waste my life
Alright so… controversial and spiritual, worship and scripture-centered topic for anyone who feels like reading and responding, I understand if you don’t. I’d love to know some thoughts. Here are mine.
Over vacation I listened to a lot and read a lot. I thought about a lot and it was just another step in a journey God has been taking me on in 2008 to draw me closer to Him, be dependant on Him, love Him more than any other, and shape who I am supposed to be as a worship leader and Christ follower. One thing I listened to was a podcast from a worship leader from International House of Prayer, Misty Edwards. It was an amazing talk. Of course I then looked to see if she had an album and she had several. It’s pretty radical stuff. This woman, from what I’ve read on the internet, told God at 19 that she would give up all of her 20s for whatever he had for her. She wouldn’t pursue a relationship or a lover, a house or basically anything that we all tend to be reaching for at that age.
She has one song on her album, Relentless, called I Will Waste My Life. You can hear it on this youtube video, but um… the video itself isn’t great so just listen 
Full lyrics are here as well. The song is big and serious, and the part that rocks me the most is this:
I say goodbye to my father, my mother
I turn my back on every other lover, and I
Press on, yes I press on
I say goodbye to my father, my mother
I turn my back on every other lover, and I
Press on, yes I press on
I believe the song overall refers to scriptures like this (if I’m not mistaken): Genesis 2:24, leaving father and mother and uniting with your spouse. She uses it though, as uniting with Jesus and taking Him as her lover. She even refers to wanting to “take His Name” in one part of the song. The other scripture I think it refers to is Luke 14:26, he who does not hate his father and mother cannot be my disciple.
These are troubling scriptures to say the least. I’ve always explained them away as in, your love for Christ must be more than your love for the people who are really in your life. He doesn’t really want us to “hate” them, He just wants us to be the one we love so much more. This could be true, but deep in me something gnaws that my love isn’t radical enough. Who knows what Christ could ask us to give up for His Name. And some who don’t know Him could ask – now why would I want to follow someone who asks me to give up everything I love?
Then there is a seeming contradiction with scriptures about God wanting us to live live abundantly and to the fullest. It sort of even relates to the sermon last weekend by Derek, about the heart behind money/stuff/and all the things in our life we love. If any of those, even a person, takes the place of the Lord as an idol, it becomes sin. Is that simply all this is? Living life FULLY in Christ and no other? In the Old Testament people were always asking for God’s blessings, provisions, land, wealth and He would give it – conquering armies, giving lands to peoples, men would take multiple wives and have many children…. and fathers and mothers were praised and honored (and of course should still be honored and loved today, that is NOT what Jesus is saying )
And honestly, I don’t think many people could sing this song Misty has written, all though I see on youtube that some have. I don’t know their individual stories, but this song seems to really draw on Misty’s personal life experience and choices. Either way, I’ve had it in my head for a few days now and I had to spit it all out.
God asks us to give up things to pursue Him recklessly. To pour our heart and soul in. To worship Him with everything and share His story and His love with others. To help the world and be fully available for His use. When God asks us to give up things or confront our idols, it is different for everyone. For some that maybe TV, drugs or other addictions. For some it may be the pursuit of a partner or other person. For some it is money, for some it may be food. For some it might be an unhealthy obsession with family, friends or career.
For me, it’s cats.
Thoughts?
(that cat thing was a joke)
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Good topic.
First off, you’re right about Jesus not meaning that we should abandon our responsibility to honor or care for our parents (see Matthew 15:4-6).
I am not sure about the whole thing though. Some he calls to be “normal” followers and some he calls to lay on their side for a full year and cook their food over their own poop and hair.
I think her song might be true for any of our stories and what songs we might write… other people might not REALLY be able to sing them.
Comment by Jayson — July 25, 2008 @ 4:16 pm
wow… i’m really dwelling on these thoughts. thank you for sharing them, and for sharing that song.
‘there is no cost, there is no loss”. -Misty
“But whatever to my profit I now consider loss for the sake of Christ. What is more, I consider everything a loss compared to the surpassing greatness of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord, for whose sake I have lost all things. I consider them rubbish that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ–the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith. I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death…” (Paul to the Philippians)
I think of Paul and how he gave up being a high official to follow Christ–he thought he had the way to heaven figured out because of his lineage and his perfect law-abiding ways. Then we hear him writing again and again how he considers all of his former life (stability, pay, social status, identity) a loss–NOTHING compared to the surpassing (growing ever bigger) greatness of knowing Christ.
‘hating’ mother and father to me seems its two-fold–not having any allegiances higher than to Christ, and –not relying on the old system, the old stability, the old security found in a familial setting.
There is radical sacrifice. There is radical obedience. And I think it can look different for different people. And I also think only certain people choose it. But are we all called to it? I’d say yes.
Comment by blythewhite — July 25, 2008 @ 9:53 pm