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I've had this CD for years, and historically it has not received much playtime. I've taken listening to Jars of Clay's Eleventh Hour album nearly every day. Each track contains something precious, and has resonated with me deeply in different ways over the last several weeks.
The CD was already in my car this morning when I started it and was on the sixth track, "Silence". It's not one I've paid much attention to until this morning. But as I find myself stripped, deeply exhausted, feeling quiet and defeated (we can be really honest here, right??), as I find myself in tears many times in the course of a day, this song gave words where I had none. It gave me permission to ask the question: where are You?
Though I know I can trust God is in this and hasn't gone away, my heart is sore and tired and just wants Him to be done with whatever He's doing.
I'm someone who believes the meaning of a song is inextricably tied to the music, so I'm posting both a video with the song and the lyrics.
Close your eyes and listen. Maybe it will speak to something in you, too.
Take
Take till there's nothing
Nothing to turn to
Nothing when you get through
Won't you break
Scattered pieces of all I've been
Bowing to all I've been
Running to
Where are you?
Where are you?
Did you leave me unbreakable?
You leave me frozen?
I've never felt so cold
I thought you were silent
And I thought you left me
For the wreckage and the waste
On an empty beach of faith
Was it true?
Cuz I ... I got a question
I got a question
Where are you?
Scream
Deeper I wanna scream
I want you to hear me
I want you to find me
Cuz I ... I want to believe
But all I pray is wrong
And all I claim is gone
And I ... I got a question
I got a question
Where are you?
Yeah....yeah
And where ... I ... I got a question
I got a question
Where are you?
Where are you?
Where are you?
Where are you?
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17 comments:
"Something Beautiful" did it for me when i was at an alarmingly low point in my life.
that silence kills, doesn't it? if you could just hear one word, a little reassurance, a clue about what's what, even a rebuke. but nothing...that's torture.
i know for a fact that there are times when God is genuinely silent. i don't really understand that. but what scares me these days is that i suspect that there are times when God is reaching out to me and i'm not letting him in. my challenge lately has been to return moment by moment to an awareness of God. even if i don't hear him, even if i don't feel him, i know that he's near. i want to be ready and receptive, and that's something that does not come easily for me. i'm very quickly absent and distracted. i'm pretty sure there have been times when God has been shouting to try to get my attention and i pretty much have my eyes squeezed shut and my hands over my ears. it's a fairly tragic picture i have in my head...me saying, "la la la la, i'm not listening!" and then complaining to God that he never talks to me.
i'm not telling you this to suggest that this is what's going on with you. like i said, i know for sure that there are these seasons of genuine silence and that is painful beyond imagining. i'm really aching for you kirsten. i wish (recurring theme here) that we lived closer. i want to pop in on you and give you a big hug. hang in there sister. i'll pray that God speaks to you loud and clear, and you can pray that i take the chance of actually listening.
mmm ... "something beautiful" was one of those gems that really reached me too. "eleventh hour" is another one i keep turning to. i keep wondering how these songs just ran over me before, they never sank in. but now ... they're real, they're raw & i can understand that they're born of experience.
i totally get what you mean about the dichotomy between actual silence and just not hearing. i know there have been times when i was just choosing not to hear. i don't think this is one of those times, but the truth is, i'm just not sure anymore.
sigh. i wish you lived closer too. a hug would be so life-giving. holding you close, praying that we will both have ears to hear.
God's silence is so strange...it's really like being in a foreign land, wandering around, wishing you knew how to ask for what you want. terri's right--it IS torture.
i know that, at least for me, his silence weans me from his presence. ok, that sounds weird. when he is silent, i learn that i don't need to feel him to know that he's there. i don't know if that's what you're finding here...i guess it's comforted me in the past to feel the stripping and know that he's there, in that. dunno if it's helpful to you.
i, too, wish i could be with you. i'd love to bring you a cup of tea and sit on the couch and listen to music with you. your burdens seem heavy right now, and i wish you didn't feel you were carrying them alone.
love to you.
oh sarah, you totally nailed it. i had forgotten about that whole dark night of the soul thing and how it severs your dependence on feelings and grounds you in the deeper things of God...in a kind of knowing beyond words or passions. i think it helps to know that this is part of what it means to sink deeper into faith. still sucks, but at least it doesn't seem meaningless or arbitrary.
sarah, i totally get what you mean about how his silence weans you from his presence ... you get used to not feeling him around, to sensing him in any way, really. you learn to trust & live as if He's really there (because He is) even though He's giving no sign of His whereabouts. i think i get this.
i know this is stripping, so i know it's Him. but yeah ... all the same, it stinketh to high heaven.
i've actually been reading through the ascent of mount carmel again. all those words just washed over me the last time i read it; i wasn't in a place where it meant anything. now it really does.
so: sarah, terri ... dinner at my place? i'm sure christianne would be game, too!! we can all hug & cry to our heart's content!!
i'm in.
You know, my comment was all JotC-y (John of the Cross--my abbreviation for him from taking notes at ISF)...I don't think I really thought of him when writing.
Kirsten, name the date and I'll be there. I'm so close to serious it's not even funny.
okay, my two cents: i just complained LOUDLY across the entire house that i need to be with kirsten right now and want to please just book a flight to bellingham. now! i swear, it's on my mind increasingly every single day over here, and being way the heck in timbuktoo florida is KILLING ME.
ok, God. you're right. it's not killing me. slight exaggeration. but still, God. you catch my drift. drop plane tickets out the sky, maybe, God??
all that to say: yeah. i'm there. kirsten. sarah. terri. couch. afghans. mugs of hot tea. and love, love, love, love, LOVE.
ps: sarah, i totally thought you were channeling john of the cross in your comment, too. so funny that you weren't even consciously thinking on that level.
pps: kirsten, i love you. you know this. but i say it again and again anyway. i love you.
ppps: terri, of course i love you, too. you always seem to know the exact right words to say. its comforting.
when? let's do it now, please.
love you all.
if only, if only there was a cheap flight...Dave thinks i'm crazy because i'm actually looking...and there's nothing, nada, zilch...i'm looking under every bush ;)
i want to be with you guys--so much love to each of you!
Well Kirsten
as usual, i am late to the game here. Of that is a vrey BAD metaphor here. You get my point. Kirsten your voice on the phone last night crushed me, i can feel anguish in your words, and yeah this really sucks living so far away. I know, well let me say i would guess, that there is a part of you that feels alone.
You know we are here, but this is really, really tough. I so wished we all lived closer together that would make life much more bearable at times. I am here, and if you need me, just to unload, no worries, call me. I MEAN THAT! CALL ME. These hard times are when you need people the most. I love you, you are in my thoughts.
you all are welcome here ANY time. it would be the thrill of my life to have you here, within reach, in the flesh. and we can exchange some real hugs instead of these cyber ones.
i would love that.
tammy, it was so good to talk to you last night!! i am sick, but i am going to be okay. jesus is holding me all together.
God was silent for 400 years between the old and New Testament. Then He made a dramatic entry in the birth of His son and caused the world to listen to God once again..
Look at the silence as a way to prepare yourself for your journey with Jesus on whatever path that He has you on. may God's glory speak to you in this journey that you and your friends are on. Glory be to God.
Remember, it is O.K. to let your jar shatter. Remember what the potters did with the broken pieces, they grafted them into newer, more beautiful vessels.
Praying for you, loving on you... all from Colorado. Hang in there.
It sounds like you are grieving something. Though perhaps the source of that mourning is not so clear. I'm sorry for the tears, and I hope that the process, the sadness will bring you out from under whatever burden has perhaps been yours for too long.
carl - that is so true. it's okay if i feel shattered. one thing i often pray is that He would help me remember that "He holds all things -- even me -- together".
l.l. - thank you for your well wishes. it is a kind of grieving: a loss of desire, of will, of stamina. it is hard to let go, to be patient & see what might be handed to me if i do.
peace.
*k
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