“Word 2 the Father” by DC Talk

Song: “Word 2 the Father”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 16

Ah, yes , here we are at the end of our examination of DC Talk’s Free at Last album.  On the whole, it honestly did a little better than I thought it would in a theological review, but my expectations were rather low.

But then again, we haven’t reviewed this song yet, and it’s so bad it might tank the entire album. 

“I Don’t Want It” by DC Talk

Song: “I Don’t Want It”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 14

I was about 15 years old when this disc came out, and I’m not sure I’d ever heard a Christian band talk about sex as openly as they did in this tune.  As just an indication of how “explicit” this song was, we were listening to the album in the car once, and my mom actually changed the track because they were so blunt in their lyrics.  Well, compared to some of the stuff “Christian” bands are saying these days, this is pretty tame, and I differ with my mother’s reaction.  I don’t think the boys crossed a line here.  This was a message that needed to be heard, and it inspired a lot of us who were right at that age where sex was becoming a very big temptation.  Their willingness to talk frankly about it was a very good thing. 

“Lean on Me” by DC Talk

Song: “Lean on Me”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 12

While everyone got really excited back in 1992 about “Jesus is Just Alright,” “Lean on Me” seems to be the more enduring cover tune of the two.  Like in “Free at Last” (the song, not the album), this proved to be a really great mix of hip hop, soul, and rock, which was the thing that really set DC Talk apart in this portion of their career. 

“The Hardway” by DC Talk

Song: “The Hardway”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 10

Besides “Jesus is Just Alright,” this tune was the big draw for the album.  It’s not the best song, but it’s the best ballad.  For a lot of people, those would be the same thing, but I’m more of a rocker myself, so I tend to like the songs like “Luv is a Verb” more than something like this.  However, the ballad is critical for a band like this, especially at that time.  Christian radio was hesitant to play songs with guitars or rhythm (only exaggerating slightly), so all bands had to put in something soft and pretty, even the Christian metal bands.

But musically, the song is fantastic.  Everything falls into place quite nicely here – the melody, the arrangement, the pace.  Let’s see if the theology does the same!

“Time Is . . .” by DC Talk

Song: “Time Is . . .”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 9

One of the hard rocker tracks.  Not the best song ever, but rocks pretty good, so worthwhile in that sense.  This is one of several tracks on the disc that is written in reference to a particular passage of Scripture, which is something I heartily applaud.  Most “Christian” music just has vague statements about Jesus being my bearded girlfriend, but DCT make a concerted effort to tie their work to the Bible.  Let’s see if they handle the text properly!

“Free at Last” by DC Talk

Song: “Free at Last”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 8

Besides the rather goofy opening, this was actually one of my favorite tunes off of the album.  It has a very nice gospel / rock / rap blend that really represents the best DC Talk was doing at this particular time in their career.  It has always been and probably will always be one of my favorite tracks off the record.

“Socially Acceptable” by DC Talk

Song: “Socially Acceptable”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 7

I’m really not at all looking forward to reviewing this song, not because I’m expecting the theology to be bad, but simply because I don’t like it.  Musically, it always felt like filler to me, and I normally skipped it while playing through the album, and was doing so even ten years ago, when my musical tastes were less developed as they are now.  But, we’ve committed to give each artist a full hearing on this blog, which means reviewing the theology of all the songs and not just the good ones.  So here we go!

"Say the Words" by DC Talk

Song: “Say the Words”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 5

As we continue our trek through Free at Last, we arrive at a tune that was never really in my favorites on the album.  Oddly enough, I always felt the music was meandering and aimless, and now that I’m examining the theology in the song, I’m finding the lyrics to be the same way.  But let’s get to it!

"Jesus is Just Alright" by DC Talk

Song: “Jesus is Just Alright”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 4

Just as way of background, this track was my favorite on this album when it first came out, and I know I was not alone.  I, like a great many others, worked really hard to learn the third verse and be able to keep up with Toby Mac rapping it.  As a side note, I sang along with him so much ten years ago, that I tried to rap this again yesterday, just to see if I remembered it, and I only stumbled on one line.  The song has lessened in my estimation over the years, mainly because the novelty of that rap has worn off, and the song itself isn't all that great.  Frankly, the Doobies did it well the first time, and we really didn’t need a hip hop version of the tune.  That being said, I do not think I'm overstating it when I say that this track was hugely influential and important to the album's success.

And it's a total theological train wreck.

"That Kind of Girl" by DC Talk

Song: “That Kind of Girl”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 2

Musically, this album starts the absolute right way.  You don’t even catch your breath after the first track before Toby Mac drops into a very skillful rhyme that leaves your head spinning.  There is literally no silence between these tunes, and they flow so naturally together.  As a side note, the tunes are so close together that the cut between tracks on the CD is actually misplaced by a fraction of a second, leaving the “T-” from “Toby” on the first track, and the “-oby” on the second.  That’s a bit annoying when you’re listening to songs on random.

But while we found “Luv is a Verb” to be a pretty cool tune, lyrically it fell pretty flat. Let’s see if the boys do better here.

The Good

This song comes (sometimes directly) from the Proverbs.  It very intentionally casts the “forbidden woman” described in the book (chapter 4, for example) with the virtuous woman of Proverbs 31.  The depictions of these women are clear and to the point, and the point is convincing.

To this day, I cannot read Proverbs 31 without hearing this song in my head, and that is because the second verse comes directly from that chapter, very often word-for word.  This is good stuff here, and not to be missed.  They take the exact same approach as Scripture does, and that is to be commended and applauded.

I want to stress this, because I’m going to touch on a couple of lines a little later.  The entire approach of the song is right and good.  We’ll nitpick a couple of points, but overall, this is the approach Christian music should take.

Neither Good nor Bad

Talk about nitpicky!  I bring this one up because I reacted to it wrongly when I first heard the song, and so I’m guessing others misunderstood as well.  At least I think it was a misunderstand, since the line is a bit vague.

When I was first listening to the album, I thought the reference to the girl in the first verse drinking and smoking as alluding to sinful activity.  Mainly because I believed those activities were sinful.  I now think they were just fleshing out a character here and weren’t trying to say that a beer is sinful.  I don’t put the line in the “bad” column because I think it was my misunderstanding here.

To be clear, drunkenness is a sin, but not drinking.  Alcohol has been the official drink of Christianity for 2,000 years.  Smoking is not a sin, but is probably unwise, and so probably should be avoided.  Now a good pipe now and then, well, that’s a gift from God and should be enjoyed heartily.

The Bad

Only a couple of lines here that need to be discussed.

First, Toby claims that “God with bring her to me so I don’t have to search.”  This sort of “Let go and let God” philosophy has been around for a while, but it’s not biblical.  We are called to wisdom as Christians, and often that wisdom will lead us to action.  We see the examples of the patriarch in the Bible, for example.  Abraham actively sent for a wife for his son, and later, we see Jacob make a similar himself.  They did not sit in the Promised Land and wait.  We are called to be wise and responsible, to seek the good.  Oddly enough, the Proverbs themselves teach us to seek a wife in 18:22, “He who finds a wife finds a good thing and obtains favor from the Lord.”

Now, wisdom may call us to hold off for a time, or that the person we are with is not the right one.  This requires prayer and godly counsel.  But generally, we are called to seek a good wife.  (Or husband.)

Next, DC Talk tells us that “When I finally meet her, I’ll know how to treat her, but fulfilling all her needs.”  Good luck with that one!  This is the sort of nonsense that single people say before they get married, and it’s a statement made of ignorance or pride.  The truth is that we do our best, but it is Christ who fulfills all of our needs, not our spouses.  Marriages built on this sort of wishful thinking are going to be rocky.

Lastly, they say they will “cherish her forever.”  Not really sure what’s behind this one.  There is a sense where it is likely true that we will cherish our Christian brothers and sisters forever.  However, not as man and wife.  Jesus teaches us in Matthew 22:30 that marriage is a temporary thing, not carried with us in the resurrection.  The vagueness of the line makes me a little nervous here.

Overall

All things considered, we have a pretty solid tune here.  There are song lines I take issue with, but oddly, they all come in the same bridge.  The other verses are commendable.  I say good job to the boys of DCT.  The song is basically on solid ground.

"Luv is a Verb" by DC Talk

Song: “Luv is a Verb”

Artist: DC Talk

Album: Free at Last (1992)

Track: 1

I cannot overstate to you how much this song influenced me musically.  Growing up, we typically listened to soft adult-contemporary Christian music with my mom or early 60s Rock with my dad.  Whatever 80s and early 90s music I had heard by that point had only been overheard.  My parents at last let me get a DC Talk album because we read about the Christian rap movement in some Christian magazine, but Nu Thang wasn’t all that musically advanced.  Granted, it was advanced for me, since I hadn’t really listened to any music that was really good recorded after 1965, but it wasn’t really groundbreaking.  There was a massive musical leap between that album and this one, and when I heard this for the first time, I was blown away, and it had no small role to play in my musical development.

But we’re not here to look at the music.  We’re here to check out the theology.

The Good

Without doing research outside of the song itself, it appears that this song draws mostly out of 1 John.  The focus here is how we show love.  And that love must be shown, not merely spoken.  The whole story about being surprised to see that the word “love” is a verb is effective, if rather inaccurate (love can also be a noun).

The third verse is particular good here.  I appreciate the part of about love not being “all that stuff that you see on T.V.”  That is a good reminder for the very young Christian, which is assumedly the target audience.

Neither Good nor Bad

One thing that this song does that the album as a whole does is put the focus squarely on DC Talk.  It starts out with a chant “Down with the DC Talk.”  It would be a minor point except that we start seeing theological problems coming through ego later down the road, so it should be pointed out and exposed here too.  It does not present a theological problem yet, but we should note that the focus is off a little.

In addition, DC Talk has a habit of loading their lyrics full of witty phrasings and hip hop lingo, but not with actual substance.  It’s frustrating, because the primary advantage that rap has over other forms of song is the ability to load it up with far more words than anything else.  But DC Talk squanders those words, and while Toby is a very good rapper, it doesn’t appear that he has much to say.

The Bad

There is a major theological flaw in this song, and one that should cause a great deal of concern.  The lyrics go thusly:  “Luv is enough if it's unconditionally given, now you're living out the Great Commission.”

Uh-oh.  That’s a problem.  They could mean one of those things here, but neither one are right.  The first possible meaning is that God gave his love unconditionally, so we’re living out the Great Commission.  Well, the Great Commission is, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you” (Matthew 28:19-20), so there seems to be a missing step somewhere in there.

The more likely meaning behind the lyric (since the song is about our love, not the Father’s) is that we live out the Great Commission by loving unconditionally.  Which is not the Great Commission at all, and neither is it something we ever really do. 

And it is with this line that they take a song about living a Christian life in love for one another and step into a massive confusion about what the Gospel is and how it is spread.  The Gospel is not something we accomplish through our love, but is accomplished by God on our behalf.  And while it is loving to go into the world and tell about the Gospel, the only perfect love here is His, and we should repent always for our lack of love.

Which brings up my second problem with the song.  There’s no Gospel here.  I believe the song is based on 1 John, which is primarily about how we are to love one another, but 1 John does not abandon us when we stumble here, but instead tells us that “if anyone does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (2:1).  We are constantly cast back to the source of our righteousness in the epistle.  Not so here.  We are cast back to the dictionary in this song and told to love perfectly.

Which is something I have failed at on a daily basis.  So DC Talk’s message isn’t really seeming that hopeful to me.  Instead, it just makes me feel inadequate.

Overall

There is only just a little theology in this song, despite all the lyrics, and what theology is there is more tainted by the bad than overcome with the good.  The opening track to Free at Last leaves much to be desires.