"I can't see the sun for the daylight"

Tonight I experienced worship at Taylor like never before. This weekend we’re having a 48-hours of prayer marathon in the prayer chapel. Allegedly this is part of a campus craze that’s sweeping the nation. Last weekend it was Calvin, this weekend it’s Taylor.

Anyway, after attending some friends’ senior art shows (which were AMAZING btw), Alison, Margaret and I headed over to the prayer chapel where roughly twenty TU students were already gathered singing and praying and generally worshipping God. I’m usually pretty cynical about things like this, but upon entering I was struck by the sincerity and genuineness of the offering. As I sat down and joined in the song, I felt deeply moved in my very spirit. I was indeed occupying holy ground.

I’m a firm believer in honesty in all forms of communication, even prayer and worship. It seems, however, that this is an area in which I am quite apt to lie. I sang, “I will not forget You, You are my God, my King…” and then I realized that’s not even remotely true. I forget God all the time! It’s sad, I know, but it’s true.

So I stopped singing along, but even so I felt the words to a very different worship song rise up in me. This is the song that I sang within my soul:

If you put your arms around me, could it change the way I feel?
I guess I let myself believe that the outside might just bleed its way in.
Maybe stir the sleeping past lying under glass,
Waiting for the kiss that breaks this awful spell.
Pull me out of this lonely cell.

Close my eyes and hold my heart.
Cover me and make me something.
Change this something normal into something beautiful.

What I get from my reflection isn't what I thought I'd see.
Give me reason to believe you'd never keep me incomplete.
Will you untie this loss of mine, it easily defines me.
Do you see it on my face?
That all I can think about is how long I've been waiting to feel you move me?

Close my eyes and hold my heart.
Cover me and make me something.
Change this something normal into something beautiful...

And I'm still fighting for the world to break these chains.
And I still pray when I look in your eyes
You stare right back down into something beautiful.

--Jars of Clay, “Something Beautiful”

Amid my inadequacies, God is gracious. That, my friends, is the message of the Cross.