sacred/secular

i was commenting in staff meeting today about how i’m growing in my understanding of the fallacy of a sacred/secular divide.

specifically in music, i find truth, beauty, and good in secular and sacred music. i also find a lack of those qualities in both secular and sacred music. sometimes in the same song.

just because something is labeled “christian music” doesn’t necessarily mean much…

anyway, i had an interesting thing happen this afternoon. after remembering a jackson browne song that was quoted in brian mclaren’s book, “everything must change,” i decided to download the song and check it out. challenging stuff. here’s an excerpt…

We guard our world with locks and guns
And we guard our fine possessions
And once a year when Christmas comes
We give to our relations
And perhaps we give a little to the poor
If the generosity should seize us
But if any one of us should interfere
In the business of why there are poor
They get the same as the rebel Jesus

after reading through the lyrics, i decided to check out some of jackson’s other music, since i’m not very familiar with his stuff.

i went to www.songmeanings.net and just started down the alphabetical listing of jackson browne songs. in each of the first three songs i looked at, i was struck by the spiritual overtones and the longing for transcendence. don’t know the music, but just reading the lyrics was an enriching spiritual experience for me.

here’s one song in particular that i think is lyrically beautiful….

I want to live in the world, not inside my head
I want to live in the world, I want to stand and be counted
With the hopeful and the willing
With the open and the strong
With the voices in the darkness
Fashioning daylight out of song
And the millions of lovers
Alive in the world

I want to live in the world, not behind some wall
I want to live in the world, where I will hear if another voice should call
To the prisoner inside me
To the captive of my doubt
Who among his fantasies harbors the dream of breaking out
And taking his chances
Alive in the world

To open my eyes and wake up alive in the world
To open my eyes and fully arrive in the world

With its beauty and its cruelty
With its heartbreak and its joy
With it constantly giving birth to life and to forces that destroy
And the infinite power of change
Alive in the world

To open my eyes and wake up alive in the world
To open my eyes and fully arrive in the world
To open my eyes and wake up alive in the world
To open my eyes and fully arrive in the world

Jackson Browne, “Alive In The World”