church.” Right there it is. Everyone is trying to remember how I have spoken and how I have represented myself. Because I have made a point to be cautious about my speech several times I have actually had people I will never see in person ask me to pray for them.

But it works both ways. We have to set a good example in life, by acting in a way that reflects the way we say we will. I myself have run into many people who have said they were believers too, but not acted in a way that has impressed me. It upsets me when I hear speech like this, or see actions like that, from someone who claims to be a Christian.

One time I was playing World of Warcraft, and I was doing a raid (a group involving a large group of people.) Halfway through, one of the other players (a real person, mind you.) made some wisecrack about Jesus not being real. I privately messaged him and asked him not to joke about things like that. He proceeded, naturally, to yell at me, and rant at me, and yell every curse word he could think of at me, alongside calling me things like "Close minded idiot" and "Bigot" and other things along those lines. In the midst of his words of rage, he mentioned that he was "Just kidding, and believe in Jesus and God too." Could've fooled me. If that were my only example of Christianity, I sure wouldn't have a good impression about it.

Now, I'm not saying this guy wasn't a Christian. That's not for me to judge. That is between him and God. But you know what? I've had people in these same games tell me I was the only Christian they know. How about you? Maybe among your friends, you will be the only Christian influence their lives ever have? Are you setting a good one?

Psalms 119:105 says “Your word is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path.” God’s Word needs to not only guide us in how we should speak, but in how we should live.

Now, I'm not perfect. I certainly don't claim to be. No one is. The only one who's perfect is God. I've slipped up in speech. Everyone has at some point in their lives, said a curse word. I'm most certainly not a perfect example when it comes to setting an example in life. That's impossible. I've done something I said I wouldn't, and I've slipped up as a Christian many times. Everyone does. The point is to try harder.

In life we need to act like a Christian where ever we go. Following Christ is not just about coming to church. It’s about representing Christ wherever we go. This doesn’t mean we have to be serious and preachy all the time. Anyone who knows me knows I'm a big goofball. But there comes a time to be serious. There are people out there that are watching. They hear you say that you're a Christian, and they're just waiting to see you slip up, so they can say they were right and all Christians are hypocrites. So remember, people are watching. Even more importantly, remember, God is watching.