The Current Soundtrack

I haven't been very tolerant of music lately. So much of the stuff I normally listen to has been grating on my nerves, adding edgyness and discomfort to the rest of the upheaval in my life just presently.

There are, however, two albums that I've been listening to over and over.

The first is a new release from Jason Upton titled “Beautiful People”. I love Jason’s heart for God, and I love the theme of this album. Some of it is stuff that I’ve felt God speaking to me over the last year, and I’m delighted to find someone else expressing the theme of finding Jesus in the broken, in the ashes. One line that sticks out to me from the album (which is at home, while I’m writing this at work, or I’d tell you what song it was from…) goes “You live in the tension, you live in the tension, you live in the tension of creation.” I love that. I’m experiencing on a number of levels again lately what it means to live in tension.

The second album is “The Cathedral” by Jacob and Lily. I think I could listen to Karla and Caleb sing and play pretty much all day. In fact, I know I could, because, on one particularly bleak day earlier this week, where the clouds of mental confusion had closed in and were threatening to overwhelm, I simply played their album over and over on my ipod, through the whole workday. And my soul felt soothed. I don’t know if I can even pick a favorite song off this album. I just know that Karla’s lyrics, and the music that brings them to life have been speaking to the deep parts of my soul lately, and that has been such a surprising, beautiful and calming thing in this space on my journey.