Songs and Life.

Alrighty...I decided to change up things a bit and blog about a song. Yes, a song.

I know there is more than one person out there who will understand when I say I related to music in a way that is supernatural, music speaks to me and I see God more clearly through songs and melodies. That said, I've decided to do a few blogs, maybe one a week, we'll see how that goes, about a song that is speaking to me or has been speaking to me. This thought occurred to me this afternoon as I was driving to work & listening to music. The sun was shining, I had a good song playing (the one i'm going to be blogging about as a matter of fact) and it was decently warm in my car so I was quite joyous and content. Anywho I connected deeply to this song for a few minutes and it occurred to me that those kinds of things are what I should be sharing in my blogs, not just ramblings about my life but things that have meaning to me. Annnnd...thus my blog idea was birthed. I'm not sure how this is going to work out, being the first time I've attempted something like this, but hopefully it will encourage my readers and maybe get them to see this song a little differently, appreciate it more than they already do.

If you don't own this song, here is a youtube link:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a0pCk12v0EQ

Alrighty, now to the main point of this blog--the song!

(please put all music, artist, genre prejudices aside & hear me out!)

"Life Again" by Decyfer Down.

Okay, now why is THIS song so significant? To be honest I simply do not know. It could be the melodies, it could be the rhythm, it could be the lyrics, although I doubt those things are what most grabs me when I hear it.

I believe God uses music to speak to me and I think today He uses this song to grab my attention, I wasn't listening to anything else on this one point (one moment and I'll elaborate) but then I caught the lyric and the chord and it all crashed over me like songs do and for the first time it HIT me. Okay, onto my point.

I'm going to pick apart the lyrics of this song & explain meaning & thoughts behind them ( my own meanings & thoughts of course.)

I don't remember the last time I could say
I was where I wanted to be

This is very relatable to me & other people in general, especially Christians. we get so far from where we want to be in our lives & relationships, especially our relationship with God, the hook of the song relates and pulls you in.

still you see through this mask

hiding all my flaws

We can hide nothing from God, we might fool everyone else but not Him.

you see something down deep in me...

He sees something in us and He loves us despite our masks & flaws, despite anything else in our lives, He sees the deepest parts of us. This is the lyric that really got me because I struggle SO much with self-worth and how I view myself. Even when I think I deserve nothing, I am worth nothing, God sees something in me and gives me unconditionally love. It's so mind-blowing. Undeserved but still given.

Bring me back so that I can feel you again
take me to that place I was before

When we've lost who we are and we've pushed God away, the chorus of this song lends a thought or a prayer, bring us back God, take us back to that place of deeper intimacy, let us feel You and Your love. We've been running but we want to come back where we belong. The prodigal looking for an ounce of love from the Father he doesn't deserve it from.

all I want is to hold my head up high

We want to rid ourselves of the guilt and anguish and sin, hold our heads up high and be children of the King once more.

so take this life and set aflame again

Our longing is to be on fire for Him. His sacrifice has proven to be more than enough time and time again and though we've been cold to the touch, we crave His fire to dwell within us once more.

Still I linger around
a life unchanged
I just cant break the cycle now

We've been lit on fire by God but then...we wake up the next day and things don't seem any different and we forget our pleadings and our Beginning. We've gone back to what we once were, let ourselves fall back into the pattern of living without life. It's an endless cycle of destruction that tears apart the soul & we're caught once more.

I feel I've lost my hope

trapped in my own mind

You can't have hope without God. The mind is dangerous when explored alone as Renee Yohe once said. Sin traps us into thinking we have no hope, that we are stuck with ourselves because why would God want something as messed up as me?

break these thoughts that are clouding me.

With one last cry for change, we sing to be broken out of the destruction and the chains. Rid us of these thoughts and this bondage of sin. Free us.

Bring me back so that I can feel you again
take me to that place I was before
all I want is to hold my head up high
so take this life and set aflame again

Back into the chorus, we remember what it was like to be free, to know the fullness of a REAL life. A life with God in complete control.

Again, Again,
set my life aflame again...

Not wanting to fall back into that destructive pattern, we plead for a never-ending fire in our hearts and souls. We pray for deliverance from ourselves. We sing the words with passion because we want them to be true.

Bring me back so that I can feel you again
take me to that place I was before
all I want is to hold my head up high
so take this life and set aflame again

Bring me back so that I can feel you again
take me to that place I was before
all I want is to hold my head up high
so take this life and set aflame again

End with a double helping of the chorus to remind us with Whom our dependence lies. We can't do anything ourselves except that which He gives us and strengthens us with. It's a reminder that we ARE in fact dependent on Him and that He wants us to be. Our flame will only last as long as it's connected to the source.

anonomous is a word i can never spell correctly.

okay, well anywho, the point to this blog is that i have a formspring: http://www.formspring.me/lizschanke and that people (anyone) can ask me questions on it & it's completely anonomous if you want it to be. i've been typing that word a lot & i keep screwing it up :P so ask me questions! okay yup good.

Dorothy Barresi

one of my friends shared this on facebook, it's from a book by Dorothy Barresi &

i think it has amazing imagery so i'm sharing it, it's very well done.

Cuttings by Dorothy Barresi

I

Not cut the rug or cut
the mustard.
Not Roethke's spectral
nudgers and weepers
growing in the bruised
root cellar of the heart.

Not exactly Plath's
glottal ragings at mid-century,either,
romance of a thumb-top
pared back
for the accidental perfection
of the idea of pain.

II

We believe or do not believe
her father did
what you have heard
to be true to her.

Roughly speaking, this did or did not
take place when she was
between the ages of three and eleven,
when his pastorate failed
and the family moved
from ---- to --------

penury advising them
in their prayer life
like a cop.

But was it true, you ask.
What are the clues?

Ask the girl with dirt in her mouth.
Ask the girl who is all poem
now, all shapes between the shapes
she carved into her flesh
like a tattoo artist
falling in love

with what remained un-inked, the border crossings
and blue edges
and the razor bleeding
in her hand.

III

Postscript.
Her father died years ago
of cardiopulmonary collapse.
He'd been on the Pritikin Diet,
which helped for a time.
Now he's in jail in heaven.

IV

Postscript.
Sometimes she would cut herself, then go next door
to the neighbor's house---
a drywall finisher out of work
because this was the recession ---
and present her arms to him
shyly, like a girl
in her first prom gown of ruched sateen,
awkward in bows
but with terribly alert eyes.

V

In the end, she took Evian water,
cigarettes, a Bic lighter,
a pinky ring of two
gold willow branches twining, and

200 Xanax
up to the avocado grove
so lush neither horses nor helicopters,
dogs nor daylight,
not one of a dozen volunteers

could cut a trail back
to her alive and nodding off,
and yes,
by the position of her body downslope
the experts agreed,
changing her mind.

VI

Let me start again, here,
where a women ends.
The wrists were involved.
Also the leg-tops, the delicate skin
of the inner arms,
anywhere she could drag sharpness

than factors in and out
what she could not change in her life
which was pain.

The steel ratio of pain
to power
being control.

VII

Now ask yourself, as I did,
why hurt yourself more?

God WILL Provide.

So several of you may have noticed, I've taken a blogging hiatus. I had some pretty cruel awful comments posted on my blogs and I was sick of being attacked like that so I just kind of stopped blogging for awhile and stuck to simple journaling, where my thoughts were 'safe'. Well I realized I can't do that. God is doing flipping AMAZING things in my life and I can't just not proclaim them. If someone else has a problem with that, then it's not me they are attacking, it's God and I need not take it personally or get upset over it. With that said, in the last 3 weeks, I have been overwhelmed by God again. Every single time I let a glimmer of doubt into my mind, He keeps showing up in undeniable and amazing ways. I really have been having a hard time finding words to accurately describe just how much I am amazed by Him.

Basically, ever since my weekend in Kenosha & my visit to the school of worship, ever since I've KNOWN that that's where I need to be, I've been plaguing myself with worries and doubts. Now, I KNOW the Bible speaks that we need not worry and we should just cast our cares upon God because He cares for us and worrying is a burden we do not need to carry, however...I fail at that quite frequently, especially when the future is concerned.

With the School of Worship on the horizon, there are many things I've been concerned about and money has been a huge one. Yes, I'm working and more hours than I believed I would be for a retail job, however, things HAVE been cut since Christmas and with the cutting back of hours, I began to worry even more (even though when I was hired I was informed it would happen, and I understand the reasoning). Well, 2 weeks ago, I just got this mad urge to clean, organize and purge everything from my "stuff" that I didn't really need or want anymore. Considering I hadn't done this since my high school graduation, almost 2 years ago now, there was a considerable amount of junk to go through. Well, lo and behold as I'm going through a pile of papers, what do I find but a card from my graduation that had somehow gotten misplaced. Inside said card was a $20 bill. When I found that I just started crying because earlier that same day I had done some rough estimates for the costs of school and living for a year and the numbers really upset me. Anyway, alls I could do was cry and tell God "thank you" which seemed so inadequate. I put the money aside, knowing it had a purpose and went about my week. Three nights later at work, I was closing with our assistant manager and another associate and the 3 of us tend to have quite a bit of fun together, especially when we're working a closing shift. I was already in really good spirits from the night and had just finished sweeping the floor when our assistant manager hands me a packet of papers with a grin on her face and says "congratulations liz!!" I looked down and saw "Congratulations on being December Employee of the Month!" and I couldn't even think of words to say to react and I just laughed and joked "Oh so you guys actually DO like me here!" and we all joked around for a good ten minutes and I took the packet of papers back to my locker to look at later and went back to mopping the floor. It wasn't until I got in my car after work that I finally looked through the papers and read the information there, there were a series of questions for me to answer so that one of the managers could type up a bit of info about me and they'd make up a board to hang in the break room where everyone could see it. There was also a little benefit of a monetary reward, and I could choose to get a gift card from somewhere or a cash amount. It didn't hit me right away but as I'm about halfway home, the song "Who Am I" by Flyleaf comes on shuffle on my ipod and it TOTALLY hit me and I just had tears rolling the whole way home. That song is emotional as it is for me, and if you've read my prior blog about my trip to Kenosha you know the reasoning behind that. I truly believe it's my song of 2009. Maybe 2010, who knows?

And if all of THAT wasn't enough of God just being amazing and doing what He does, my bass teacher called me up just last night (and he and I are good friends) and he asks me how the bass is working out for me (because I don't have one of my own and I'm borrowing one of his, one of the ones he prefers to use for live concerts when he plays with his band, Isaiah 42:10 link: http://www.myspace.com/isaiah4210band ) and we chatted a bit how I was getting along with practicing and learning my frets and all that fun stuff and he goes "well, if you'd like to buy it i'd be willing to sell it to you" and my heart started pounding really hard and I thought okay even if he DOES offer it to me, it's going to be WAY too much and there's NO way i can afford a guitar right now. Well, I asked him how much he was asking and the price blew me away. Not only was it affordable, but it includes the brand new strings he put on two days before he gave it to me to borrow O.o

Oh yeah, and today? I was scheduled to work from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. right? Well, I get to work and the other associate I was working with today approaches me and asks me if it would be alright if we switched shifts because she needed to get done with work early and go take care of some stuff. I said of course because, what else did I really have to do? And also, I know what's goin on with her and I'd help her any way I could. Well, that added another 2 hours to my shift, and I went on my 15 minute break and just looked up and told God "okay You win, no more worrying" 15 minutes later, I head back onto the floor and the manager on duty, our store manager comes up to me and informs me that instead of leaving at 4 she's gonna keep me for part of my call-in til 5 or so because the managers needed to have a meeting and they needed me to man the floor.

No more doubting.

No more worrying.

God will provide.

The Beatitudes as Written in 'The Message'

A good friend of mine posted these on her facebook and I really loved how this was worded. It's from the Message and this is how it states the beautitudes. Keep in mind that the Message is a paraphrase of the bible, but I just liked how this particular passage of scripture was stated and thought I'd share it.

3"You're blessed when you're at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.

4"You're blessed when you feel you've lost what is most dear to you. Only then can you be embraced by the One most dear to you.

5"You're blessed when you're content with just who you are—no more, no less. That's the moment you find yourselves proud owners of everything that can't be bought.

6"You're blessed when you've worked up a good appetite for God. He's food and drink in the best meal you'll ever eat.

7"You're blessed when you care. At the moment of being 'care-full,' you find yourselves cared for.

8"You're blessed when you get your inside world—your mind and heart—put right. Then you can see God in the outside world.

9"You're blessed when you can show people how to cooperate instead of compete or fight. That's when you discover who you really are, and your place in God's family.

10"You're blessed when your commitment to God provokes persecution. The persecution drives you even deeper into God's kingdom.

11-12"Not only that—count yourselves blessed every time people put you down or throw you out or speak lies about you to discredit me. What it means is that the truth is too close for comfort and they are uncomfortable. You can be glad when that happens—give a cheer, even!—for though they don't like it, I do! And all heaven applauds. And know that you are in good company. My prophets and witnesses have always gotten into this kind of trouble.

yesterday today and forever

"Jesus Christ is the same yesterday today and forever" -hebrews 13:8

No matter what happens in life, you can always run to Jesus and He'll still be loving and forgiving.

Nothing stops Him loving you.

Nothing.

where words fail, music speaks.

I take a walk in the bitter cold,
I try to see your face,
The way it used to be,
The sky was never grey,
There was a time when I let you in,
You turned my night to day,
But I turned you away

Burn back the sun,
Bring back the fire once,
Blazing inside this hollow cage,
Burn back the sun,
You were the only one
To love me with passion's quiet rage

I have tasted the apathy,
It's bitter on my lips,
I am not who I used to be,
Betrayal with a kiss,
Open mouth for the prodigal,
You kept the flame alive,
You keep this flame alive.

"burn back the sun" by decyfer down

Sleeping with your eyes wide open but closed inside

Where light and darkness both are blinding (2 CORINTHIANS 4:4)

The novella you write painted with the brush of night

That never has a happy ending

Decisions will make you or break you

Don’t let them pull away (PROVERBS 2:20-22)

Made a wish upon a falling star (ISAIAH 14:12)

Ran so fast you don’t know where you are

Wake up friend (MARK 13:36)

It’s just one life(HEBREWS 9:27)

It’s not too late (JEREMIAH 13:16 / LUKE 13:24-25)

Your ride is far from over

Far from over

Medicate away every nightmare that you create

If it falls short then try another

Doesn’t God see this? Wonder why He won’t throw the switch?

He’s asking you the same question (COLOSSIANS 3:5)

Decisions will make you or break you

Don’t let them pull away (PROVERBS 2:20-22)

Made a wish upon a falling star (ISAIAH 14:12)

Ran so fast you don’t know where you are

Wake up friend (MARK 13:36)

It’s just one life(HEBREWS 9:27)

It’s not too late (JEREMIAH 13:16 / LUKE 13:24-25)

Your ride is far from over

Far from over

"falling star" by disciple

i fully believe that when words fail at saying the necessary things, music takes over and speaks

with words and melodies in a way that simply speaking cannot do alone. songs can speak FOR us

when we can't speak ourselves. that's exactly what these 2 songs do for me. i can't say this stuff

out loud but i can sing it in a song. i find that amazing. ♥ music