The Fourth post in “The Song of the Week” series.
The previous post in this series:
(and you can link back to the previous ones from it)
3. "I Know My Redeemer Lives" - Mark Heard (with Kate Miner)
It occurred to me recently that music sits pretty close to the intersection of the key themes of this Substack: reading/writing, community, and formation. The songs we sing are deeply formative for us as persons and communities. So, I thought I’d share a song each week that has been formative for me, and offer a couple of brief thoughts that connect it with this particular week (in the church calendar and/or natural year) and explore why it is significant for me. Let me know what you think…
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Continuing our theme of Songs for Eastertide, and despite its title, this song is a rich joy-filled song of hope for Easter. Released on Julie Miller’s 1997 album, Blue Pony, one of the essential gem albums of the early alt.country era, this song has been covered by many bands (including the folk-supergroup Cry, Cry, Cry, and the Wailing Jennys) over the last quarter century.
What is particularly striking about this song, in relation to the Easter season, is its insistence that the vibrant life of the resurrection (for which humanity was created) cannot be separated from the way of the cross. I was reminded of this song, as I was reading Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age today. Taylor observes:
“Flourishing is good, nevertheless, seeking it is not our ultimate goal. But even when we renounce it, we re-affirm it, because we follow God’s will in being a channel for it to others, and ultimately to all.” (18)
The flourishing of the resurrection life, is for ALL creation, and sometimes following the way of Jesus invites us to set aside our own personal flourishing in order that others may move closer to flourishing. And the history of the Christian tradition is full of stories of those who have placed the flourishing of others above their own flourishing.
In this way, Christian discipleship deviates from positive psychology. Yes, we have each been created for flourishing, but as Taylor notes, that doesn’t mean that I should pursue my own flourishing at every step of the way. The flourishing that is in store for us, as Julie Miller so poignantly reminds us, eclipses the sorrows of the moment. Part of embodied existence is the intuition, expressed familiarly by the Apostle Paul in his meditation on what it means to be the body of Christ: “If one member suffers, all suffer together with it; if one member is honored, all rejoice together with it” (I Cor. 12:26). A life of belonging to others is a vibrant tapestry, woven together with the threads of both joy and sorrow.
You've been taken by the wind
You have known the kiss of sorrows
Doors that would not let you in
Outcast and a stranger
You have come by way of sorrow you have come by way of tears
But you'll reach your destiny come to find you all these years
Come to find you all these years
You have drunk a bitter wine with none to be your comfort
you who once were left behind will be welcome at love's tables
You have come by way of sorrow you have come by way of tears
But you'll reach your destiny
You will one day come to know
You will one day come to know
All the nights that joy has slept will awake to days of laughter
Gone the tears that you have wept
You'll dance in freedom ever after
You have come by way of sorrow you have come by way of tears
But you'll reach your destiny
You will lay your burden down
You will lay your burden down
It’s amazing to me how well a three-minute song can craft an image of the vibrant life of the resurrection. We were created to flourish, but we do suffer in this age of brokenness and follow One who suffered with those suffering around him. But this suffering, as Miller so keenly intuits, is never the end of the story.
This post is made freely available to Substack readers, but if you appreciate The Conversational Life, please consider helping to sustain our work with a paid subscription ( $5/month or $50/year ).
You hit a homer with this one. JM is one of the greatest and most underratedest. Thanks for refocusing our gaze in her direction.
What a great song. I can identify with the words very well. Thanks again for sharing this song. Keep it up! I love this feature.
La Vonne