Theological Song Review: Forever and Amen by Cody Carnes, Kari Jobe – 20/100

This tune was released with the rest of the album God is Good! (Live) on September 30, 2022.

Note: For a full explanation of the rubric and a primer on our scoring methodology, click here.

Doctrinal Fidelity and Clarity: The song opens with a “version” of the Lord’s prayer – notably modifying Christ’s prayer that “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” to simply state, “Your Kingdom as it is in heaven, let it be on earth the same,” a statement that aligns with the “Kingdom Now” theology found in the New Apostolic Reformation teaching of Carnes’ and Jobe’s Gateway Church. Jesus’ prayer to “lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil” is later modified to become “deliver us again,” removing the context of temptation and instead alluding to the idea that the delivery spoken of is a perpetual occurrence – quite possibly occurring as God progressively regains control over the world (a “Kingdom Now” idea), before the chorus (and song title) which is simply a repeated and contextless “forever and amen.” Modifying scripture to say something other than what it says is sinful and disqualifying for any worship song. 5/25.

Doctrinal Specificity: Unfortunately, when a song is generally non-specific but the specifics that are there twist what the Bible teaches, it renders the specificity analysis rather moot. Even the NAR-typical, mindless repetition of the sometimes-included doxology “Yours is the kingdom, Yours is the power, Yours is the glory” is completely absent of any specific context and seems only useful in stirring the crowd to emotional heights in the comically-long live rendition of the song. 5/20.

Focus: Focus is similarly hard to analyze as the lyrics are primarily out of context and repeated ad nauseam. But it is safe to say that the focus of the song – especially in context of the marathon-length rendition – is on creating an emotional release for the worshipper. While “our Father” is mentioned, His utility is validated by his response to us (“when we pray, you long to hear it, you love to bless it”). When God’s actions are mentioned, they are mischaracterized. The focus of the song is clearly on the experience of the worship participant rather than God. 5/20.

Association: To say Cody Carnes and Kari Jobe have troublesome associations is putting it mildly. In fact, we consider anyone associating with them to be troublesome. They come out of Robert Morris’ NAR-promoting, seeker-sensitive Gateway Church. Jobe is famous for teaching through her song “Forever” that Jesus descended into hell for a fight with Satan – a heretical belief that denies that Christ paid the price on the cross. She is also known for her sexualization of Jesus in song lyrics, like her song The More I Seek You, where she sings, “Lay back against you and breathe, feel your heart beat, this love is so deep, it’s more than I can stand.” Gross. 0/20.

Musical Value: The composition bears all the musical signatures of a modern, disposable musical vehicle utilized for mind-numbing repetition. While the use of 1-4-2-5 (verse) and 4-5-6-5 (chorus) chord sequences are not in and of themselves problematic (and are used in hundreds of songs), the ridiculous overuse of the 4-2-6 build under the “Yours” repeats are strikingly similar to the “lose yourself” repetitions of techno kids on ecstasy or weed-smoking jam band fans that will blissfully listen to the same musical phrase over and over in a mindless, emotion-informed trance. In short, the music doesn’t matter. The chords and melodies could be just about anything to serve the purposes of this song. 5/15.

Total score: 20/100. Avoid this garbage like the plague.

Bonus: Practice applying this rubric on a David song here:

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