Thinking Through “So Will I (100 Billion X)”
A pastor buddy of mine messaged me today about the popular Hillsong song, “So Will I (100 Billion X)” and how I feel about leading it at church. While there’s no denial it’s a great song, he, and a lot of others are trying to navigate the lyric, “And as You speak, A hundred billion creatures catch Your breath, Evolving in pursuit of what You said.”
If this lyric makes you have question marks appear above your head, you’re not alone! As a worship leader staunchly dedicated to Biblical truth in the songs I lead, here are my thoughts:
Simply put, no. I wouldn’t do the song for a few reasons.
1) Hillsong, while they do have some songs that aren’t theologically wrong and can be defended, is a movement that overtly teaches prosperity gospel and New Apostolic Reformation theology. Dangerous stuff. Heretical stuff. I’ve actually stopped adding Hillsong tunes to my repertoire altogether because of the fact that I simply don’t want to point people to their teaching via the music. Same with Elevation and Bethel. If those movements didn’t have a music arm, they wouldn’t be what they are today, but the music is the hook into the divisive theology.
2) Joel Houston took to Twitter after somebody asked him to clarify the lyric. He responded with the notion that evolution is undeniable and that God created the Big Bang. Now, he went on to say that evolution isn’t the source of our creation, but that’s it’s a natural part of God’s order. In all reality, he ended up just muddying the waters even more. I’m all for being poetic, but if clarity can’t be brought to the figurative language in a way people can understand as aligning with and dictated in scripture, I believe it shouldn’t be sung in church. Even though evolution is being embraced more and more by Christians because of the pressure put on by culture, evolution (other than micro-evolution) is completely anti-God, anti-Genesis, and truthfully, anti-science. For the Christian world to begin to embrace it is only the world gaining more ground in our lives. It isn’t mindless or boneheaded to believe that God created the world in 6 days. He did. The Bible says it, and the response called “evolution” takes WAY more faith once actually researched and not just taking “science” at its word - which, let’s be honest. That’s what people are doing. It’s simply the popular idea. We laugh at people who think the earth is flat, but legitimately believe that we are physical descendants of fish and green beans. Absolutely ridiculous. Either the Bible is true, or it isn’t. There’s no evidence, literally, no evidence for this thing scientists are attempting to push called evolution and it has absolutely no place in a worship song to our infinitely Holy God.
3) It’s just means for distraction. Sure, the song is good and we all need good songs in our sets, but it’s just not worth it. Just like when George Lucas does a wipe transition in his movies that completely take me out of the movie, a subtle but evasive, confusing, and jarring lyric in a worship song only serves to remove us from worshipping God. We want people to grapple with true theology and Biblical doctrine, not, “did they just reference evolution?” The lyric itself is not clear, and the lack of clarity only makes us wrestle with, “is this ok?” Rather than, “YES! I believe this truth!” Our songs should reflect the glory, majesty, Justice, and splendor of Christ...not distract us from all of that.
Anyway, those are my thoughts. At the end of the day, it’s just not worth it to me just to have a killer song in the set. And it is a killer song! But, as we know, the quality of musicianship doesn’t equate itself to the level and quality of truth. Musical and theological excellence are not mutually exclusive. It’s hard to find good songs, but Hillsong is slowly putting out more and more divisive, anti-biblical stuff and pushing the boundaries of truth. As worship leaders, may we not be guilty of what 2nd Peter 2 talks about in secretly introducing destructive heresies! We are in prime placement for that if we’re not careful. Let us, with a watchful eye, Biblically-centered hearts, in submission and obedience to our righteous and perfect Father, reject all things that don’t hold up the beautiful, powerful, all-consuming truth of Christ in God’s Word wether they’re popular and widely embraced or not. Submission to God is eternally more important than being on the cutting edge. God defines truth, man defines the cutting edge.
