Red Rocks Worship – Breakthrough

Many churches collaborate for a unified goal: to spread Christ to others.  Some might be focused on helping local communities.  Others have an international vision.  Red Rocks Worship works together through music, pooling together talented singers and songwriters who love God and follow Jesus.  They released four albums and one EP, including:

• Into the Light (2015)
• Living Liturgies (2016, EP)
• Here (Live) (2017)
• spark. (Live) (2019)
• spark.  ACOUSTIC SESSIONS (2020)

I am not aware of any prestigious awards or nominations based on their work.

Check out my other Red Rocks Worship review: Not Afraid.

Lyrics can be found at https://genius.com/Red-rocks-worship-breakthrough-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?

Red Rocks Worship is exhausted from their daily grind called life.  They ask God for release, listening for His still, small voice that will grant them assurance.  God is powerful enough to do it and Red Rocks have both faith and knowledge that God will come through.  He is the same God who takes their sins and restores them spiritually.  It also declares Christ as King.

While I initially thought this song taught Word of Faith, Red Rocks Worship neither claims that all people will experience a breakthrough nor do they say that faith guarantees healings. They are citing a true statement: that when God is present, healings occur.

My chief criticism is Spontaneous and Interlude.  How does Red Rocks Worship know that God will do these things?  Are they prophets?  It’s one thing to say “I believe”, but it’s another matter to know.

Side Note: To those who are sensitive to massive repetition,  Interlude repeats the same phrase six times in a row, followed by an “I know” statement and another six refrains.  Finally, Bridge repeats again (twice) and ends with Chorus.

Score: 8/10

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

Most of it adheres to Scripture, except possibly Spontaneous and Interlude, where they claim to know God will heal.

[Verse 1]

Lines 1-3: Red Rocks is burdened by the daily struggle of life.  Rather than being fearful, they turn to God for liberation (Genesis 15:1, Joshua 1:9, Deuteronomy 31:6, 1 Chronicles 28:20, Psalm 23:4, Psalm 27:1, Psalm 34:4, Psalm 56:3-4, Psalm 94:19, Psalm 115:11, Psalm 118:6, Isaiah 35:4, Isaiah 41:10-13, Isaiah 43:1, Isaiah 54:4, John 14:25-27, Romans 8:15, Romans 8:38-39, 2 Timothy 1:7, Hebrews 13:5-6, 1 Peter 3:13-14, 1 Peter 5:6-7, and 1 John 4:18).  He is a merciful God (Exodus 33:19, Psalm 86:5, Psalm 145:9, Lamentations 3:22-23, Luke 6:36, Romans 9:15-16, Ephesians 2:4-5, Titus 3:5, Hebrews 4:16, and 1 Peter 1:3).

Lines 4 and 5: In at least one example in Scripture, God passed by, causing a gust of wind, an earthquake, and a fire to break out, but His voice was not in any of them. Yet, His voice was not in them.  It was a still, small voice that the prophet Elijah heard (1 Kings 19:11-13).  That is the desire of Red Rocks, to hear God’s voice amid chaos.

Line 6: Red Rocks is asking for assurance in the human sense.

[Chorus]

Lines 1 and 2: God’s strength breaks chains (Psalm 116:16, Mark 5:8, Romans 6:20, and Galatians 5:1), that He is the King of heaven (Exodus 15:6, Exodus 15:11, 1 Chronicles 29:11, 2 Chronicles 20:6, Psalm 24:10, Psalm 93:1, Psalm 110:2-3, Psalm 104:1, Psalm 145:5, Psalm 145:12, Job 37:22, Isaiah 24:14, Isaiah 26:10, Hebrews 1:3-4, Hebrews 8:1, Revelation 4:1-11, and Revelation 19:7-16)

Line 3: God’s voice is the source by which our faith causes mountains to crumble (Matthew 17:20, Matthew 21:21, and Mark 11:23).

Line 4: Faith is required for a breakthrough to occur (Hebrews 11:3-38); However, Red Rocks Worship does not declare that faith-filled requests result in healing.

NOTE: Preceding refrains contain a callout to Casper the friendly ghost (lines 4 and 5, second refrain), a full repeat (third refrain), essentially repeating the fourth line with multiple “I know”s (third refrain), and “we know”s (fourth refrain).

[Verse 2]

Line 1: God took the penalty for Red Rock’s lawbreaking (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).

Lines 2 and 3: God takes the brokenness in Red Rocks and repaired their lives (Romans 6:1-11, Romans 7:4-6, Galatians 2:19-20, 2 Timothy 2:11, and 1 Peter 2:24).

[Bridge]

Lines 1-8: See commentary in Chorus, lines 1 and 2.  Also, Jesus is King (Isaiah 9:6, Isaiah 11:10, Micah 5:2, Matthew 2:1-6, John 12:15, John 18:37, 1 Timothy 6:13-16, Revelation 17:14, and Revelation 19:11-16).

Lines 9-14: Repeats lines 1-3 and 5-7.

[Spontaneous]

Lines 1-4: See commentary in Chorus, line 4.

Line 5: Unless they received direct revelation from God (I have no reason to think they have), it’s presumptuous for them to make this knowledge claim.  Instead, Red Rocks ought to precede it with “If God wills” or an equivalent disclaimer (Proverbs 27:1 and James 4:13-16), stick with belief (as they did with previous lyrics), or tell us that God told them these things would occur.

[Interlude]

Line 1: See Chorus, line 4.

Lines 2-6: Repeats line 1 with another Casper refrain.

Line 7: Essentially repeats Spontaneous, line 5.

Lines 8:-13: Repeats line 1 with another Casper refrain.

Line 14: Essentially repeats Bridge, line 1 using the pronoun “we”.

Score: 8/10

3. How would an outsider interpret the song?

I’ve talked with many people who walked away from Christianity because of Word of Faith.  They prayed with all the faith they could muster up, that God would heal them or their loved one.  It didn’t happen.  Why?  “Because you didn’t have enough faith”, they were told.

It’s hard for unbelievers who have similar experiences not to see this song as anything other than “If you have enough faith, then whatever you ask in Jesus’ name, it will happen.”  As I mentioned in my commentary to Spontaneous, God’s will is not taken under advisement.

For unbelievers who are not familiar with/have not experienced Word of Faith, they will likely see that God has the power to address their problems, including their broken hearts.  I fear that those who expect guaranteed results upon hearing this song will experience disappointment and will reject Jesus because of false hope.

Score: 5/10

4. What does this song glorify?

While it glorifies God to express the truths about His power over our ailments and repairs our hearts caused by a life of sin, it’s difficult for me to know if Red Rocks Worship received a revelation from God or asking on their own when claiming to know God will act.

Score: 8/10

Closing Comments

Red Rocks Worship’s Breakthrough is decent.  While it accurately presents a God who can rescue us from our weariness and heal our spiritual brokenness, they claim to have intimate knowledge that, judging from the lyrics, it’s inconclusive if this came directly from God or themselves.

This song’s score could have significantly improved and, perhaps, find my recommendation if it contained a caveat, that we must ask according to God’s will and not claim to know things we don’t.  However, based purely on the lyrics provided, I cannot recommend it for corporate worship.

Final Score: 7.5/10

Artist Info

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

Artist: Red Rocks Worship

Album: spark. (Live)

Genre: Contemporary Christian Music (CCM)

Release Year: 2019

Duration: 9:27

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

Updates:

01/21/2022 – Per Artist Theology announcement, I expanded the red text to encourage others to study Red Rock Worship’s theology.

10/25/2021 – After much prayer and examining other similar lyrics, I concluded that my vendetta against Word of Faith was unjustified in this review, except possibly with unbeliever interpretation (especially due to Spontaneous).  I updated the entire review, signifigantly raising this song’s score from 4.5 to 7.5.

03/25/2021 – Updated per repetition announcement.  I moved my commentary to a side note.