Ok so I grew up in the age of the late80s -2000s music. What is with the rock group Creed? Are the Christian? Are they Christianish? Or completely secular? There are many words in their lyrical content to songs that hint at perhaps somethings like faith, judgment day, mentioning one king, lyrical references to describing what heaven may be like Etc etc… where should a Christian categorize this music?
It was a fine line they rode, much like Evanessence did at the same time.
Scott Strapp seemed to be vocal about his faith somewhat at the time, yet his actions often did not line up. Once he got a DUI and some other negative media he seemed to disappear for a while.
A few years ago he reappeared with a new solo project, after sobering up. He seemed taken with a more Catholic view, based off the lyrics.
Meanwhile the rest of the guys went on to form Alter Bridge, which also fell into the label of Christian, but seemingly more legitimately than Creed did.
I suspect Scott Strapp was more the face of the band, as well as lyricist, and did more to cause confusion than the musicians, as he was always in the center of all the controversy. Hence peoples confusion.
And he seemed to have either grown up with a faith based upbringing or simply had a lot of struggles in his life, combined with a faith he was unsteady with.
I always found them more Christian friendly rather than Christian, other than the use of God d@mn in one song. That did seem to put a smudge on their Christian reputation, but less than I expected.
Evanescence had plenty of confusion at the same time as to whether or not they were Christian. It turns out only the guitarist was a Christian, but the record label made the call to advertise them as Christian. Though they did go on to have Christians in the band later, most notably Rocky Gray, guitarist of well established Christian band Living Sacrifice and his side project, Christian band Soul Embraced.