Learning to love a song I used to hate

Greetings all,

It's Thursday morning, it has been raining and I have been enjoying time with God on the front porch.  The morning started with Mark Knopfler from The Dire Straits, but it resolved as it often does to Eva Cassidy.  There is a peace and beauty to her voice, the song she chooses to sing and the manner in which she plays her guitar that just draws me that much closer to God.  I find more and more that she is my music of choice during quiet time.  I especially love her rendition of Wade in the Water but lately every time I listen to her one songs sticks out above all others.  It is a song that I used to hate as a young man.  I can't really give you a reason why, perhaps it was a dislike for John Lennon, perhaps it was because it seemed so pretentious, perhaps it was to mellow for my rock and roll tastes.  Whatever the reason I grew up so disliking the song, that I just ignored it.  If it came on the radio I changed the station.  If it was playing in a store I left.  If my friends were playing it I ridiculed them into playing something else.  So for nearly thirty years I have ignored this song that many consider to be John Lennon's greatest song.  If you haven't figured out what I am referring to yet, let me make it clear Imagine.

The lyrics are as follows:

Imagine there's no Heaven; It's easy if you try.
No hell below us; Above us only sky.
Imagine all the people living for today.

Imagine there's no countries; It isn't hard to do.
Nothing to kill or die for and no religion too.
Imagine all the people living life in peace.

You may say that I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one.
I hope someday you'll join us and the world will be as one.

Imagine no possessions; I wonder if you can.
No need for greed or hunger; a brotherhood of man.
Imagine all the people sharing all the world.

You may say that I'm a dreamer but I'm not the only one.
I hope someday you'll join us and the world will live as one.

Now all of you are probably thinking, "What the heck took you so long to appreciate this song Faron?"  But in my defense I did come to maturity as a young man during the Reagan era as the son of an Army officer so anything that smacked of communism I immediately hated; and "imagine no possessions" did smack of communism to a young man in the eighties.  That being stated I must add that I also did not possess a full understanding of God and the Bible.  I didn't understand God's preference for the poor, His desire for peace or His desire that ALL be saved.  I have grown much over the years in my understanding of God; yes, I still have a really long way to go, but knowing Him in a newer, deeper way has opened my eyes to find beauty in unexpected places.

The voice of Eva Cassidy has opened my eyes to the beauty of this song and my passion for exegeting culture has given me a new lens through which to appreciate it.  In so many ways Lennon has written an incredibly Biblical song whether he meant to or not.  He has captured the three things that have created the most chaos in our world: misinterpreted religion that we use in a damaging and harmful way; nationalism to a level that disregards people for enemies because they are not from our country; and the desire for more stuff!  If we apply a Biblical lens over this song we can truly embrace the dream that of which Lennon writes and Cassidy sings.  First to change our understanding of religion from getting people into heaven in the future to taking care of their needs today.  Second to keep our eyes first on the fact that we are all citizens in the Kingdom of God and through that realize that to go to war as a nation is to go to war with our brothers and sisters in God's Kingdom.  Third to change our desire for more stuff into a desire to use the stuff we have to help others.  This particularly is something that really matters to God, read Amos.  God wants us to help the least and the lost and those without.  Lennon has it right if we can just get those three little things right we can truly change the world.  Listen to the song below, close your eyes and simply "imagine" what God can do through each of us if we learn to love in such a way as this.

Your brother in Christ,
Faron