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This song is by Noah Gundersen, and has transparent – from the veins – lyrics that I really relate to…
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This song is by Noah Gundersen, and has transparent – from the veins – lyrics that I really relate to…
Sam DuRegger ruminates on faith and technology at duregger.net and is Managing Director of Samwell Creative Group, LLC, a boutique creative firm which focuses on transmedia storytelling and inspirational branding. Sam also is Co-Founder of Lake Surf Co., a online distributor Stand Up Paddle Boards (SUPs). Check out his Digital Business Card for more...
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Great song, Although some of the words are a “little cussie”.
Guess Im just an old fashion 51 year old…lol
Beautifully sung from an honest heart! The lyrics depict one of the challenges of faith we all, in every generation, have to face at some point in life. The answers are there in the Bible. These lyrics also reveal a heart that grieves for what we all were created to eventually enjoy-an unfallen world, where righteousness and peace reign in every aspect of life. I wrote “eventually” because the present state of life is intended to strengthen our character, moral resolve, sharpen our gifts, and make us to endure (Romans 8:28). Why? Because there is more to life than what can be tangibly seen and felt and experienced. There is the spiritual side of life. There is God's soveriegn plan that is beyond what we can imagine.
The grief this songwriter/singer expressed is no more than what the Holy Spirit of God also feels. In fact, it probably is less. He grieves too over the state of man and the world-the creation of Elohim. In the beginning, when God created the heavens and the earth, HE branded it “good”.
“That word both defined reality and specified how we ought to live. Out of that relationship with God, all other relationships take their cue; including the use of language in defining the world. We read that Adam named the creatures. That naming was the work of man as sub-soveriegn, defining reality in God's terms.
It was at this point that truth was tested. The temptation of Satan was the challenge to the first humans to take upon themselves the perogative of God and redefine reality in their own terms. The lie entered, and truth was violated by rejecting the propostitional revelation of God and contradiction His definaitions of good and evil. By yielding to that temptation Adam and Eve 'exchanged the truth of God for a lie' and chose to create their own realities. This, as God had warned, led to death and destruction.”–Ravi Zacharias, Deliver Us From Evil, pg 222
God didn't “make” things as they are-humankind did.Yet he did allow, He tolerates with a grieved Spirit because He will not trespass our free will. But . . .wait . . .there is hope! There is redemption, and there is even restoration back to that Edenic state! The hard thing is that we have to slog through this mortal life before we are rewarded with the immortal life-life everlasting in the Kingdom of our Liberating King! As we “slog” we have better choices to make each new day. Yes, we've “F____” things up as the song writer honestly sang. But there is forgiveness; there is mercy; there is a new day to follow God's specified plan for “good” . If you do a word study on “Hope” you will rise from the grief, find solace, and be rekindled to lift someone else up from despair. That is where we can find purpose and joy as we take someones weary and drooping face in our hands and say, “Wait . . look up! There is a day coming when every knee WILL bow and every tongue confess the Lordship of Christ. A New heaven and new earth! We can be a part of that if we chose! Let's abandon those sins that entangle us and set our feet, our hearts, our actions toward that place! Let's be ready for it and for our coming King!”
It is appropriate to be grieved, to be outraged at evil and suffering. We should be as human as God made us. Augustine wrote,”Who would wish for hardship and difficulty? You command us to endure these troubles, not to love them. No one loves what he endures even though he may be glad to endure it.” This is the balance of faith and realism. Knowing God we know the outcome. For Jesus, to trust God did not mean to deny the evil and brokenness He saw in the world, but He absolutly refused to make it the determinative.
God has spoken and God will ACT. Christ has coe once and Christ will come again. We have heard and read the promises and we will witness the event whether we are still alive or whether physically dead. Faith's task is to join hands with the past and the future to hold down God's will in the present. One aspect of God's will is to be merciful ourselves-”Blessed are the merciful-they will be shown mercy.” Matthew 5:7 We are the extensions of His hands and so in finding a way to bring relief to others in hardships, in suffering, etc . . .we engage in God's specified “good” with an exchange of joy for sorrow.
Well, then I guess I am too. Really, it was an honest expression of grief. Yet, growing away from “cussie” is a part of spiritual growth. That our hearts are laid bare befire God and He is not shocked by crass words is true. Yet, when one has experienced the presence of God, like Isaiah when He saw the LORD of hosts you can do no more than bow down in humility and say, “For I am a man of unclean lips . . .” Then when your guilt is taken away and sin atoneed for in Jesus, coming into that relationship changes the heart, makes it softer and more pure-not perfect but your whole attitude changes along with language that now reflects good.
The simple honesty of this song is that all of us, especially those around my age group (20 – 30) have at point in our Christian lives, honestly felt this way. To be perfectly honest, I still have days where these honest questions come up.
From the perspective of a young person, these lyrics are potent and as “older” Christians, we can use songs like this to help relate to others and build each other up with encouragement. None of us have the answers. We won't know the answers to most of these questions until we're in Heaven and Jesus straightens all this out.
All that being said, having a cup of coffee with Jesus while having Him clear up all this confusion is a dream I've had most of my Christian life. In that conversation, I'm sure I'd get a bit “cussie” during the conversation, but Jesus hung out with Blue-Collar Fisherman, I'm sure he'd heard worse.