Billboard Hits and The Gospel: Part 1

Un-Thinkable (I'm Ready) was number one on the US Billboard R&B chart for twelve consecutive weeks. The song was co-written by Alicia Keys and rapper Drake. Mariel Concepcion from Billboard magazine said of Keys: "the singer/pianist goes from entertaining puppy love to confessing deeper emotions… She finally builds up the courage to share a serious desire with her lover ... atop a building, thumping beat. For an artist who has built her career on songs about love, lust and heartache, Keys has never sounded quite as vulnerable and exposed as she does here." As we’ll see in a minute, the realistic sounding emotions that played a part in the track’s success could be attributed to the fact that Keys is singing to a real person.

The music video for Un-Thinkable was awarded Outstanding Music Video at the 42nd NAACP Awards. The concept is a noble one. It tackles the issues of interracial dating. Keys told Rap Up magazine before the video came out, "The [video] will highlight the past and present stigmas surrounding the subject." The gospel affirms the video’s concept of rejecting racism. Genesis 1:26-27 says that all human beings are created in the image and likeness of God. One of the bible’s central figures, Moses, was married to an Ethiopian woman (Num. 12:1-6). The parable of the Good Samaritan teaches that people of different ethnicities and cultures are to be considered our “neighbor.” And we are to love our neighbors as ourselves (James 2:8).

I appreciate that the music video intends to promote cultural unity and an awareness that racism still exists. But, only the gospel has the power to get our society over the wall of racism. We see the solution as we look at what God has done to remove the barriers between us and him and us and others. The Apostle Paul says in Romans 5 that we were once God’s enemies and that there was a separating wall between him and us. But, through the death of Jesus we were reconciled to God. There is now nothing that can separate us from his unconditional love (Rom. 8:38-39). In addition, Paul addresses in Ephesians 2 the relational tension between the Jews and Gentiles. For thousands of years these two groups had kept their distance. But, through the death of Jesus, the dividing wall of hostility was destroyed (Eph. 2:14). All who trust in Christ are adopted into one family and become brothers and sisters with the same Father God. The gospel offers hope for our broken relationship with God and broken relationships with others.

While the music video promotes unity, as we pull back the curtain, we see that the song itself was not originally written with this message in mind. MTV reports that in a BET.com interview Drake revealed that the song was written with his lover and Keys’ lover in mind. "[Un-thinkable] is [about Minaj], I'm not gonna lie," Drake said. "The concept came from a conversation that we had, or conversations we have. I wrote it based off two things: Number one, based off that, and then two, based off Alicia and Swizz [Beatz] and their situation, and it just seemed fitting. It was like the perfect concept." We see here that the song wasn’t written to combat racism but illustrate Drake’s desires for a girl as well as parallel Keys’ desires for her new crush. So far, this is a pretty normal as far as song writing goes.

Where the gospel would confront Keys is in the fact that she is longing for a married man. Another MTV.com article, which traced the history of their relationship, reported that in 2008 rumors spread that Swizz and Keys were forming a relationship while Swizz was married to a popular nightclub singer Mashonda. Later that year, Keys threw a surprise birthday party for Swizz after him and his wife had separated (but still weren’t divorced). In 2009, he confirmed his relationship with Keys (through the lyrics of a remixed song) while he was engaged in a messy divorce with his wife.

Keys sings in Un-Thinkable “I know you said to me ‘This is exactly how it should feel when it’s meant to be.’” The warning that Keys needs to hear is that love is much more than a feeling. Love is a choice that is binding and covenantal. Who is to say that Swizz in a few years won’t go on to say “this is exactly how it should feel when it’s meant to be” to another lover? Divorce plagues America but especially those in the movie and music industries.

The gospel confronts this shifting from one marriage to the next. It is sin and it dishonors God because a) it rejects his design for how we are to live and b) it distorts the picture of how we are to live in relationship to God. He has provided us all with the gift of marriage so that we can experience a strong, pleasurable, and secure love with another person that will withstand hard times and keep us safe from our disordered emotions. For those who are united with Christ, he goes further and gives the gift of the Holy Spirit to empower us with agape love.

Listen closely. I’m not writing about Alicia Keys to say that people like her is what is wrong with the world. Sin is the problem and everyone has it by nature. All of us are tempted break our covenant with God and one another. Thankfully, the good news is that Jesus died to forgive our constant straying from God and put us in a secure relationship with him forever. Each week, when we as Christians attend church, we practice covenant renewal, which includes asking God to forgive us for being “staying sheep” (Isa. 53:6) who continually break our marriage covenant with the One who will never break his commitment to us.