What Does ‘Jesus Take The Wheel’ Really Mean?
The phrase, “Jesus, take the wheel,” is a figure of speech calling for divine intervention in your life. In 2005, Carrie Underwood released a song using this common figure of speech as its title. In the song, a woman’s car begins to skid on an icy road and so she prays , “Jesus take the wheel.” But this phrase predates the song and has another meaning.
Carrie Underwood sang ‘Jesus Take The Wheel’
Country singer Carrie Underwood’s “Jesus Take The Wheel” first appeared on her 2005 album, “Some Hearts.” The song tells the story of a young mother who is driving her infant to her own parents’ house in Cincinatti for Christmas. Underwood sings that she only has 50 miles to go, but is “running low on faith and gasoline.”
She had a lot on her mind, and she didn’t pay attention
Carrie Underwood
She was going way too fast
Before she knew it, she was spinning on a thin black sheet of glass
She saw both their lives flash before her eyes
She didn’t even have time to cry
She was so scared
She threw her hands up in the air
Then the driver shouts “Jesus, take the wheel!” And the results are miraculous. Even though she takes both her hands off the steering wheel, her car steers itself to the shoulder and comes to a complete stop. And of course her baby sleeps safely through the entire incident.
As a result, the young woman bows her head to pray and tries to repent for the way she’s been living her life. She asks Jesus to “save me from this road I’m on” and to “take the wheel” in all aspects of her life. See Carrie Underwood’s official music video below:
Where in the Bible does it say Jesus take the wheel?
Though a number of folks regularly Google this question, the truth is that “Jesus take the wheel” is a figure of speech turned into a Carrie Underwood song, and never appears in the Bible.
This figure of speech refers to having a divine force drive your car so you don’t have to. And the Bible is a collection of stories that have been around for well over a thousand years–much longer than the car.
So nowhere in the Bible does it say that even the most faithful will enjoy an upgrade to some sort of heavenly self-driving car. So we can’t recommend you let go of your car’s controls during a skid this winter, like the woman in the Carrie Underwood song.
What does the saying Jesus take the wheel mean?
The phrase “Jesus take the wheel” first appeared in some sermons and online forums in the early 2000s, always referring to surrendering some measure of control of your life to God. In 2005, Carrie Underwood’s country song of the same name told a story of divine intervention actually steering a car.
See comedian Nick Offerman muse on why releasing control of your vehicle to God might be a bad idea in the video below:
