Jars of Clay - Part 1

Jars of Clay released their latest album a couple weeks ago,which got me feeling all reminiscent about life (it doesn't take much) as I thought back on my history with Jars of Clay. They've been my favorite band since junior high, and they still hold that title even if I'm not 100% impressed with them all the time anymore. Just about all their albums hold special signifiance for me, and I'm always looking for excuses to share my favorite lyrics w/people. So this post may take awhile and come in more than 1 part, but I want to reflect on each of their albums and maybe some lyrics from each. If no one reads this, I don't mind - it's fun for me anyway...

Much Afraid - the first JOC cd I owned, and one of the first cds i owned, period. This is my favorite album to play on the piano these days, too. One of my favorite stanzas, from "Hymn:"

"Oh gaze of love so melt my pride, that I may in Your house but kneel
And in my brokenness to cry, spring worship unto Thee."

Jars of Clay - their self-titled album came out before I was on the scene. My sister had it and eventually gave it to me because I loved it so much. "Worlds Apart" probably contains some of the best lyrics ever written, like the following,

"I look beyond the empty cross Forgetting what my life has cost
And wipe away the crimson stains And dull the nails that still remain
More and more I need you now, I owe you more each passing hour
The battle between grace and pride I gave up not so long ago,"

but their "Love Song for a Savior" became sort of my theme song for a long time and still may hold the title of one of my favorite songs of all time (sorry for all the superlatives). The line, "Someday he'll call her and she will come running" often made me cry when I thought of my friend Katherine who suffered a traumatic brain injury as a teenager and would never again run in this life. This song was one of the theme songs of the Chrysalis retreat I went on in high school that made the gospel come alive in my heart and life. And, corny as this sounds in comparison, my high school boyfriend had the dj at a church dance play this song when he asked me to dance and to be his girlfriend. ha, the memories...

I really liked If I Left the Zoo but nothing stands out as life-changing with that one...

Enter The Eleventh Hour. When this album first came out, I enjoyed it but it wasn't my favorite. But when my grandparents died the following year and I questioned God in a way I never had before in the weeks and months that followed, this album was sweet medicine to my soul. I saw their concert during the week when my grandma had died, and my grandpa was on his death bed. They spoke about how being a believer is not always a happy, carefree existence - that life is hard and questions are real. This part of "Something Beautiful" still brings tears to my eyes as I reflect on how desperately I wanted to feel God's presence in a real way during that time:

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.

I think this is long enough for 1 blog. We'll leave it as part 1 of hopefully 2.