I always believed that this song was about someone struggling with the implications of human worthlessness at the core of Christianity, and trying to reconcile them with the idea that God loves human beings and has made a personal sacrifice to save them. Christianity, as I understand it, holds that all people are irredeemably sinful, and that they could never possibly get into heaven on their own -- but God sacrifices himself out of love on their behalf. If you really think about, it, though, that's kind of weird: the message is that, no matter how well you live your life, you're scum. You get God's love, but you could never deserve it.
So, you've got the narrator of the song: a profound believer who doesn't believe in himself. He's keenly aware of his religion's message about his sinful nature (for instance: "my bright is too slight to hold back all my dark") but also aware that God is, apparently, giving him a second chance. He's afraid of coming face-to-face with God and having to account for the fact that he's still a bad person ("I'm not scared to die -- I'm a little bit scared of what comes after"). What's more, he can't get the idea of Jesus' return out of his head: Jesus says that he'll come back subtly, and that true believers will know when it's happened. But what if the narrator's not good enough to know? What if he misses it, or worse, mistakes his Lord for an impostor and "crucifies" him all over again? These worries dominate the narrator's thoughts, and so, for all that his religion claims to offer him grace, it's only clouding his mind with pain and fear.
That is a clever song, as it is the fear of many people.
We, on this earth cannot be perfect yet, because of the many temptations we have here, not because we are not good enough, and it is not our fault that we are so distracted and tempted... and so God knew how difficult it would be, that is why he sent one who could do it for us.
As for his second coming, no one has to be perfect to feel him. He's coming as a thief in the night, means we do not know the day when he...
That is a clever song, as it is the fear of many people.
We, on this earth cannot be perfect yet, because of the many temptations we have here, not because we are not good enough, and it is not our fault that we are so distracted and tempted... and so God knew how difficult it would be, that is why he sent one who could do it for us.
As for his second coming, no one has to be perfect to feel him. He's coming as a thief in the night, means we do not know the day when he comes, but we will all see him and know who he is. That is why "every knee shall bow and tongue confess he is the Christ". We will all recognize him and see him in his spiritual glory. There will be so much love and light about him, that no one will miss him. We will all know who he is, even if we choose not to follow him.
When we will see and feel of his love and kindness and light, we will realize we have nothing to fear. We are the ones punishing ourselves and feeling guilty. Jesus and God always love us the same.
@ForSpareParts I have to disagree with a bit of what you said in the first paragraph. It's Because we deserved his love that He (Jesus) made that sacrifice. And once we (Christians) accept Jesus and are saved, those same mistakes that made us "scum" don't matter anymore bc it is in the past. I don't mean patronize. Thanks for being respectful of the religion.
But otherwise I also wanted to say that I completely agree with what you said about the song's meaning in the second paragraph. :)
@ForSpareParts I have to disagree with a bit of what you said in the first paragraph. It's Because we deserved his love that He (Jesus) made that sacrifice. And once we (Christians) accept Jesus and are saved, those same mistakes that made us "scum" don't matter anymore bc it is in the past. I don't mean patronize. Thanks for being respectful of the religion.
But otherwise I also wanted to say that I completely agree with what you said about the song's meaning in the second paragraph. :)
I always believed that this song was about someone struggling with the implications of human worthlessness at the core of Christianity, and trying to reconcile them with the idea that God loves human beings and has made a personal sacrifice to save them. Christianity, as I understand it, holds that all people are irredeemably sinful, and that they could never possibly get into heaven on their own -- but God sacrifices himself out of love on their behalf. If you really think about, it, though, that's kind of weird: the message is that, no matter how well you live your life, you're scum. You get God's love, but you could never deserve it.
So, you've got the narrator of the song: a profound believer who doesn't believe in himself. He's keenly aware of his religion's message about his sinful nature (for instance: "my bright is too slight to hold back all my dark") but also aware that God is, apparently, giving him a second chance. He's afraid of coming face-to-face with God and having to account for the fact that he's still a bad person ("I'm not scared to die -- I'm a little bit scared of what comes after"). What's more, he can't get the idea of Jesus' return out of his head: Jesus says that he'll come back subtly, and that true believers will know when it's happened. But what if the narrator's not good enough to know? What if he misses it, or worse, mistakes his Lord for an impostor and "crucifies" him all over again? These worries dominate the narrator's thoughts, and so, for all that his religion claims to offer him grace, it's only clouding his mind with pain and fear.
That is a clever song, as it is the fear of many people. We, on this earth cannot be perfect yet, because of the many temptations we have here, not because we are not good enough, and it is not our fault that we are so distracted and tempted... and so God knew how difficult it would be, that is why he sent one who could do it for us. As for his second coming, no one has to be perfect to feel him. He's coming as a thief in the night, means we do not know the day when he...
That is a clever song, as it is the fear of many people. We, on this earth cannot be perfect yet, because of the many temptations we have here, not because we are not good enough, and it is not our fault that we are so distracted and tempted... and so God knew how difficult it would be, that is why he sent one who could do it for us. As for his second coming, no one has to be perfect to feel him. He's coming as a thief in the night, means we do not know the day when he comes, but we will all see him and know who he is. That is why "every knee shall bow and tongue confess he is the Christ". We will all recognize him and see him in his spiritual glory. There will be so much love and light about him, that no one will miss him. We will all know who he is, even if we choose not to follow him. When we will see and feel of his love and kindness and light, we will realize we have nothing to fear. We are the ones punishing ourselves and feeling guilty. Jesus and God always love us the same.
@ForSpareParts I have to disagree with a bit of what you said in the first paragraph. It's Because we deserved his love that He (Jesus) made that sacrifice. And once we (Christians) accept Jesus and are saved, those same mistakes that made us "scum" don't matter anymore bc it is in the past. I don't mean patronize. Thanks for being respectful of the religion. But otherwise I also wanted to say that I completely agree with what you said about the song's meaning in the second paragraph. :)
@ForSpareParts I have to disagree with a bit of what you said in the first paragraph. It's Because we deserved his love that He (Jesus) made that sacrifice. And once we (Christians) accept Jesus and are saved, those same mistakes that made us "scum" don't matter anymore bc it is in the past. I don't mean patronize. Thanks for being respectful of the religion. But otherwise I also wanted to say that I completely agree with what you said about the song's meaning in the second paragraph. :)
@ForSpareParts excellent synopsis. You put in ways that I was feeling, but couldn't quite say. Very nice work my friend.
@ForSpareParts excellent synopsis. You put in ways that I was feeling, but couldn't quite say. Very nice work my friend.