I want to figure out the connection between me and music. I feel happiest when I'm listening, a sublime joy that reaches simultaneously down my throat to tighten my chest and through my toes to shiver my spine and it kills me that I DO NOT UNDERSTAND THE CAUSE.

What prompted this fresh rambling (I edit not, I promise you) is Crusade praise night on Monday. I love praise nights, they speak to me like nothing else. I think it was Voltaire who claimed "anything too stupid to be said is sung," perhaps criticizing the simplicity of the human spirit by its ability to be moved by base feelings, and yet the songs we love the best are the ones we can hum, chant and recite perfectly when the occasion is kindled.

With worship, especially, we want to train our attention, our energies, all our gratefulness and thanksgiving and whatever it is that moves us to... to live in those moments, and as such, it's the sombering matter-of-fact coupled with the revelating (sorry, I'm in a Gillian Welch mood at the present) power of the sweepingly melodic that prevails. We want to raise a message unambigious in mind and intent because it sets that meditative tone, it does not detract for want of decoration or in the blatant pursuit of style... we want unity over uniqueness, we want our combined wills over the tinkering mess that is songcraft too aware of itself.

Sometimes we get both:

How Deep The Father's Love For Us (Stuart Townend)

How deep the Father's love for us, how vast beyond all measure
That he should give his only son, to make a wretch his treasure
How great the pain of searing loss, the Father turned his face away
As wounds which mar the chosen one, bring many sons to glory

Behold the man upon a cross, my sin upon his shoulders
Ashamed, I hear my mocking voice call out among the scoffers
It was my sin that held him there until it was accomplished
His dying breath has brought me life; I know that it is finished

I will not boast in anything: no gifts, no power, no wisdom
But I will boast in Jesus Christ; his death and resurrection
Why should I gain from his reward? I cannot give an answer
But this I know with all my heart: his wounds have paid my ransom


I am a composed person, for the most part; I like to argue and I don't usually back down, although I've been developing the ability to listen and concede with grace... but I'm so humbled by this lyric. Some recite verses as an extension of devotion, I recite lyrics... I wish it weren't so, I wish I could discipline myself... I wish I wasn't so flaky and these moments of purity so fleeting.

I wish for faith like a child and the discernment of the adult I can only hope to be; I wish I could take being humbled more gracefully; I wish for discipline from the thoughts of the numb; I wish I could be confident of what's to come... and again I wish overmuch.

Ha. Well, till the next time blog. I don't know why I only come to you when I'm melancholy.