Captain's Log

Entry date - November 1, 2009

The Life Story

"Listen carefully: Unless a grain of wheat is buried in the ground, dead to the world, it is never any more than a grain of wheat. But if it is buried, it sprouts and reproduces itself many times over. In the same way, anyone who holds on to life just as it is destroys that life. But if you let it go, reckless in your love, you'll have it forever, real and eternal." - John 12:24-25

Rebecca Falls once said, "Nothing is so healing, as when we listen to each other's story." Everyone has a story. Over the past several months we have listened to, and cried and prayed with, so many people in desperate situations. And often, it seems like we are just bystanders, watching as God meets them in their brokenness and pain. But God uses us and our stories as a part in their healing. He includes you, and us, in His love story which He is telling to the world.

It's a story that goes beyond religious cliches and gets to the heart of what is really going on in people. And it's this story, that God can powerfully use if we are willing to humble ourselves and be vulnerable with one another. Honestly though, that is not easily done.

That's one reason why we love using music to convey what we know to be true in our hearts. The songs on LAY IT DOWN have been a wonderful new way for us to do just that. The title track says it clearly.

"When your plans and dreams don't work out,
And you don't know just how you feel...
When your love for life let's you down,
And you don't seem to understand, that if you
Love your life, you'll lose it. Give your life, you'll find it...
Lay it down. Jesus waits to work it out. So, lay it down."
- Roby Duke

Whatever language we use to cry out to God with. Whatever form it takes. A song, a prayer, a dance, a groan, He calls us to converse. A mysterious dialogue of the mundane, the monotonous, the profound, and the unspeakable. We speak, He listens. He speaks and we hear, all the while cloaked in a blanket of safe mercy.

No cliches or flippant idle words here. He knows us to the core and love us completely. What does He see? What is the draw for Him as he looks at us? He must see something we just don't see.

So we tell him our story, and he lets us in (just a little) on His. The detail set aside for now, He invites us to embrace trust. And speak of a Love that completes us, quenches the deep soul thirst, and gives us a glimpse of that which is beyond our line of sight.