Thursday, 29 January 2015

80. Rock Goes The Gospel - Mr Mister "Broken Wings"

"Broken Wings" is a song recorded by American pop rock band Mr. Mister. It was released in September 1985 as the lead single from their second album "Welcome to the Real World". The song peaked at number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in December 1985, where it remained for two weeks. It was released as the band was just about to embark on a U.S. tour opening for Tina Turner. The song peaked at number four in the United Kingdom, the highest chart position the group ever achieved in Britain.

This song was inspired by a book the lyricist John Lang read called Broken Wings, which was written by the Lebanese poet-philosopher Kahlil Gibran. The book is about picking up the pieces of your life and moving on. The line, "Take these broken wings and learn to fly" appears in The Beatles song "Blackbird." Paul McCartney and John Lennon both drew from the work of Kahlil Gibran, as the first 2 lines of The Beatles "Julia" came from Gibran's 1926 poem Sand And Foam: "Half of what I say is meaningless, but I say it just to reach you, Julia." The book The Broken Wings, which was written in 1912 is a story of a love that is doomed by oriental social convention.

Baby I don't understand
Why we can't just hold on
To each others hands
This time will be the last
I fear unless I make it all so clear
I need you so

Take these broken wings
And learn to fly again
And learn to live so free
And when we hear the voices sing
The book of love will open up
And let us in

Baby I think tonight
We can take what was wrong
And make it right
I need you so
Baby it's all I know
That you're half of the flesh
And blood makes me whole
I need you so


The song "Broken Wings" is about  learning to fly again after a relationship breakdown, or it could also be a serious circumstance that has happened in your life. The song is a restoration song, a song of hope in the face of hopelessness. "Learn to fly again and live so free" The person in the song is demonstrating immense hope, that things can be restored and become better. "We can take what was wrong and make it right" This song reminds me this morning of the passage in Isaiah 40 about the character of God, the power and majesty of God and the Hope that is instilled in people who "Wait for him" Trust in him.
Isaiah 40:28-31
Have you not known?Have you not heard?The Lord is the everlasting God,the Creator of the ends of the earth. He does not faint or grow weary; his understanding is unsearchable. 29 He gives power to the faint, and to him who has no might he increases strength. 30 Even youths shall faint and be weary, and young men shall fall exhausted; 31 but they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles; they shall run and not be weary; they shall walk and not faint.
Just like in the song of Hope by Mr Mister the passage in Isaiah refers to recovery of hope and strength. Those that wait on the Lord, or those that put their trust in him will "Mount up like eagles" Those who were weary will fly. In the New Testament there are many that could lay claim to that fact of being so weary and putting their whole trust in Jesus and being raised up. The blind, the lame, the outcast, the women, the ones that have been rejected and without hope. None more so than the story of the Samaritan woman in John 4. Where Jesus is weary and sits by a well at Sychar and a woman comes to draw water. she comes not at the allotted time to do so but at a time when no-one will be there. She encounters Jesus and that encounter changes her life. 
John 4: 6-30
6 Jesus said to her, “Go, call your husband, and come here.” 17 The woman answered him, “I have no husband.” Jesus said to her, “You are right in saying, ‘I have no husband’; 18 for you have had five husbands, and the one you now have is not your husband. What you have said is true.” 19 The woman said to him, “Sir, I perceive that you are a prophet. 20 Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you say that in Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” 21 Jesus said to her, “Woman, believe me,the hour is coming when neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. 22 You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. 23 But the hour is coming, and is now here, when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for the Father is seeking such people to worship him. 24 God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” 25 The woman said to him, “I know that Messiah is coming (he who is called Christ). When he comes, he will tell us all things.” 26 Jesus said to her, “I who speak to you am he.” 27 Just then his disciples came back. They marvelled that he was talking with a woman, but no one said, “What do you seek?” or, “Why are you talking with her?” 28 So the woman left her water jar and went away into town and said to the people, 29 “Come, see a man who told me all that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?” 30 They went out of the town and were coming to him.
She has "Broken Wings" and has been looking for love in all the wrong places. But now at the well she comes face to face with Jesus who later in the story she testifies to meeting and is the reason for her confidence and changed life. In the gospel of John she returns to the town and proclaims "Come, see a man" She has learned how to fly again after so much hopelessness.

She has discovered what many discover when they encounter Jesus - Life.  Jesus encounters many in the gospels who are in need of learning to fly again and he gives them strength, he heals them or raises them to life again. He is the restorer of Hope. Many find the prophesy of Isaiah true in their lives through the ministry of Jesus. The same is true of today.

The ministry of Jesus is still active in the world in which we live. By the Holy Spirit through the Church, Jesus continues to give Hope to the hopeless and Strength to the weary through the hands and feet of ordinary people. Today if you are in need to restoration, of renewed hope then I can think of no other in whom you might receive those things except Jesus.

Jesus can meet you a fresh in your present set of circumstances. It doesn't matter if you have been at this place before, The woman in the story had been looking for love and fulfilment in five husbands and did not find resolution till she encountered Jesus.

May God bless you today, may You have tons of hope, lift up those wings and fly. 


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