Keith Green and the Scariest Bible Story
Whatever you do, don't be a goat.
A few years ago, at the height of his National Football League career, people started calling Tom Brady, the Greatest of All Time, or the GOAT. At the time, he had won six Super Bowls and been named NFL MVP and Super Bowl MVP multiple times. Shortly thereafter, “GOAT” transitioned into the American pop-cultural lexicon. Suddenly, high-performing people of all manner started to be called “the GOAT” in their area of excellence.
The word “goat” always had another meaning for me, though, and when it comes to Christianity, you definitely don’t want to be a goat.
Keith Green was born in New York in 1957, but his family moved to southern California shortly after. Green’s parents were Jewish Christian Scientists. After having been a successful composer and performer since his childhood in the 1960s, Green and his Jewish wife became Christians in the mid-1970s. As his life took on a new direction, so too did his music, and he became a popular Christian singer.
Like a lot of converts and unlike a lot of traditional, raised-since-birth Christians, Green took the Bible at face value. If it said to do something, he thought Christians should really do it.
In the early 1980s, when I was in middle school, Green was performing a song called The Sheep and the Goats, taken from Matthew 25. This song recounts the sorting process that is going to happen following Jesus’s return.
Jesus describes some religious people as sheep and others as goats. The sheep are those who followed Jesus’s commandments to take care of those in need. The goats are those who did not. To be clear, both the sheep and the goats think that they are in good standing with Jesus, but the goats are fooling themselves.
Green’s song has haunted me through the decades. Am I a sheep or a goat? Deep down, I know that I’m saved, and thus a sheep. But Green’s song demands accountability for what I have done with my time as a Christian and how I have treated those around me. Have I ministered to them as Christ would have? Or have I turned my head and ignored their needs?
Sadly, Green was killed in a small plane crash in 1982. Twelve people were on board, including Green and two of his children. Green’s wife and two younger children were not on board, and his wifed continued his ministry after the tragic event.
Have a listen. And whatever you do, don’t be a goat.
A Simple Prayer
Holy Father, help us to see the need around us and engage with it in your name. Do not let us turn our eyes away those in need, whether because of embarrassment or shame, but help us to live out your word daily. Some day, when it comes time to separate the sheep from the goats, let us be counted among the sheep. Amen.
If this article spoke to you, leave me a comment and let me know. Your feedback is always appreciated. Does somebody in your life need to read this? Share it with them! If this spoke to you, please subscribe to get future articles. And always like and “restack” this post in Substack to help others find it.
I agree David, when people say they are goats I think to myself "what? why would you say that? Don't you know what the Bible says?" We must all strive to be sheep.
Keith Green is still missed.
The term GOAT, by the way, was coined in the 90s by Muhammad Ali's wife as a marketing tactic to describe him as the best ever. =)