Skillet lead singer John Cooper says Christians need to portray grace in a time where social media outrage runs rampant.
Social media is a “cesspool where people are constantly yelling at each other,” Cooper told Crosswalk. “Everybody is telling you how to live,” he said. The constant message is “I hate you because you don’t agree with me, and you are ruining the world.”
He believes Christians should not spend a lot of time on social media. They’ll see a lot of things they disagree with, but if they do respond, it needs to be with love and grace.
“Before you start judging someone else, judge yourself,” Cooper said, adding, “This starts with me. This is what I’m trying to do.”
There are ways to disagree with respect and love. If more people did that, social media would be a lot healthier.
“Just say, ‘Hey, that’s not what I believe — because I’m a Christian. … But that doesn’t mean that you and I can’t be friends. It doesn’t mean I hate you. I’m not saying you’re ruining the world. … I want to show the love of Christ to you the best way I can,” he said.
In 2019, Cooper criticized church leaders like Joshua Harris and Marty Sampson after they made public statements about leaving Christianity.
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“I’m not saying that leaders shouldn’t wrestle with their faith, or get confused, or have a crisis, I think all that is fine, I just don’t understand why adult leaders don’t understand that social media is not your diary. … The posts that are coming out are not posts just saying, ‘Hey, I am struggling’ they are posts making statements of influence because they are people of influence,'” Cooper said at the time.
In 2022, Cooper shared that social media presents constant lies to young people.
“Society is telling all of our young people, ‘You’re good just the way you are.’ But the Bible says actually, there’s a big problem with the way that you are because every single one of us has sinned and fallen short of the glory of God,” he shared. “You are not OK, but Jesus made a way for you to be restored. That’s the great news.”
Skillet celebrates its 20th anniversary this year. Their song, “Monster,” surpassed four billion streams on Spotify. It’s the only song by a Christian group or artist to ever surpass one billion streams. Cooper says the most surprising audiences can relate to it.
The song is about sin and feeling imperfect.
“I had never considered that a soccer mom would hear ‘Monster’ and say, ‘Yeah, I feel that way, too.’ So it was kind of shocking to me. But I do think that there’s something about the lyrics that I think everybody can relate to,” Cooper said.
The song reminds Cooper of his daily need for God. He’s a sinner through and through, and without God, he doesn’t know what he would do.
“If I don’t have a daily meeting with Jesus to focus myself and say, ‘God, I want You to be reflected in my life, and I want to put myself to death today’ – I am not going to make it, and I just think that’s a very biblical message. So I think that’s why people can relate to the song,” he said.
For Cooper, whether through his music or social media interactions, his goal is to point people to Christ with truth, grace and humility.
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