I don’t know about anyone else, but I grew up with music as an integral part of my life. My mom is a music teacher and was the choir director at my first church, so I was surrounded by, and practically bathed in, music for most of my life, and so I have a connection with it. There are some things that I just get better from music than anywhere else, but sometimes, lyrics don’t quite make sense the first couple times through, which is why I decided to start this section of my blog: lyric breakdowns.
See, for me, I sometimes hear God speak better when I’m listening to music. There’s something about worship that gets me focused on listening a little better than reading sometimes. So, without further ado, For King and Country’s “Burn the Ships.”
How did we get here?
All castaway on a lonely shore
I can see in your eyes, dear
It's hard to take for a moment more
This song starts with what I would deem the most ambiguous part of it, which makes sense, because it’s a query. That query is a question that I’m sure a lot of us ask when we struggle with sin. You get in so deep, and before you know it, you’re a castaway, abandoned on an island by yourself with no clue of how you arrived or where to go afterward.
If you check out the background of this song, you’ll find that Luke Smallbone, one of the writers, was driven to writing this partially by his wife’s battle with a prescription medication addiction. That’s where the last two lines of the first stanza come from.
Another part of the driving force behind the lyrics of this song has to do with historical figure Hernán Cortés, who, to ensure his men would follow through on their conquest of Mexico, ordered them to burn their ships, eliminating any chance of backing out.
We've got to
Burn the ships, cut the ties
Send a flare into the night
Say a prayer, turn the tide
Dry your tears and wave goodbye
While mostly self-explanatory, “Burn the ships, cut the ties,” is doubling down on eliminating escape routes. Basically, this is setting the boats on fire and then casting them off to sea, as well. So, not only are you destroying the integrity of the ship, you’re also sinking it so there’s no chance of salvaging any part of it.
“Send a flare into the night.” Flares are for emergency rescue situations. It’s a call for help because it’s so much harder to fight sin alone.
To turn the tide is to reverse the situation, as a tide turns from high to low. In the times of sailboats, the turning of the tide was extremely important to casting off to sea. If you were trying to set sail as the tide was coming in, it was far more difficult than if you cast out as the tide was going out. You had to put yourself in a favorable situation to more easily escape the harbor, and it’s the same with sin.
Step into a new day
We can rise up from the dust and walk away
We can dance upon our heartache, yeah
So light a match, leave the past, burn the ships
And don't you look back
I really love the first line of the chorus because it implies so many things. Not only is it mentioning a new beginning (“a new day”) but it also mentions that changing your life isn’t a passive thing. You can’t just let the new day come upon you, you must “step into” it. It’s an action of moving forward.
The second line re-enforces the first. Rising up from being knocked down isn’t something that just happens. You have to force your muscles into action, even against their aching protest (because you’d definitely be aching if you were knocked into the ground hard enough to kick up dust). And, you also have to “walk away” from the fight. A deeper implication here is that you have to pick yourself up and let someone take over the battle you were fighting, i.e., God.
And then, “dance upon our heartache” is significant in that it implies the necessity of joy, of finding the energy, the grace of God, to find joy even when you’re aching, in pain. I believe that’s important because we are called to have joy even when we are suffering.
Finally, “don’t you look back.” One of the most dangerous things about turning away from sin is the temptation to look back at what you’re running from. It’s dangerous because you see what you had, and you know it, and it attempts to draw you back in. Not looking at sin is the easiest way to avoid the temptation, I believe.
Don't let it arrest you
This fear is fear of fallin' again
And if you need a refuge
I will be right here until the end
For King and Country would agree with me, I think, based on the next stanza. We often consider the fear of the unknown as being literally that, fear of what you don’t know, but I’d argue that it’s more of a fear that we can’t handle what’s ahead. The first two lines are stating as such: don’t let the fear of failing stop you from moving forward. The next two lines serve as encouragement to go forward: even if you fall, there is a safe place where you can heal and rest to go forward again.
So long to shame, walk through the sorrow
Out of the fire into tomorrow
So flush the pills, face the fear
Feel the wave disappear
We're comin' clear, we're born again
Our hopeful lungs can breathe again
The last stanza to talk about is absolutely filled with metaphors that I could go on and on about, but I’ll keep it as short as possible.
One of the things that keeps us back from God is shame, feeling like we’re not enough and we won’t be accepted. Say bye to shame and go through the necessary feelings to shed that. If you have to be sad, hurt, in pain, walk through it. It’s something that’s here now, but there is another side to it where you’ll be free. You’ll eventually escape the “fire” and get to a new chance.
“Flush the pills” is another reference to Luke’s wife’s addiction, but it also serves as a symbol of any sin. Flush that down the toilet. Get rid of it in a way that you can’t go back for it. “Face the fear” of the unknown, of the uncomfortable and feel the unbearable weight that was prepared to come crashing down vanish.
Resurface from the water and breathe in the air, breathe in the hope of starting again, of being free from that pain and suffering of drowning.
I absolutely love this song, and I hope I’ve done a decent job of explaining it in a somewhat short manner. It’s filled with so much advice on how to combat sin in this life and really gets deep into the feelings that people who are suffering with these incredibly addictive sins such as drugs, porn, etc. feel as they’re trying to turn to God.