From the recording Time Gives Way
I’ve recently watched “cancel culture” vaporize relationships and turn human voices into squeaks. Many of us politely, quietly, lowered our profile. To stoop out of blame’s way and to refrain from complicated words. Like red or blue, black or white, or Jesus.
At the same time, a global pandemic is a wondrous reminder that life is too short to stoop. We lost a few dear ones to mortality and a few more to fear itself. Not sure which is worse.
So, the bell rings in my ear - like closing time at a bar, or the end of the boxing round. On your feet, girl. Use the backbone that demarcates your species. To be a person of consequence, or a person at all, you have to man up. To be different, aka weird, for something. God forbid it’s pickleball. Or hygiene. Or the time tested obsessions of money, sex and power.
I will recall the life that’s at my core. And I’ll say it as simply and truly as I know how. Earth is a beautiful but temporary place, so I’m locking eyes on eternity. Jesus has already done the hard part. I’ve got love and mercy to spend wildly here. And nothing to fear but a faithless life.
Lyrics
just an idea love breathed into life / umber eyes, nervous skin, fingers printed one to ten / and when the rhyme has run, he’ll read my book, ask what I’ve done / did I give it all for love’s sake? did I kiss the son?
can I say it loud? will I sing it out? / love made me, Jesus save me / seeds of Eden sprung and grown / it’s everything I’ve ever known but earth is a cradle / heaven is home
this life is striped with promise and with pain / kiss me once and kiss me twice / keep at bay the age of ice / we work with all our might, we run the race and we fight the fight / but can we bow in the presence of the light of lights?
so I say it loud, hear me sing it out / love made me, Jesus save me / what I’ve bent my back to own / don’t I know it’s just a loan / earth is a cradle but heaven is home
eternity’s near and not just far away / I hold out for what’s coming, not what’s fading away
light and dark are different and I’ve picked my side / to hold the sinner, hate the sin / thank you Jesus, losers win / we win, so say it again
say it loud, sing it, sing it, sing it out / love made me, Jesus save me / mercy fall when memory’s flown / you
touch what’s weary to the bone / earth is a cradle but heaven is home
like moon shines with the light of sun, earth points to the life to come / such a beautiful cradle but heaven is home