Lyricist of Life

Music is timeless. It’s voice never stops and always pierces to the soul of those who listen. Music brings joy to your heart like an embrace of an old friend. But music can also touch the sorrow and pain in our soul much like the unwelcome news of a lost loved one. It has the ability to bring revolution…to bring change.

Some of the greatest lyricists and songwriters have transformed how we communicate and relate to each other and our world. Listen to the words and envision the timelessness of the following lyrics:

words by john lennon

Imagine there’s no Heaven 
It’s easy if you try 
No hell below us 
Above us only sky 
Imagine all the people 
Living for today 

Imagine there’s no countries 
It isn’t hard to do 
Nothing to kill or die for 
And no religion too 
Imagine all the people 
Living life in peace 

You may say that I’m a dreamer 
But I’m not the only one 
I hope someday you’ll join us 
And the world will be as one 

Imagine no possessions 
I wonder if you can 
No need for greed or hunger 
A brotherhood of man 
Imagine all the people 
Sharing all the world 

You may say that I’m a dreamer 
But I’m not the only one 
I hope someday you’ll join us 
And the world will live as one 

Did your hear the gentle piano playing in the background as the teacher helps us cope with the violence of world all the while composing a new reality? Pictures of extreme poverty, slavery and war flash through the mind and invoke strong feelings. Faces of the people whose lives violence has touched play across my mind

The victims in Cairo (both Muslim and Christian)…
The struggle for life by mothers, daughters and sons in war-torn neighborhoods…
The hate and anger that fuel people to acts of unimaginable violence…
The desecration of humanity (maybe our own) as others are enslaved by poverty, sex trades and greed…
And one that has burned an image into my soul, the joyous dancing at the death of another…

But also pictures of hope. Pictures of humanity living together in peace embracing the life in the other.

Another lyricist would compose…

Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the LORD. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live? 

Another lyricist would gently sing…

lyrics by foy vance

If there’s one thing that I know
It is that two shades of hope
One the enlightening soul
And the other is more like a hangman’s rope

Well it’s true, you may reap what you sow
But not that despair is the all-time low
Baby, hope deals the hardest blows

There’s once someone I loved
Whose heart overflowed his cup
And his shoes got covered in blood
Oh but he never knew 
Cause he only looked up
Well he was a troubled soul
Who’d known pain more than most I know
Yet it was hope that dealt the hardest blows

And the girl that holds the hand of
Of a somewhat distant man
Though she did everything she can
Still his heart set sail for a distant land
And she wonders sometimes if he knows
How she feels like a trampled rose
Baby, hope deals the hardest blows

Aaah oooh baby 
Oooh, oh oh

Well some people think their sin 
Caused the cancer that’s eating into them
And the only way they can win
Is by the healing of somebody’s hands on their skin
But when the cancer does not go
Baby hope dealt the hardest blows

And now all these truths are sold
With foundations below them
That were dug out in winter’s cold
When the world stole our young and prayed on the old

Well hope deals in the hardest blows
Yet I cannot help myself but hope

I guess that’s why love hurts
And heartache stings
And despair’s never worse
Than the despair that earth brings

But hope deals the hardest blows, dear
The hardest…
Hope deals the hardest blows

Pain and hope always seem to be composed together. Hope is the longing for the harmonious chord while the  dissonance  of pain and violence is being sung. Sometimes that hopeful chord comes and at other times the listener is left waiting.

One of my favorite lamenting songs is written by Thomas Moore.

words by thomas moore

 

Oh, Thou who dries the mourner’s tear,

How dark this would would be,

If pierced by sins and sorrows here

We could not fly to Thee!

 

The Friends who in our sunshine live

When winter comes are flown;

And he who has but tears to give

Must weep those tears alone.

 

Oh who could bear life’s stormy doom

Did not Thy wing of love come

Brightly wafting through the gloom

Our Peace Branch from above.

 

Then sorrow touch’d by Thee

Grows bright as more than rapture’s ray

Reveals the glorious shades of light

We never saw by day!

May these lyrics bless you and provide that hopeful chord amidst the pain and violence in your life.

On Being Love

In all my fews years on this earth, I have found only a few pictures of what the true heart of Christ is all about. This is one of them. This picture was taken during the protests in Egypt. Egyptian Christians surrounding Egyptian Muslims so they can pray in peace on the streets. The Egyptian Christians also provided newspapers and clothes for the Egyptian Muslims to kneel on. Beautiful is the only way for me to describe it!

 

Spend some time contemplating the meaning of love.

Nearness

Rereading one of my all time favorite books (The Road of Life: Reflections on Searching and Longing by David Adam).

“If you feel that God is far off, remember feelings are liars. ‘In him we live and move and have our being.’ You are in the presence of God no matter where you are. You are in the heart of God and God seeks to dwell in your heart…You belong to God and in a wonderful way, God belongs to you.”

Take comfort and hope today that God is nearer to you than you realize.

Invitation to Journey

I found my life in something David Adam wrote. It goes like this. . .

Come on pilgrimage.
Let us walk together the road of life.
We will go on well trodden paths,
and also open us new ways.
We will seek,
we will search,
we will rejoice,and perhaps we will sing.

You cannot come as an onlooker,
that leaves you on the outside,
yet still influence us,
as we influence you.
Come and share your experiences,
your sorrows and your joys.
If your prayer has gone dead,
your God is too small,
your vision too narrow,
Come journey into new depths,
let life be an adventure.

Come and participate,
come and discover -
We will go to strange places,
we may even meet dragons.
But we do not journey alone
we go together along the road
and our God goes with us

Anybody up for a journey together?

Blind No More

I saw this the other day on YouTube.

Maybe this is hype, I don’t know. I only hope they will act on this when one of them becomes president. Pope John Paul II once said, “Social justice cannot be attained by violence. Violence kills what it intends to create.” Maybe just maybe we will try to stop fighting each other and decide to live with each other.

Echoes of Something More

I am a softy when it comes to movies and tv shows. I love to watch all kinds of movies and tv shows. Action. Drama. Comedy. And even Foreign. I love to get lost in the stories and plots. I love to see the characters develop and grow. I love to explore the plot lines.

But there is something more about movies that I love even more than the above. I love the echoes of something more. You don’t always hear them. Sometimes they are faint phrases in the background of a bigger plot. Sometimes they are so apparent that the echo sounds as if someone had just said it. Take for instance the move August Rush. The movie is about music right? Or is it? There is an echo of something more in the story. Don’t we all want to be found?! Don’t we all desire to play the music (our lives) the way it was intended to play?! Don’t we all want to connect to that rhythm that is being played across the world and across time?! Echoes of something more. . .possibly the connection of being found by the one who created us. . .Composing “music” with the God who composed life. . .Echoes of something more.

I was watching Eli Stone tonight. It is about this guy who has an aneurysm and now can see visions of the future. Somewhat of the future. These visions help determine which case he will try for a law firm. Before the aneurysm he didn’t have a conscience but now he does. At the end of tonights episode were these words. . .

“There is no faith without hope, no justice without compassion, no humanity without fairness. . .every one of us, the least of us, is still divine.”

Echoes of something more. . .

Voices from Darfur

I had the opportunity today to go and listen to a couple of refugees from the Darfur genocide. There names were Ibrahim Mousa Adam and Daoud Hari.

Ibrahim grew up in the village of Jadara in Northern Darfur where he worked as a farmer and volunteered as a teacher. In July of 2003, Ibrahim’s village was attacked by the Sudanese Army and the Janjaweed. 80 people were murdered that day. 20 of those 80 people where family members of Ibrahim. Over 100 of his relatives now live in six different refugee and internally displaced persons camps in Darfur and Chad. He would like to someday have a job that allows him to move back to Jadara and help rebuild Darfur. He told stories of the atrocities that are happening today.

Daoud Hari comes from Musbat, a village in the northern part of Darfur, where he worked with his family raising sheep and camels. Daoud fled his village in Darfur after months of bombings by the Sudanese government. When Daoud reached a refugee camp in neighboring Chad, he risked his life by re-entering Darfur to translate for the New York Times, BBC, and National Geographic and aid workers. Last summer, Daoud was arrested on false espionage charges with Chicago Tribune reporter Paul Salopek and subsequently tortured. He spent one month and ten days in prison. His attitude was such that he expected to die every day. He was released only when Mexico Governor Bill Richardson negotiated their release. The United States soon after granted Daoud refugee status. He has recently testified before Congress three times.

Both Ibrahim and Daoud spoke about the many injustices happening each and every day in Darfur. They spoke of how help was needed today not tomorrow on behalf of the estimated 2 million displaced refugees of Darfur. 3.5 million rely on international aid to survive every day. To date over 5,000 villages have been bombed and burned down, over 400,000 Darfuris have been murdered.

I listened in amazement and wonder at their courage and passion. The horror they have experienced and seen is far more than humanity should bear. But Ibrahim and Daoud don’t back down. They fight back not with more killing and atrocities. The fight back with the stories that will change the future of an oppressed people. Their ammunition is not bullets but stories of real people.

So the war continues. The Sudanese government and the Janjaweed fight with ammunition and bombs and the Darfuris fight back with stories of atrocities.

The question is how can we make a difference? You can click on the Save Darfur link. You can write, email the President of the United States or UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.

Martin Luther King Jr. once said,

“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”

He also said,

“The ultimate tragedy is not the oppression and cruelty by the bad people but the silence over that by the good people.“

So what is your voice going to say about the injustices happening in the world? I would love to hear your voice.

Voices from Darfur

Pictures of the Kingdom

 

Snap! The sound of the camera invades the environment of the picture I have just taken. I love to take and look at pictures. Moments in time captured and treasured. A picture to be looked at over and over again so I can relive that special moment.

As I think about the kingdom of God, words seem very inadequate for me. So, I must rely on the pictures of life to help me grasp what this elusive kingdom of God is all about.

The first picture is of Quinton. Quinton is a young boy in elementary school. He lives on 51^st Street in Tacoma, Washington. He has two sisters. His father is in construction. His mother stays at home. He is much like any little boy—full of energy, always on a great adventure and good at Madden Football. He has a mohawk (it was blue at one time). He dresses in hand-me-downs. As my youth group began to paint Quinton’s neighbor’s house, he was always there to help. The minute we would drive up, Quinton comes running out of his house with expectations of helping us. As the days pass, Quinton and I begin to develop a friendship. We talk about what fun things he did the night before, school and family, all the while expletives rolling off the tongue of his mother. It dawned on me one day, the kingdom of Heaven was being brought near to Quinton and Quinton was eagerly receiving it. He was experiencing a place of peace through the camaraderie of teenagers and adults painting a house. This snapshot of the kingdom of Heaven provides images of love, acceptance and peace.

Another picture came unexpectedly. The location was a community fair. This was not a ordinary community fair. A blowup jumping toy and face painting were the only “fun” activities for kids. The main portion of the fair was designed to help a community of people who had been displaced learn about the resources that were available to them. As each displaced mother, father, child and grandmother entered into the fair, they were greeted with love and respect. As they were handed a bag full of school supplies, a list of what schools were actually open, the anxiety of being displaced began to slowly be replaced by love and support. Each table they encountered brought new information about health clinics, job opportunities, educational services and emergency services. As the stories of surviving a hurricane and the worst national disaster in American history were told and retold, a strange thing began to occur—the sounds of laughter and hope began to fill the air. As we conversed with individuals and families, listening to the stories of survival and hope, an overwhelming awareness of the kingdom of Heaven began to settle in and make itself at home. What we thought would be a day that we would bring the kingdom of Heaven to people turned out that they were bringing the kingdom of Heaven to us. In this particular snapshot the kingdom of Heaven was full of hope, laughter, restoration and love.

These are just two of the snapshots God has graciously allowed us to participate in. These two snapshots have opened the eyes of our faith to see the kingdom of Heaven in the pictures of life. Snap!