Saturday, January 29, 2011

Hope I

I have been thinking a lot about hope recently, as a concept. I feel like there might be some deeper lessons in this, so I am planning to revisit it in the future. For now, a story.

Several years ago, my life felt like it ended. What I had been working toward for months, years, or possibly even my life had abruptly ended. At least, that's how it felt to me. My life had been building up to this one thing, and it had been taken away from me. I was completely crushed, and I didn't know where to turn. I literally had no idea what else to so with my life, and I was completely devastated.

In my agony and pain, I wanted to express on the outside what I felt on the inside, even if it was a bit dramatic. So during a worship set led by some of my favorite worship leaders ever, I found myself in the back of the room, on my knees, bawling my eyes out. I was in agony, crying out to the Lord, without a hope in the world.

In my mind's eye, a scene flashed before me. A middle-aged woman with brown skin and long dark hair, dressed in a beautiful sari, was in the middle of a crowd. She had flung her body over a rectangular wooden box: the casket of her son, the pride of her life. She wept sobs that wracked her body, mourning his death as her own.

In an instant, I felt the Lord gently ask me, "Why are you crying? This woman has no hope. You at least have hope."

God wasn't being rude or a jerk about it, but he did have a point. Even though it felt like my life was over, I still had a lot to live for. Even though I had no idea what to do with my life, I still had hope. I still had Jesus.

Wednesday, January 12, 2011

song lyrics

The J Band - Take Our Turn lyrics

Looking down a young man's seen
Waltzing once past everything
He takes a knee and pray
A father trains his king to be
It's the night that he runs free
He walks along castle walls
And looks upon, did he give up it all

Hey, we lay our burdens down,
Lord we burn 'em to the ground
Hey, we'll take our turn and die
For our souls to come to life

He found himself in foreign land
No one else with him to stand
But the mad man, the drunkard, and he
Together they went traveling on,
Singin' "Friends, we have become."
He turns to the call
Oh, he gave up it all

Hey, we lay our burdens down,
Lord, we burn 'em to the ground
Hey, we'll take our turn and die
For our souls to come alive

He remembers this one time when he
Saw a small child,
For one moment give one, one small smile
He thought that maybe,
That maybe the smile was meant for him
That the smile was meant for him

Hey, we lay our burdens down,
Lord, we burn 'em to the ground
Hey, we take our turn and die
For our souls to come to life