Song Of The Moment : The Other Side
David Gray

Meet me on the other side
Meet me on the other side
I’ll see you on the other side
See you on the other side

Honey now if I’m honest
I still don’t know what love is
Another mirage folds into the haze of time recalled
And now the floodgates cannot hold
All my sorrow all my rage
A tear drop falls on every page

Meet me on the other side
Meet me on the other side

Maybe I oughta mention
Was never my intention
To harm you or your kin
Are you so scared to look within
The ghosts are crawling on our skin
We may race and we may run
We’ll not undo what has been done
Or change the moment when it’s gone

Meet me on the other side
Meet me on the other side
I’ll see you on the other side
I’ll see you on the other side

I know it would be outrageous
To come on all courageous
And offer you my hand
To pull you up on to dry land
When all I got is sinking sand
The trick ain’t worth the time it buys
I’m sick of hearing my own lies
And love’s a raven when it flies

Meet me on the other side
Meet me on the other side
I’ll see you on the other side

Honey now if I’m honest
I still don’t know what love is

It Sure Is Dark Out Here … Somebody Save Me.
Last week a coffee break with Stu and Nige saved me just a little bit. Reading, although not really connecting with Dani is saving me a little too. I miss you, girlie.

This weekend has been good, solid, back breaking but inspiring work with my young people. I’ve been silent since Wednesday on, because Wednesday night was gut wrenchingly difficult and I nearly wanted to throw in the towel. The difference between my ‘successful ministry’ (could there really be such a thing?) in the arts and my struggles in youth is primarily based around the desire for participation and ownership. All my pomo development ideas have to be thrown out the window when working with these very modern kids. Saturday, however, combined the arts and young people and was a riproaring success.

Tonight though.. I am in a dark and lonely place.

Maggi writes blogs this entry.. it captures my darkness well.

I am not winning enough battles, fighting the fight well enough, counting enough, or measuring enough to feel like anything is worthwhile at the moment. My dreams even, seem like feathers on slight whispers of wind, under gathering stormclouds.

Driving down the driveway tonight, to my little dark house, as lovely as she is, with my darkness inside me swelling and bursting out through teardrops.. I cannot even find heavy enough chords on my guitar to pour out my lament to any heavenly ears that are listening.

This isn’t really a spiritual post. It’s just a sad one. I need saving again, a companion on this faith path for a while. I’m reading Henri Nouwen’s The Inner Voice of Love and it wounds and heals me all at once. It speaks truth to me in deep places, not only because of similar experience, but because the Spirit of God is so deep in these places alongside me.

I wish though, at a time when I am pressing my young people strongly around their Holy Spirit theology, I was more secure in my own.

How desperate am I, for You, Spirit of God? How open and restless without your present Presence with me? How graciously you have given of Yourself to me, yet I ungratefully say, more.. It is not enough. Quicken Yourself to me, for I have need of you, to comfort me. I don’t wish for strength to continue, nor light for my path, simply to be comforted, oh Comforter.

Pray for me, that these words of Stu’s 131st Psalm become a present reality. Help me to remember my trust.

Psalm 131
Lord I have given up my pride,
I have placed my own opinions under your scrutiny
and I realise how unknowing I really am.

I am not concerned now with matters that are too difficult for me to understand
or with problems that I will never be able to solve.

These are your ocean,
and I acknowledge I can only dip my toes in from time to time,
but only you know how wide and deep it is.

So instead, I stop and reflect.
I divorce myself from the concerns of the things around me.
I stop.
Like a small child fallen asleep in its mother’s arms.
Safe, sound and cherished.
My busy passions and annoyances are quiet now.
Let me sleep.

People of Jesus, trust in him all the time.

Sleep for awhile and be content.
© Stu McGregor