In the 1934 Broadway play “Anything Goes” composer Cole Porter not only wrote a classic song
that became part of the Great American Songbook, but was perhaps inadvertently prophetic
about the times that we are living in today.
The lyrics start off with 'times have changed,' and while that was certainly true almost ninety years
ago it is even MORE true today! While at the turn of the last century to glimpse
at a ladies stocking was considered 'something shocking' morals have shifted
so far that in today’s world there are truly no more boundaries.
Porter goes onto say that 'those that once knew better words now only use
four-letter words' - and today this is even more true than ever.
What was considered foul-language years ago is now commonplace in videos, TV, rap music,
in everyday conversation, and even used in reputable on-line news stories. The song ends that despite all this
'nobody will oppose' - which is sadly true
for the times in which we live.
One of Porter’s verses was also a 20th century paraphrase of today’s scripture:
The world has gone mad today
And good’s bad today,
And black’s white today,
And day’s night today,
Even so he ends saying 'But now, God knows,
Anything Goes.'
While God indeed knows, in His permissive will
He has given and allows everyone free choice to do or not do whatever we want, and although
times have indeed changed over the last century, God’s guidelines for living have not.
The question is, as the song says, are YOU living by the “GOOD and the DAY or
by the “BAD and the NIGHT where 'Anything Goes??'
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