Whatever Else They Tell You

Last week I shared lyrics from Kyle Matthews latest CD “The Main Event.” I had only had a chance to listen through the 4th cut. Since then I have listened to the whole CD several times. This is not just a commercial plug. It is completely unsolicited ... although he puts food on the table, clothes on his family's backs and a roof over their heads with his songwriting and recording. Click on the sidebar link or on the title of this blog post. Either will get you to Kyle's web site.

You need what Kyle has to say in this CD. It is in my opinion his strongest work yet. Stylistically it's a bit reminiscent of some of his earlier works, but there is more depth and artistry in the lyrics. The focus on relationship issues is classic Kyle Matthews. As the father of a high-school senior preparing in the next 3 weeks to take him to interview for scholarships at schools between 6 and 10 hours’ drive away, I found this song particularly poignant.

I’ll let you go off the first day of school
Where strangers stand guard and kids are cruel;
And I’ll whisper in your ear, “I love you. I love you so.”
So whatever else they tell you, you’ll know.

I’ll let you go off, diploma in hand,
To conquer a world you don’t understand;
And I’ll whisper in your ear, “I love you. I love you so.”
So whatever else they tell you, you’ll know.

Someone thinks you’re beautiful,
And someone thinks you’re smart;
And you’re the song that keeps the beat
In someone’s heart who knows you best … so don’t forget.

I’ll say this enough so that when I am gone
The memory will echo loud and strong enough
To whisper in your ear, “I love you. I love you so.”
So whatever else they tell you,
Whatever else they tell you,
So whatever else they tell you, you’ll know.

The world around us (and the people in it) bombards us with words and images that attack us in sensitive places. They erode our self-esteem and wound us where we are most vulnerable. The only way to survive in such a world is to hear the voice of God saying, “I love you. I love you so,” so whatever else they tell us … we’ll know.

That’s enough to think about for now. The peace of Christ to you.

All of Us - Kyle Matthews

I was away at Pine Lake Music's MUSICATLANTA conference most of last week. On Saturday I had to go get things set up for the 8:30 service (which I usually do earlier in the week, but I was away, so ... ). While I was at the church I checked my mailbox and found that my friend Kyle Matthews (you'll find a link to his website to the right) had sent me his latest CD. If you're not familiar Kyle, he has a unique, storytelling kind of style to his songs. You can hear Ken Medema's influence in his stuff, but he's not a mimic ... he does his own thing with it. I've not listened through the whole thing yet, but the 4th cut -- "All of Us" -- is choice. Here are the words:

She's got a toddler and a baby, but she's just a child herself;
She's desperate, but she's too afraid to ask for help.
As she wanders through our yard sale we want to offer food,
But we don't want to embarrass her, we don't want to intrude ...
Thinkin' "How can we be what she needs?"

She needs friends to be like family in the best and worst of times,
A job, some education, enough cash to get by,
Women who will listen, men that she can trust.
There's still a chance she'll make it, but she's gonna need
All of us.

He longs to be the savior of people such as these.
He wants to wipe out hunger, house the homeless, cure disease.
He rides in on his white horse, he's noble and unbowed,
'til his money, optimism, and his patience have run out.
He thinks, "I should have known I can't do this on my own.

She needs friends to be like family in the best and worst of times,
A job, some education, enough cash to get by,
Women who will listen, men that she can trust.
There's still a chance she'll make it, but she's gonna need
All of us.

She stands with all the others in a sea of caps and gowns;
Cheers rise from the balcony when her name is called out.
She says, "I'd like to give you all a gift that I have found:
A church to be there for you when others let you down,
'Cause a day's gonna come when you will be the one ...

Who needs friends to be like family in the best and worst of times,
To celebrate your victories, cry with you when you cry,
A sea of faithful people so that when the trouble comes
They surround you like a wave that gently lifts you up, and that takes
All of us.

Kyle's songs tend to take my soul to healthier places. Most of his writing is about how our faith is supposed to look in the day to day. So here's my recommendation: go to Kyle's site and order the CD. Order some of his other stuff as well. I also highly recommend the booklet "The Silly War".

That's enough to think about for now.

Healing Broken Places in the Soul

Sunday evening I shared a song in SHOWCASE FBC that hits me at a very sensitive emotional place. It was a huge risk for me because I wasn’t sure I would be able to get through it without falling apart. I almost didn’t. I first heard John Mark McMillan’s How He Loves at Catalyst 2008 this past October. We had just heard an interview with William Paul Young talk about his book The Shack, and how his own story led him to write the book. As I read the last parts of the book, this song kept echoing in my head.

The song is a little bit on the grungy side, speaking style-wise … and some of the poetic imagery still makes me twist my head funny when I hear [or sing it], but it paints a wonderful picture of what Brennan Manning calls “God’s furious love for us” … and it heals broken places in my soul.

1
He is jealous for me; loves like a hurricane, I am a tree
Bending beneath the weight of His Wind and Mercy
And all of a sudden I am unaware of
These afflictions eclipsed by glory
And I realize just how beautiful You are
And how great Your affections are for me

Oh, how He loves us so;
Oh, how He loves us;
How He loves us so.

CH
He loves us, Oh how He loves us
Oh, how He loves us; Oh, how He loves …

2
We are His Portion and He is our Prize
Drawn to redemption by the grace in His Eyes
If His grace is an ocean we're all sinking
So Heaven meets earth like a sloppy wet kiss
And my heart turns violently inside of my chest
I don't have time to maintain these regrets
When I think about the way that …

CH
He loves us, Oh how He loves us
Oh, how He loves us; Oh, how He loves …


That’s enough to think about for now. The peace of Christ to you.

Harold Best on Ceaseless Worship and Prayer

Romans 12:1-2 reads like this from the NIV:

1Therefore, I urge you, brothers, in view of God's mercy, to offer your bodies as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual act of worship. 2Do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind. Then you will be able to test and approve what God's will is—his good, pleasing and perfect will.

I'm almost through with part 1 of Harold Best's Unceasing Worship: Biblical Perspectives on Worship and the Arts. As I have written before, the depth of thought in Best's writing makes me feel like a babbling idiot. I can wrap my brain around some of it, but there is so much more there than I can comprehend. What I can comprehend, though, challenges me deeply. This morning it was this:

Lives of continued worship cannot but be lives of continued prayer, since continuing worship is itself a continued and continuously varied conversation with the One who lives within us. It should be an unbroken continuum, a breathing in and out, a full articulation of all that we are in Christ throughout all our days. Living in Spirit and truth, walking the course of my days in the beauty of holiness, undertaking every action as a living sacrifice is, in its way, conversation with the Almighty. So this question comes to me: As I think of the mix of things that comprise my day, can I truthfully and unabashedly say that any one of them is in itself a prayer, another way of saying, "My Lord and my God"?

That's enough to think about for now.