Falsehoods floating in an aluminum can
Smoking cigarettes, promote the nuclear ban
Thinking humanly won't get you too far
Hate a nation, save a dog hit by a car
Walk a mile for what's behind your back
Say you're cautious when your mind has just one track
Hear what you want to hear 'cause it's all you'll hear anyway
'Cause man you've got it wrong and I'm not gonna stay
I'm goin' where the Lord is 'cause I know He is real
You say He's for the fool, base your facts on what you feel
Turn on the radio, hear the crazy preachers yell
Flip to a rock n' rolling song to praise the lord of hell
Look in the mirror, you think you're so good
You'd see you're so diseased if you only would
Go where the Lord is, 'cause I know He is real
You say He's for the fool, base your facts on what you feel.
Declare reality, invent your fate
Now if you're listening to me it's not yet too late
Jesus wants all of you, soul body and mind
You cannot see Him now 'cause you are blind
So go where the Lord is, 'cause I know He is real
You say He's for the fool, base your facts on what you feel.
I dare you, base your facts on what is real now.
I will admit that listening the sea of political commentary voices can make me want to rant like my 15-year-old self. The part of this song that keeps repeating in my mind is "hear what you want to hear..." and the refrain. Why? You watch a debate, then you hear Republicans saying the Republicans were great and Democrats saying Democrats were great, and they both point out how the other guys really are doofuses. You hear socialists saying that governments are the savior of mankind and you hear libertarians talk as if countries had no people in them to be concerned about. You see some Congressional representatives being bribed -- and accepting bribes -- to vote hastily for a catastrophic amount of money and power to be placed into hands that are not elected by citizens of this republic. I have been having flashbacks of my days working for Wisconsin Right to Life where I was the phone recipient of death threats, bomb threats, angry people trying to justify abortion and grieve the loss of their grandchildren to the same, evil taunts and gloating when Bill Clinton wiped out a decade of pro-life gains immediately after his inauguration.... all when I read of Catholics trying to say that abortion is not a significant enough political issue. All of this makes me want to scream.
But in the end, of course, my answer to my own tirade is the same now as it was 25 years ago. The Lord is real, and to Him I go. That too seems so much more complex now than when I was a teenybopper. Not more difficult (in fact, it is easier for me now). But the "real" is more real, I guess. I see now that there truly is no other answer to human needs. I don't go to the Lord simply to be sheltered from turmoil. I go to the Lord because He alone has the words of everlasting life. We desperately need somehow to pick up the shards of truth that get trampled underfoot in the public arena, or at least draw attention to them, while pointing to the coherent Whole who alone can give meaning to human life.
5 comments:
Oh, dear! I certainly remember those days of being all intense about social hypocrisy, and writing poems about it. In fact, I seem to remember trying to write a catchy protest-style chant about the downsides of feminism, with a reference to Valium, and the refrain, "Who's gonna do the pans?" My face still reddens at the remembrance!
I don't have a whole lot of faith in politics these days, but I do still vote, and I am still trying to be the change I want to see in the world, and all that. It's going to be interesting, isn't it, to see how the Lord has worked in all the hideousness of human history? That would even include, I dare hope, the redemption of my teenage years.
Laura,
That's a very valuable perspective. God can write straight with our crooked lines. What else are our lines ever going to be? If God can redeem my life, can He not redeem any mess? Yes, indeed. He can.
As I think about it, I've been doing a lot more reading this election than previous ones, seeing more thoughts, views, opinions floating around out there. My idealistic nature has a hard time giving credence to the possibility, to the vocation, of bringing Christ into the public square, without also finding an ideal to promote. I think I've liked Ron Paul for that very reason: he represents a certain ideal vision of adherence to constitutional thought. But politics and idealism are almost like two weights tugging against each other on the fabric of reality. Or something like that. It's hard for me to "do" politics as an idealist is what I'm trying to say.
I also like your statement about being the change you want to see. I want to see intelligent voters, and that's what I am still striving towards becoming. I've taken a very "simple" approach to political issues in the past, but I'm seeing that there is much I need to learn and understand -- really wrestle with -- if I'm ever to have something valuable to say on any political topic.
Golly, I'm long winded today!
Wow! I love this song. I'd love to hear it sometime! And what you say here is so much what I've been feeling. The folks at CP convinced me to get myself better informed about things, but they didn't tell me how much pain would be involved!! And I still don't feel I know what's going on or what part I'm supposed to play in it all!
Hi Suzanne :)
Pain is the word. I was just talking with Erol tonight about how my thinking, reading, about economics or constitutional theory, etc., is much like really facing those subjects in school that I avoided because they were "boring" and "too hard".
I need to host a Marie concert sometime (blush). I have a lot of songs I'd like to share, in theory at least. Of course, many of them I haven't played in 25 years, and I might be a bit rusty with!
I'm really dying to hear them!
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