Trying to Make It Rhyme

This evening I was working on the chorus of a song I am writing and was struggling to make a particular rhyme work. I looked at it right-side-up, upside-down, sideways, diagonally… I just couldn’t find the right word. Suddenly, I remembered that I had decided NOT to make the chorus rhyme! I sighed with relief. I recalled how I usually have trouble writing things that don’t rhyme. But, in this situation, that wasn’t the case. Hmmm… This particular chorus was almost entirely Scripture… that’s it! I thought of another song with a chorus that didn’t rhyme and, again, the tool that allowed that was Scripture! When setting Scripture to music, the words dictate the music, rather than vice versa. In a song, I don’t want to change even the smallest word in a passage from God’s precious Word, if I don’t have to. This reminds me of our lives.

When we try to go through life on our own and try to control everything that happens in our lives, we feel much like we are trying to use a rhyme that won’t work. Try as we might, we can’t find the right words and, even if we think something rhymes, it’s only immediate gratification and we then find ourselves searching for something else. We try to hold ourselves together and navigate uncertain situations in ways that make us feel as comfortable as possible - and we have had plenty of opportunities for that in the last couple of years! But, in the end, we feel more uncertain than we did before because we are going our own way and depending on our limited human wisdom.

But when we turn to God’s Word, we discover something incredible. God's Word contains all the answers we could ever need. When we turn to it, we forget about our desire to make our lives ‘rhyme’ because Scripture has a flow and cadence that is all its own. Nothing else can do what these powerful words do when we apply them. It is so unlike anything else that only the Holy Spirit can allow someone to understand it. Rather than satisfying us for the moment, God’s Word meets our needs for security, comfort, value, and protection in ways that last beyond this life. Underneath our efforts to control our lives, our spirits are, in reality, crying out for the Living God. It isn’t until we allow our spirits to feed on His Living Word that we become who He intends us to be. Through His truth, God quiets our spirits’ cry and introduces us to the “…Author and Finisher of our faith, Who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God” (Hebrews 12:2, NKJV).

When we stop trying to fit our lives to a man-made rhyme scheme and, instead, let God and His Word move us in whichever directions He chooses, our spirits are at rest and we are better able to live for God’s glory. Sometimes, even after we decide to follow God’s truth, we find ourselves thinking: My life doesn’t rhyme; it doesn’t make sense. If it doesn’t make sense to me, it can’t make sense. But this confusion is what God uses to bring us closer to Himself in ways that are more profound than they first seem. Because we are confused, we seek the Lord’s wisdom more and more and, in turn, discover great spiritual treasures. Sometimes things that don’t rhyme are actually more beautiful for it:

Psalm 24 (NIV)

As the deer pants for streams of

water,

so my soul pants for You,

O God.

My soul thirsts for God, for the

living God.

When can I go and meet with

God?

My tears have been my food

day and night,

while men say to me all day long,

“Where is your God?”

These things I remember

as I pour out my soul:

how I used to go with the

multitude,

leading the procession to the

house of God,

with shouts of joy and

thanksgiving

among the festive throng.

Why are you downcast, O my soul?

Why so disturbed within me?

Put your hope in God,

for I will yet praise Him,

my Savior and my God.

My soul is downcast within me;

therefore I will remember You

from the land of the Jordan,

the heights of Hermon - from

Mount Mizar.

Deep calls to deep

in the roar of Your waterfalls;

All Your waves and breakers

have swept over me.

By day the Lord directs His love,

at night His song is with me -

a prayer to the God of my life.

I say to God my Rock,

“Why have You forgotten me?

Why must I go about mourning?

oppressed by the enemy?”

My bones suffer mortal agony

as my foes taunt me,

saying to me all day long,