learning together

One of my favorite bands of all time, cool hand luke, is sadly very much unknown. I got to see them play a year ago during one of their rare appearances in california. Not only was the music incredible, but I was impressed with frontman Mark Nicks. He started talking about why the band plays music, and it ended up being a ten-minute description of how Christ has impacted the band and his life. But it wasn't one of those cheesy, rehearsed speeches you're likely to hear at a MercyMe or Casting Crowns shows. This was raw, profound but unpolished, real. You could feel Nicks searching for each word as he went, and despite the differing beliefs of the crowd, a respectful silence settled over the music festival as he shared.

I recently checked out the lyrics for a cool hand luke song called 'friendly jas.' To put it lightly, I was blown away. I have always liked the song, but reading the lyrics made me appreciate more the honesty and realness the make cool hand luke one of my favorite bands. I haven't found another song that better describes a part of my life.

The song talks about friendship. There is a naivity in being young, the truth is that we simply can't yet understand how hard, wonderful, and trying life will be. We haven't experienced it. But that's the beauty of friendship; the fact that you grow together. In a sense, we will never fully grasp this life, we will fail to wrap our minds around this existence. There are too many unexpected trials, countless unforseen joys, and we'll never have enough wisdom to perfectly navigate through life. But Christians have a tremendous priveledge, a right to release everything, to throw up our hands, and trust Him to help us.
It's amazing that He gives us friends, who live through the process alongside us, who make the same mistakes, who hold us up when we can't stand.

So here's the song. It has so much meaning for me, and depicts perfectly one of my most treasured friendships from junior high and high school.

"It was a blessed day--The day that I met you
Though at the time I didn’t have a clue
As iron sharpens iron so does one man another
And that’s what God intended us to do (Psalm 27:17)

Flowers fall and seasons change (Isaiah 40:8)
And you know how we treat the rain
In times of drought we pray it comes
And when it falls we turn and run
The moon is new, you’ve left your seat (I Samuel 20:18)
The time has come to go in peace (I Samuel 20:42)
With my own hand the bow was strung
The arrow shot now falls beyond (I Samuel 20:36)

I thank my God for every (Philippians 1:3)
Memory of you
The lessons learned andThe way the Spirit moved
I remember hearing “church is more than just a building”
I remember when we proved it

That day, I could have stared at the ocean forever
With a song for every grain beneath my feet
We were so young and brilliantly naïve
To the joy and the pain and the days that we would see

Everything has changed
But our hope remains the same
I want you to know that I’ll be here
Through a hundred years of rain
Together we run into what we do not know
Trusting our God who made tomorrow"