“The law of the jungle says
You look after yourself
But I remember this much
I love as I've been loved myself.
But you keep on
GOING OUT IN A BLAZE OF GLORY
Setting your sights for the sky.
They can offer you anything at all
But your dreams must not be sold.
GOING OUT IN A BLAZE OF GLORY
No price is high enough
I'm fighting back with feeling
I'm fighting back with love
When the nails are biting into your hands
And the cross is heavy on your heart
Now is the time to really make a stand
MY HANDS ARE HELD UP HIGH.”
From Blaze Of Glory by The Alarm
Welsh band The Alarm came crashing into the big music scene with 1983’s Declaration album prepared to fight alongside U2 in making the rock revolution about more than throwing TVs out hotel windows. Declaration shouted at the devil and was about a commitment to something higher and bigger. Christian faith, as with U2, lay at the heart of their mission.
Blaze of Glory bristles with long term defiance and shows how big communal choruses, when sung in community, can fuel perseverance and resistance. The lyrics I picked for today’s pondering challenges the spirit of the age in looking out for yourself and brings the cost of Christ’s cross into play. Loving as we are loved is the Christian commission and challenge. God’s love and grace meet us in a warm caress as we believe that we are loved by the one who holds the Universe in place BUT the same love crashes into our self indulgence and knocks it on its head demanding that we fight the world into peace with the same unconditional love God showed us. Now... if I could go out on a blaze of glory doing that. Life in its fullness!
Thanks for your reflections on these songs, "the truth is the truth or the truth is surely a lie" is also a great lyric for a post-modernist world!
Posted by: Simon Curran | 04/02/2011 at 07:58 PM