Beauty Will Rise, part 1?

So I came to a coffee shop with a friend today with the express purpose of blogging. I intended to bring my journal from my road trip and transfer and expand upon some of what I wrote during that journey...but I forgot to bring it along. Which brings me to plan B...blogging about my latest favorite cd.

2 years ago, Christian singer/songwriter Steven Curtis Chapman lost his daughter in a tragic accident. He didn't know if he'd ever return to the stage/studio...but then he ended up creating this amazing, heart-wrenching album, Beauty Will Rise. His songs are full of pain and heartbreak, but never without hope. Seems like my blog could, of late, take that as a theme - pain and heartbreak and striving for hope. So, needless to say, I relate well to this album; despite the fact that my recent losses have not included anyone's death, there are many of the same wrestlings with the Lord, and grief over things lost, and a struggling to bring the hope that lies deep within me up to the surface, to make it tangible.

So I'm going to write at least about part of the album, song by song...we'll see if this turns into a series...

1) Heaven is the Face

SCC looks forward to the day when he sees his little girl again in Heaven. I'm not sure what I think about counting on seeing people we love when we get to Heaven - I think we'll be pretty consumed w/worshiping Christ anyway. And I think SCC probably thinks that too...he even acknowledges that Heaven is going to be "so much more" than seeing his daughter but that right now, those specific desires are what his "heart is aching for." But my actual favorite part of this song is toward the end, where he lists off all the things that will be absent in Heaven - cancer and hunger and loneliness, etc. And he ends this list with:

"And there's no more goodbye
and no more 'not enough'
And there's no more enemy."

And nowhere else in the whole album does SCC talk about the enemy's role in his grieving process, and I'd be interested in knowing what he means exactly. But there's something in the way that he throws that line in and what he does with it musically at that point that makes me think that Satan has had a pretty active role in his attacks on this man. And oh! How I long for the day when there IS no more enemy - his lies have been so present in my own mind and heart over the last several months. And the battle is wearisome. But I know there is a victor, and I am His. Satan's attacks hurt immensely, and they incapacitate me for periods of time. But ultimately he will lose. And I take comfort from these words from 2 Peter 5:8-11:

"Be sober-minded; be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish you. To him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen."

Amen!