Bethel Music (Feat. Cory Asbury) – Egypt

Bethel Music is a major contender vying for the title “king of modern Christian music”.  Bethel Church was founded in 1952, releasing their music in 2001 with too many albums than I care to count.

Check out my other Bethel Music reviews.

Lyrics can be found at https://genius.com/Bethel-music-egypt-live-lyrics.

Note to new users: This is a different kind of review site!  Read About the Berean Test and Evaluation Criteria prior to reading this review.  I strongly encourage you to consider the potential blessings and dangers of this artist‘s theology by visiting Resources.

1. What message does the song communicate?

Bethel Music borrows from elements in the book of Exodus, including rescue from Egyptian slaves, the parting of the sea, cloud by day, and pillar of fire by night, to loosely describe salvation.  Bridge makes this more apparent when it says “Death is swallowed up forever”, pointing to Christ’s sacrifice that put death to death.  In response, Bethel Music sings their testimony to others, remembering His sacrificial love.

Chorus, line 2, could be interpreted as Word of Faith, that God will prevail over all circumstances when Scripture says otherwise; However, Bridge makes this conclusion untenable.

Score: 10/10

2. How much of the lyrics line up with Scripture?

All of this song aligns with God’s inspired Word.

[Verse 1]

Lines 1 and 2: In much the same way that God delivered Israel to freedom from their Egyptian slaves (Exodus 14:30-31), so too has saved Bethel Music from their former slave of sin (Psalm 119:45, Isaiah 58:6, Isaiah 61:1, John 3:16-21, John 8:31-36, John 10:10, Acts 13:38-39, Romans 6:1-23, Romans 8:1-4, Romans 8:20-21, 1 Corinthians 6:12, 1 Corinthians 7:21-23, 2 Corinthians 3:17, Galatians 2:4, Galatians 3:13, Galatians 3:22, Galatians 5:1, Galatians 5:13, Colossians 1:21-23, Hebrews 2:14-15, and 1 Peter 2:16).

[Pre-Chorus]

Lines 1 and 2: Off the heels of Verse 1, Bethel Music borrows from the divided sea in Exodus 14:13-29 to make a figurative statement, that God intervened so that we could be free from sin’s grip.  This is an indirect reference to Christ’s payment for Bethel Music’s penalty (Isaiah 53:1-12, Matthew 20:28, Mark 10:45, John 1:29, John 3:16, John 19:30, Acts 4:12, Acts 20:28, Romans 5:6-10, Romans 6:23, 1 Corinthians 1:30, 1 Corinthians 6:20, 2 Corinthians 5:21, Galatians 1:3-4, Galatians 3:13, Ephesians 1:7, Colossians 2:14, 1 Timothy 2:6, Titus 2:14, Hebrews 9:12, Hebrews 9:15, Hebrews 9:22, Hebrews 9:26, 1 Peter 1:17-21, 1 Peter 2:24, 1 Peter 1:18-19, 1 John 1:7, 1 John 2:1-2, and Revelation 5:9).

Line 3: That is, God.

Side Note: According to all the rabbis and Jews that I’ve interacted with over the years, the word “Yahweh” is a mispronunciation of the Tetragrammaton YHWH or YHVH.  While they find this pronunciation offensive, I won’t deduct points.

[Chorus]

Lines 1 and 2: That is, God fights our battles for us (Exodus 14:14, Deuteronomy 3:22, Deuteronomy 20:4, Joshua 1:9, Joshua 23:10, Psalms 44:5, and Romans 8:31).  While the second line could be interpreted as “God is always victorious”, meaning that God does not allow us to suffer, contrary to Romans 5:3-5, Hebrews 12:4-11, and James 1:2-4, it’s saying that God is a God of victory.  It means that “God is victorious in all wars He wages”.

Line 3: The word ‘Hallelujah” is a compound Hebrew phrase, with “hallelu” meaning “a joyous praise in song” and “jah” or “yah”, which refers to the Tetragrammaton YHWH. Put together, we are singing “we joyfully praise God in song” when we use this word.

Lines 4 and 5: See Pre-Chorus, lines 1 and 2.

Line 6: Repeats line 3.

[Verse 2]

Lines 1 and 2: God guided the Israelites to the promised land with a cloud by day and pillar of fire by night (Exodus 13:21).  This also signified that God was with them in a physical, tangible way.  So too God is with Bethel Music, guiding them to where they should go.

[Bridge]

Lines 1-3: Summarizes the entire song up to this point.

Line 4: The “promised land” for Bethel Music is paradise, where they will be with God for all eternity (Mark 10:29-30, John 3:15-16, John 3:36, John 4:14, John 5:24, John 5:39-40, John 6:27, John 6:40, John 10:28, John 17:3, John 20:31, Romans 5:21, Romans 6:22-23, Romans 8:18, 2 Corinthians 4:16-18, Galatians 6:8, 1 Timothy 1:16, 1 Timothy 6:12, 2 Timothy 2:11, Hebrews 5:9, 1 Peter 5:10, 1 John 2:23-27, 1 John 5:10-13, 1 John 5:20, Jude 1:20-21, Revelation 3:5, Revelation 7:16-17, and Revelation 21:3-4).

Lines 5 and 6: Bethel Music responds by proclaiming to the masses how God rescued them.

Lines 7 and 8: That is, death is swallowed in victory (1 Corinthians 15:54).

Lines 9-16: Repeats lines 1-8.

[Interlude]

Lines 1 and 2: Bethel Music calls his direct audience to utter the same basic prophecy that they have: there’s freedom found here.

[Outro]

Lines 1-8: Repeats Bridge, lines 1-8.

Score: 10/10

3. How would an outsider interpret the song?

I’m on the fence on this one.  On the one hand, as I mentioned in section 1, the dead giveaway to concluding God’s deliverance from sin is Bridge’s seventh line.  On the other hand, one could forgive an unbeliever’s ignorance to “death is swallowed up forever”, opting to think that Bethel references Word of Faith in this song.  Nonetheless, they should know that it’s either Christian or Judaism, judging from all the references to events in the book of Exodus alongside words like “God”, “Lord”, and “hallelujah”.

Score: 7/10

4. What does this song glorify?

It glorifies God that His salvation from sin’s grip to Himself is paralleled with Exodus’ account, where God rescued Israel from their Egyptian captors.

Score: 10/10

Closing Comments

Bethel Music’s Egypt is good for believers.  It borrows from the book of Exodus to communicate Christ’s rescue operation that saves us from the consequences of our sins, bringing glory to God.  While some might interpret this as Word of Faith language (especially unlearned unbelievers), a closer examination shows a small detail that nullifies this misinterpretation.

I recommend it for corporate worship for mature believers.  Churches full of newcomers to Christianity or would consider themselves “seeker-sensitive” might want to explain this song or find something else.

Final Score: 9.5/10

Artist Info

Track: Egypt (Live) (listen to the song)

Artist: Bethel Music (Feat. Cory Asbury)

Album: Revival’s In The Air (Live)

Genre: Rock

Release Year: 2020

Duration: 6:23

Agree?  Disagree?  Don’t be shy or have a cow!  Calmly and politely state your case in a comment, below.