Welcome to the Daily Blade. The word of God is described as the sword of the spirit, the primary spiritual weapon in the Christians' armor against the forces of evil. Your hosts are Joby Martin and Kyle Thompson, and they stand ready to equip men for the fight. Let's sharpen up.

Welcome back, guys. This week on The Daily Blade, I'm introducing you all to some music that you may not have considered to be worship music before. Again, a lot of guys just don't like contemporary worship music, but worshiping God through song is not optional. So I just want to expand the category of worship music for you. Yesterday we looked at the song On My Knees by the country gospel band Red Clay Strays. And today we're looking at the song Graves by the hip-hop artist KB, featuring Brandon Lake. So just a quick side note: of all the genres of music that took the longest time to come around into the Christian world, rap probably took the longest. So I actually grew up in an area where almost everyone listened to rap and hip-hop. And when I became a Christian in the early 2000s, I tried to find some solid, God-fearing, gospel-centered rap artists. And I mean, yikes, it was pretty slim pickings at the time. And luckily, now there are a lot of rappers that would fall into the solid category. So I'm thankful for that. And KB is certainly one of those guys. So the song actually starts off with Brandon Lake singing part of his song, Graves into Gardens. And Brandon Lake is probably the dominant hegemon in the contemporary Christian space. But the dude is just crazy talented as a performer and a songwriter. So it's a very subtle and subdued beginning of the song by Brandon Lake. The lyrics are you turn graves into gardens, you turn pain into promise, you bring beauty from ashes. Where we go, I'll stand by you. Only you take me. And that's the first 20 seconds of the song. And then the beat drops, and then KB comes in, and what follows is just high energy. It's a high energy rap anthem, essentially. And KB's first line finishes Brandon Lake's last one. So we so we have here Brandon Lake saying, Only you take me. And then KB says, Out of the grave. Again, the name of the song is Graves. And just here in the intro, the entire image is a God that regenerates, you know, a God that transforms. I mean, this is right out of Ezekiel 37, the Valley of Dry Bones passage. And it's such a powerful passage. I wanted to cut it down, but I'm actually going to read a good chunk of it here. So I'm going to read Ezekiel 37, verses 1 through 14. The hand of the Lord was upon me, and he brought me out in the spirit of the Lord and set me down in the middle of the valley. It was full of bones, and he led me around among them, and behold, there were very many on the surface of the valley, and behold, they were very dry. And he said to me, Son of man, can these bones live? And I answered, O Lord God, you know. Then he said to me, Prophesy over these bones and say to them, O dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus says the Lord God to these bones, Behold, I will cause breath to enter you, and you shall live, and I will lay sinews upon you, and will cause flesh to come upon you, and cover you with skin, and put breath in you, and you shall live, and you shall know that I am the Lord. So I prophesied as I was commanded, and I prophesied that there was a sound, and behold, a rattling, and the bones came together, bone to its bone, and I looked, and behold, there were sinews on them, and flesh had come upon them, and skin had covered them, but there was no breath in them. Then he said to me, Prophesy to the breath, prophesy, son of man, and say to the breath, Thus says the Lord God, Come from the four winds, O breath, and breath breathe on these slain, that they may live. So I prophesied as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great army. Then he said to me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Behold, they say, our bones are dried up, and our hope is lost, we are indeed cut off. Therefore prophesy and say to them, Thus says the Lord, behold, I will open your graves and raise you from your graves, O my people, and I will bring you into the land of Israel, and you shall sho you shall know that I am the Lord when I open your graves and raise you from your graves, O my people. And I will put my spirit within you, and you shall live, and I will place you in your own land. Then you shall know that I am the Lord, I have spoken, and I will do it, declares the Lord. I mean, goodness gracious, that is just powerful, powerful stuff from that passage. And then we get to the end of KB's chorus. Yeah, dead man, dead man, dead man brought me back to life. Who yeah, dead man, dead man, dead man, now I'm living twice. And guys, you know, the lyrics there, the the capital T truth therein is referenced all over the Bible. We're just gonna look at a few places. So Ephesians 2, verses 1 through 6. And you were dead in the treadpass trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world, following the prince of the power of the air, the spirit that is now at work in the sons of disobedience, among whom all we have lived in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the flesh in the mind, and were by nature children of wrath, like the rest of mankind. But God being rich in mercy, became the great love that which he loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ. By grace you have been saved, and raised us up with him, and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Then we see in Paul's letter to the church in Colossae, this is Colossians two, verses thirteen through fifteen, and you who were dead in your tread trespasses and the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made alive together with him, having forgiven us all our trespasses by canceling the record of death that stood against us with its legal demands. This he set aside, nailing it to the cross. He disarmed the rulers and authorities and put them to open shame by triumphing over them in him. And just one more. This is Jesus talking to the Pharisee Nicodemus, as recorded in John chapter three. This man Nicodemus came to Jesus by night and said to him, Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher come from God, for no one can do these signs that you do unless God is with him. Jesus answered him, Truly, truly I say to you, unless one is born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. And men, that's the key. It's really everything. We were dead in our trespasses and sins, but God snatched us from death. And Jesus died willingly on the cross at Golgotha so that we could have a chance to be born again, only this time in Christ. Man, that's just good stuff there. So, guys, check out the song Graves by KB featuring Brandon Lake. Come back tomorrow where we'll highlight a worship song from a ska punk band.

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