Good Morning After All

(This is copied over from Goldfish and Clowns.  It doesn’t have anything to do with NASCAR, but please bear with.)

I’ve been a Collective Soul fan since first hearing “Shine” in 1994. It’s never been the cool band to like, with most rock snobs turning up their noses as its precisely controlled sound. To me, its gift for melody and band leader Ed Roland’s lyrical bent toward that which while not tipping his hand as to exactly where he’s coming from evidences a spiritual bent holding little if any conflict with the fundamentals of Christian spirituality has always been welcome.

Afterwords, the band’s most recent (2007) album and of their catalog my overall favorite, has a song entitled “Good Morning After All.” The lyrics give cause for reflection, to put it mildly:

Yeah you give up some days
When the tears they must flow
But God is always your strength
The only strength that you know
Now everything starts to fall in place

Chorus:
As you wake just to crawl
Still you say good morning after all
Then you stand just to fall
Still you say good morning after all

Yeah you questioned this life
Sure you wondered about love
But you swear there’s always hope
Always hope from above
Now everything starts to fall in place

[chorus]

It’s just another breath
It’s just another breath you say
It’s just another step
It’s just another step today

[chorus]

Twice yesterday I heard first hand about people whose bodies have been ravaged by cancer and who by all standards ought to be dead or dying. Yet they live, healed or healing. Coincidence that people of faith have had them in prayer? Hardly. Science and medicine treated them, certainly. But God cured them.

I’ve always found it slightly — slightly — amusing how in situations such as these I’ve had zero problem believing that God can and will cure people according to His perfect will and the grace He shows us. Yet when it comes to myself and dealing with the stuff of life and its inherent issues, be they professional or personal (for the record, the former is extremely edgy right now), my natural reaction is near-paralyzing fear that it won’t work out. Why? Why is my faith so lumpy, for lack of a better way to put it? I’ve long sought to understand that, but to date the reason or reasons escape me.

Perhaps the reason is somewhere within how its time I admit I’m human. I too get upset, and angry, and frustrated, and scared. Perhaps it’s time I admit I need prayer and comfort and reassurance as much as everyone else. I’ve always strove to be someone who comforts, cares for and prays for others. Now I need comfort, care and prayer. I need wisdom to know how to deal with matters. I need courage to do the right thing. I need strength to do the right thing.

I need faith, really.

It’s embarrassing how strong my faith is when extended to others yet weak when extended to myself.

How I pray that I will be able to say for myself as I’ve said to others no matter what…

… good morning after all.

Please keep me in prayer.

Thank you.