Tues Dec. 27 - Time Is on Our Side (Free Energy)

We'll never get any other life...

So together we make this whole.
                      - Free Energy

It may seem strange to put a pop dance song in a Christmas lineup.  There are no 'silver bells' here, but there is plenty of cowbell.  This song is basically about liberation through a great beat, singable lyrics and a will to survive - and if this theme seems a little thin to you, just hold on for a minute.

One of the reasons the A.M. Project came into existence is because I know in my own journey how many times a good song has "saved" my life.  Sometimes prayer or meditation works, sometimes worship works, sometimes a talk with a friend does the trick, but sometimes when we're lost in the circles of our own thoughts, a good song on the radio can resuscitate us back to reality.  This is no insult to more "certified holy" forms of rejuvenation; it merely acknowledges what many of us already know: music moves us.

A danceable song, lyrics that seem to speak right to us, hum-able tunes... whether we more often listen to R&B, bluegrass and soul, hip hop, dance pop, classical or jazz, those of us who love music love it because of its power to stay with us, to change us - to help us.

This is all we got tonight

This is all we got tonight

We are young and still alive

And now the time is on our side

The Advent Music Project could very easily have been a collection of Christmas classics and new Christian rock favorites and indie Christian gems where the lyrics were always clearly about Jesus and God and the Christmas miracle.  Honestly, this would have made our reflection-writing task much easier!  But we didn't take on this project to find God only where God was already obvious; we wanted to find God, Jesus, Advent and Christmas in a few places no one had thought to look yet.

As with many good pop songs, the lyrics to Free Energy are both extremely literal and also open to the listener's personal experience. 'We are young and still alive' can be a rally cry for anyone from 9 to 90, and 'now the time is on our side' can speak to each of our hopes and longings.  So if we let go of our prejudgments about what "makes" Christmas music, isn't this the kind of song we could imagine the shepherds singing on the way back to their fields - the world and its possibilities suddenly opened up before them by a baby and his family camping in a manger?

What if 'this is all we got tonight' isn't a minimalist statement, but a free-wheeling confession that all we need is what we have because we've been freed from all our fears?  What if it was better-known that the angels loved a good cowbell-enhanced rock song just as well as harps and flutes?  What if we could acknowledge that at Christmas we are free to rock, free to dance, free to dare new things, because once and for all we have been shown that time is on our side, that God is bringing about astounding acts of mercy and grace, hope and love, freedom and wisdom all around us, and is urging us to just join the chorus and sing along:

The Lord is my light and my salvation -

so why should I be afraid?

The Lord is my fortress protecting me from danger -

so why should I tremble?

                                - Psalm 27:1 (NLT)

This Christmas-tide, let us not be afraid to rock, to dance, to shout with the knowledge that, despite all brokenness and waiting, in the end we have been shown in Christ's birth that time is definitely on our side.