Do we recognize how much we need God’s love in our life, or put a different way, how much do we desire that love that only God can fulfill? Our lives are so busy, we tend to just push away this desire or we may not even think about it at all. But even when we do contemplate God’s love, we can only express it in terms that a limited human mind can do (like below), in terms of things that are familiar, but it’s so much more than that.
I came across a familiar poem today that expressed, in worldly terms, how much one can desire the love of another, and it reminded me more of whether we desire God at least like this, or is it only this powerfully expressed for the things of this world? If we can express worldly love “like the hot needs the sun, like honey on her tongue, like oxygen, I need your love”, how much greater is the love God has for us? Without the desire for God’s love, and for His Glory, we are just about in the same shape as my widow pictured above, broken.
I have gone over the words below about twenty times now, it’s pretty powerful (even more when put to music), but how much more should we desire God’s love… probably more than we need to take our next breath.
I Need Your Love
Like a desert needs rain
Like a town needs a name
I need your love
Like a drifter needs a room
Hawkmoon
I need your loveLike a rhythm unbroken
Like drums in the night
Like sweet soul music
Like sunlight
I need your loveLike coming home
And you don’t know where you’ve been
Like black coffee
Like nicotine
I need your love (I need your love)When the night has no end
And the day yet to begin
As the room spins around
I need your loveLike a Phoenix rising needs a holy tree
Like the sweet revenge of a bitter enemy
I need your loveLike the hot needs the sun
Like honey on her tongue
Like the muzzle of a gun
Like oxygen
I need your love (I need your love)When the night has no end
And the day yet to begin
As the room spins around
I need your loveLike thunder needs rain
Like a preacher needs pain
Like tongues of flame
Like a sheet stained
I need your loveLike a needle needs a vein
Like someone to blame
Like a thought unchained
Like a runaway train
I need your loveLike faith needs a doubt
Like a freeway out
I need your loveLike powder needs a spark
Like lies need the dark
I need your loveI need all the love in your heart… and I need all the love in your heart…
~ Hawkmoon 269, U2
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This past Sunday we were privileged to have Brian bring the message to us and he spoke around John 3:30, He must increase, but I must decrease. It was a thought-provoking message but it left the details on how we are to carry this out in our lives something for us to think about and tackle on our own. There were and are many applications for this, but I started chasing my rabbit trying to think about why, and somehow landed on the song, “When Love Comes to Town” by U2. If everything we do and have comes from the Lord, and our actions are to glorify the Lord, then how do we do this.
To do this, we must not take His glory for ourselves. Not something very easy to accomplish, especially when you take today’s culture and modern technologies into consideration. We do almost everything for ourselves, with ourselves in mind.
Driven and drilled into us from day one in our great country (for those who live in the U.S.), life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, which sometimes seems like the pursuit of ourselves. The American dream, to own a house, 2 cars, have 2.4 kids, a good career, and a full 401k. For some reason, “when love comes to town” reminded me of the reason for Christmas and even moving on into Easter, and the love He showed for all of us when He became flesh, and is why He deserves the glory.
The point of this message (at least in my interpretation) was to bring the Christmas season series to a close and bridge into our new and upcoming series on bringing our spiritual life alive, but I think we use the example we were given and use love to accomplish this. For God to increase, I must decrease, for me to decrease, I must do this out of love. To me, matters of faith start from the heart.
I was there when they crucified my Lord
I held the scabbard when the soldier drew his sword
I threw the dice when they pierced his side
But I’ve seen love conquer the great divideWhen love comes to town I’m gonna catch that train
When love comes to town I’m gonna catch that flame
Maybe I was wrong to ever let you down
But I did what I did before love came to town
As the year comes to a close, I always start thinking about a recap of where, what, when, and how of this year and what is coming up next year. This year and leading into next year, to bring my spritual life “alive”, I must decrease. [I am not sure why we only do this at year-end instead of all year-long, but it just seems like a natural break where we mark a point in time that has an end and a beginning at 12:00 midnight at on December 31st.]
Some random thoughts on how I can try to extend this into next year:
- read more
- do less for my reasons, more for His reasons
- work as if no one will ever know or see the results of my labor but God Himself
- remember I am working for His glory, not any one person
- give more :: time, money, effort, support, attention
- give up more :: control, of self…
- don’t give up when… I feel like it
- appreciate :: time, life more (not to be confused with Time Life)
- serve more
- make a don’t do list, and don’t do the things on my don’t do list
I like top ten lists but all the items above can be narrowed down to “love”, and I did what I did before love came to town. Happy New Year everyone.
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I love technology. We can find so many ways to do things we never dreamed of before and create things we can’t live without before we even knew they existed. Some things are trendy, some useful, but many are to organize our life in some form or fashion, basically to make our life more simple and easy than it already is today. Problem is, some of the time it just makes our lives more complicated.
The Internet of course is a place that moves at such lightening speed that it is almost impossible to keep up with what is going on outside of your circle, which is one reason the social networking sites like Twiiter and Facebook work so well. So after a rather frustrating day of working with code for hours on end I went for a walk and came across this song. You have heard of the term “code is poetry”, well how about poetry is poetry. I really thought this poem (song) spoke to the frenzie that sometimes is technology.
Message in a bottle, rhythm of a drum
Smoke signals and telegraphs make the airwaves hum
But that’s all ancient history like bongs and Lincoln Logs
Now we livin’ like the Jetsons in a wacky wireless fog
Talkin’ squawkin’ hawkin’ who knows if anybody’s gettin’ throughToasters talk to crackberries, Boston to Bombay
Teenage schemes and Ma-bell’s dreams as minutes tick away
We act like crazy people talking to ourselves
Crashing cars in conversation while that stuff flies off the shelf
The information superhighways locked up like a L.A. traffic jamEverybody’s on the phone
So connected and all alone
From the pizza boy to the socialite
We all salute the satellites
Let me text you with your master plan
You’re loud and clear but I don’t understand
I’m a digital explorer in analog roam
And everybody’s on the phoneDo you remember dialing up?
Yes I remember well
Now I just can’t go anywhere with out that sacred cell
I think that I might die if I miss anything at all
Text me, send me an e-mail, link me up, give me a call
I’m ADD on AOL tryin to read the writing on the wallEverybody’s on the phone
So connected and all alone
From the pizza boy to the socialite
We all salute the satellites
Let me text you with your master plan
You’re loud and clear but I don’t understand
I’m a digital explorer in analog roam
And everybody’s on the phoneNow I’m a real jungle jumper
I’m a megahertz man
I swing from tree to tree on the very latest plan
On the download In the dropout zones
In every major city ‘cross the land
I got my Marley on my ringtone, get up, stand up, reach out, touch somebody manEverybody’s on the phone
So connected and all alone
From the pizza boy to the socialite
We all salute the satellites
Let me text you with your master plan
You’re loud and clear but I don’t understand
I’m a digital explorer in analog roam
And everybody’s on the phoneCan you hear me?
Can you hear me now?
I gotta get over by the beerstand
Oh no my batteries are going
I’ll call you back(Jimmy Buffett, Peter Mayer, Roger Guth, Will Kimbrough)
Yes, I like how Buffett can take you to a tropical island from right here in Alabama, but he really makes a point here in “Everybody’s on the Phone” that we can have it all and nothing at the same time. I love the line “so connected and all alone”. For me with the church, the question becomes how can we use technology, for good, to reach people for Christ. This video has been passed around to various blogs and I first saw it over on Brad Rugles’ blog (Shift Happens) but still wanted show it here in case you had not seen it yet.
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Every have hours or weeks, or months you feel like this? To borrow a term from my wife and her knitting friends, they call it “frogging”. That refers to when you knit row after row after row and suddenly realize that you messed up 20 rows ago and have to rip all those bad rows out (can’t remember why they call it frogging but I am sure someone will let me know) and start over before the place that had the error.
Anyone else love reading lyrics? I could do a blog post centering around just about any song I like once I read the lyrics. It makes me wonder what the artist was thinking at the time, where they are in their own life, what meaning they wanted their listeners to take away from the song and so on. This line (well it’s full speed baby, in the wrong direction) came from a song called Mary Jane by Alanis Morisette. It got me thinking about many different things in my own life like my family, friends, work, faith… and what direction I am going in each. What areas do I neglect, and which ones am I just totally going in the wrong direction and how do I recognize those areas before to much damage has been done (i.e. time wasted).
Time wasted has to be the enemy’s biggest weapon. Occupying our time with worthless and meaningless things so we can accomplish nothing of significance is just what (to me) wastes the most precious resource God has given us. How much time do we spend doing things we don’t need to be doing, or that doesn’t make any difference? Unfortunately we can’t just spend our time doing nothing but meaningful things. We have to do the mundane and repetitions of life, but sometimes we can just feel time wasting away for no good reason.
The photo I took of Deb above is one where we spent time together creating a memory. I don’t remember what in the world I was doing before or after that, something on the computer I am sure, but spending time with your spouse is (usually, haha) never wasted time.
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I love this line below in the Robbie Williams song, Make Me Pure, from the Intensive Care album. It really speaks to me sometimes. We all want to live pure lives for our Lord, right? So I ask myself if I do, or do I really just listen to the chorus of this song and know this is how I feel sometimes?
The song goes through various “un-pure” ways and always ends with the line, Lord, please make me pure, but not yet. As Believers, I don’t know if we walk through life trying to keep one foot firmly planted in the world and the other asking for purity. Scripture tells us to separate ourselves from the world and live pure lives, pleasing to the Lord.
I got a ton of selfish genes and lazy bones
beneath this skin
Oh Lord, make me pure, but not yet
After reading some of Williams biography it looks like he struggled with this throughout his life, but I don’t think he has a corner on the market, I think we all ask this question from time to time. I think we try to hang on to those things we want from this world. These can be personality traits or objects, anything that blocks our relationship with our Lord and keeps us firmly planted in the world. This is not a call to become a Puritan, but as a group in history, they are an interesting study.
Our walk is not one in which we can mark the finish line here on earth. It is a constant ebb and flow of our commitment, relationship with our Lord, and our continued repentance and effort to live as scripture teaches us to live. Interesting that this lyric is by an artist that doesn’t make any claim to be a Believer at all. Doesn’t mean that he isn’t still searching for the Truth, as many are.
This could go just about anywhere, so how about it? Chime in below and let me know what you think.
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There are so many different types of music and given the right key and harmony can make a spirit come alive with dreams of places and relationships. Music to me is a memory of time and place.
It is poetry for those of us who can’t read and to me lyrics have an amazing way to tell a story.
China all the way to New York
Maybe you got lost in Mexico
You’re right next to me
These are part of the lyrics of a song that I listened to while I did my daily walk about. An interesting artist, one I did not know prior to about 6 months ago.
Update: I have since come to know this as poetry, but had never really seen the words for the music.
