The Christian rocker, who is known as much for his passion for apologetics as his powerful rock anthems, says he feels called to defend the faith and to encourage believers as they navigate an increasingly secular world. John Cooper is the frontman for the Grammy-nominated band Skillet, which in recent days released its newest album, Revolution, and a new single, Ash in the Wind, which debuted at No. 1 on the iTunes All-Songs chart. The album comes on the heels of Cooper's 2023 book Wimpy, Weak, and Woke: How Truth Can Save America from Utopian Destruction, which itself was a follow-up to an earlier apologetic-themed book, 2021's Awake & Alive to Truth: Finding Truth in the Chaos of a Relativistic World. Cooper, though, wasn't always known as an outspoken apologist. For most of the band's history—Skillet launched in 1996—Cooper stuck to music. He released the first book around the same time he debuted his podcast, Cooper Stuff.
"God began putting those seeds in my heart around 2014, and that is when I realized the world was changing to a degree that, frankly, I did not understand," Cooper told Crosswalk Headlines, referencing his desire to speak out about Christianity and cultural issues. "I began a journey of What is going on? But I knew by 2017, I knew that God was calling me to be someone that would defend the faith and that would stand up for Christian morality. And it was around 2019 when I finally decided: I have to do this."
The deconstruction of Joshua Harris and several other high-profile Christian leaders was confirmation to Cooper of his new mission. Harris was the author of I Kissed Dating Goodbye (1997) and several other books.
"And I thought: Okay, I want to speak out about what is happening and make a real clear statement. Because I think there's a lot of Christian people in my generation that were really impacted by Joshua Harris [and] who subsequently were going, 'If Joshua Harris didn't make it, what does that mean for the faith?'
"And I wanted to say: Stand firm on the Word of God. The Word of God never ever changes. The grass withers, the flower fades. The Word of our God will stand forever. You can bank on it."
A decade ago, Cooper said, "Everybody took it for granted that if you called yourself a follower of Jesus, then you held to certain moral principles." One of those, he said, is the pro-life position.
"So it didn't need to be said all the time by a musician like me," he said. "And as I've seen more and more Christians -- whether it's churches, theologians, influencers, whatever -- be on the opposite side -- I started saying, 'Oh, I guess we need to begin to be clear about those positions now. And that's why I did so."
Skillet is the headline act for this season's Winter Jam, the popular multi-act Christian concert tour.
Photo Credit: ©Getty Images/Ethan Miller/Staff
Michael Foust has covered the intersection of faith and news for 20 years. His stories have appeared in Baptist Press, Christianity Today, The Christian Post, the Leaf-Chronicle, the Toronto Star and the Knoxville News-Sentinel.