Skillet’s John Cooper Explains Why God Let the Pandemic Happen

Many people often wonder why bad things happen to good people, and everyone is trying to figure out why we've been dealing with a global health crisis for the last two years. Skillet frontman John Cooper has explained his take on why God let the pandemic happen in the first place.

Skillet's 11th studio album Dominion is out today (Jan. 14) via Atlantic Records. During a chat with Loudwire Nights, host Toni Gonzalez brought up the track "Valley of Death," which features the lines, "Someone said this is all part of the plan / But I don't understand." She then queried him on why he believes God would allow a pandemic to happen at all.

"Well, the first answer is that we're not good people. We're all fallen and we are all in desperate need of salvation through Jesus," Cooper said. "So, we're not actually good people, we all do bad stuff. We all cheat, we've all lied, we're all greedy and as much as the most loving person in the whole world that you'll ever find, that person is actually still very far off from what mankind was supposed to be, and certainly far off from who God is and the way that God truly loves in a perfect way."

The singer acknowledged that that answer doesn't necessarily make the trials and tribulations people go through any easier, such as his mother dying of cancer when he was 15 years old.

"I'll just end it with this… most people would agree that when you go through trials in life, whatever they may be, there is this idea that in the end, if you make good decisions, if you follow it through, if you change your mind and struggle through it, you come out on the back side stronger than when you started," he continued. "I think religious people and non-religious people seem to agree on this idea that being through the fire, that sort of refines the gold if you will, that's what makes you stronger."

"And a lot of people say, 'You know what, that was really difficult, but I wouldn't change it because it made me who I am today.' And I guess what I'm saying is, in the same way on a Bible perspective, we go through these things so that God can change us and he can remind us of how much we actually need him. If we don't have grace from God every single day, we are not going to make it."

Tune into Loudwire Nights tonight at 7PM ET to hear more details about Dominion, including how the band adapted to creating an album through Zoom.

Loudwire Nights with Toni Gonzalez airs nightly starting at 7PM ET. You can tune in anytime, from anywhere right here or by downloading the Loudwire app.