Songs of the Soul

When I was a child, only twelve, I was deeply moved by a song.  I didn’t know why I loved this particular song.  I didn’t know what it said to me. But it touched a longing deep in my heart that I didn’t know was there, and it touched a piece of the fulfillment of that longing.  The song was The Search is Over from Survivor.  If you’d like the experience I had at twelve, you can look away and just listen. I will post both the music video and a lyric video below.

Then, when I was nineteen, I was captivated by a different song with a similar theme. It was Save the Best for Last Sung by Vanessa Williams.

What was it that moved me about these songs?  I won’t know everything. There is something in each of us that is deeper than we know, and we are always journeying, always exploring, always pondering, seeking, and letting truth seep in.  But Save the Best for Last has this line: “Sometimes the very thing we’re looking for is the one thing we can’t see.”  And The Search is Over has these lines: “I was always reaching, you were just a girl I knew. I took for granted the friend I had in you,” and “Love was right before my eyes.”

Both songs are about love that was always there while the person was looking for something else. One is from the point of view of the person waiting, and one is from the point of view if the person realizing.  But there isn’t a sense of shame of not noticing here. There is a sense of gratitude for the realization. I challenge you today to take this to heart, and to listen to these songs with a deeper sense. Is there something beautiful beyond what you’ve been noticing? I believe in unconditional love all around us, and in something and someone leading us to the fulfillment of all desire. For me, it is something that I ignore way too much, that Presence which reaches out to me in amazing love.

What might this be saying to you? If there is someone or some blessing you aren’t seeing, you don’t have to wrack your brain trying to see it.  Just write or speak the things you are thankful for, and it will come.  Another line from the Vanessa Williams song is this: “It’s not the way I hoped or how I planned, but somehow it’s enough.” Good things may not be the ones you wanted, and it’s OK to want them.  But good things are here.

May God bless your day.