Bleed and Speak
And we will never know, who they could be
It could have been you, could have been me
Your sister, your brother, the next hero to save the day
Now we will never know
Never know who they could be
---
She was only Seventeen
And the t.v. told her how easy it would be
Just see the Doc and pay the Cost
Never said how much would be forever lost
Looking at the slide, under the belly's arch, in kindergarten yards
These little ghosts are free but never run too far
Chorus:
Blood is crying out to God you see
Its Covering the Pain and the Fear and the Greed
From the floor in surgery it seeps
It covers her and the boy who ran away
It covers the Doctor and the congressman he pays
As we stand here silent it covers you and me
We don’t bleed but we should speak
Or we will never know, who they could be
----
We all bleed, but about it we won't speak
And we will never heal, while supermen we pretend to be
I could have loved you, you could have loved me
Your sisters, your brothers, the ones you chased away
Now we will never know
Never know who they could be
-
He was only Thirty-Three
And He never pretended it was an easy Truth to Preach
He Just saw the Debt and Paid the Cost
Never willing to just let wander, those who were forever lost
In their Pride, and in their Pain, underneath their scars
These prison doors are open, but we never run too far
Chorus:
Blood is crying out to God you see
Its Covering the Pain and the Fear and the Greed
From the streets of Jerusalem it seeps
It covers her and the boy who ran away
It covers the Doctor and the congressman he pays
As we stand here silent it covers you and me
We don’t bleed but we should speak
Or we will never know, who they could be
“10 Hear the word of the LORD,
you rulers of Sodom!
Give ear to the teaching[b] of our God,
you people of Gomorrah!
11 “What to me is the multitude of your sacrifices?
says the LORD;
I have had enough of burnt offerings of rams
and the fat of well-fed beasts;
I do not delight in the blood of bulls,
or of lambs, or of goats.
12 “When you come to appear before me,
who has required of you
this trampling of my courts?
13 Bring no more vain offerings;
incense is an abomination to me.
New moon and Sabbath and the calling of convocations—
I cannot endure iniquity and solemn assembly.
14 Your new moons and your appointed feasts
my soul hates;
they have become a burden to me;
I am weary of bearing them.
15 When you spread out your hands,
I will hide my eyes from you;
even though you make many prayers,
I will not listen;
your hands are full of blood.
16 Wash yourselves; make yourselves clean;
remove the evil of your deeds from before my eyes;
cease to do evil,
17 learn to do good;
seek justice,
correct oppression;
bring justice to the fatherless,
plead the widow's cause.” Isaiah 1:10
Bleed and Speak is a song about selective Justice. Humanity is often fickle in its passion and selective in its concerns. We are more concerned about baby eagles than baby humans, more about the “right” of adults to choose the preservation of the lifestyle than the right of children to live and the preservation of their “pursuit of happiness.” We are more concerned about brand name athletic shoes than we are children in sweat shops, more concerned with cheap gas in Texas than we are with Christians put to the guillotine in Saudi Arabia, and more concerned with our children’s “Education” than we are with their Choices and their Character. Our convenience and our comfort make us blind to our sins and to whatever darkness is required to feed our lifestyles, so those who feed our beast get pardons and those who get fed to the modern machine are hidden and forgotten. As long as the fatherless, the widow the foreigner and the poor are trampled underfoot by someone else on our behalf, that somehow makes us innocent because no blood is on the soles of our own shoes.
“The hour is out of joint, Black sun has risen. And the river of words, Is flowing on through the cages of tradition. And they're handing out emptiness we'll take it 'cause it's given.
Free with this plastic innocence. And these standards of living. Lies that bring ruin and disease, into wounds like these, let’s let the truth sting.” David Gray
How do we call for the Thunder to come down against those who do not share our sins, and plead for mercy for those with a darkness that is familiar to us? This is illustrated in the Scripture in the story of Sodom and Gomorrah, while the Church focuses on one sin of Sodom which is definitely against the Creator’s Design and therefore against His Will and against His Life because it is a counterfeit for that which gives life, there is for the forgotten “Sin of Sodom” which was abusing the poor, economic oppression like we have allowed, and all that we allow makes us guilty as well. We all proclaim a heart like Abraham but our lifestyle and our choices and what gets our wrath and our attention reveal the compromised heart of Lot and the salty face of his comfortable wife.
“So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin.” James 4:17
Sin is Breaking the Universal Instructions the Creator has given us. The Instructions that give Life and Shalom to His Creation, and to break His Law is to rob ourselves or others (who are both His Creation) of both Life and Shalom. The Tree of Knowledge was deciding for ourselves what is Good and Evil, or what is Right and Wrong, deciding for ourselves when we are Righteous and when we are Wicked which has been the fodder that feeds the Darkness in the World.
“Everyone who makes a practice of sinning also practices lawlessness; sin is lawlessness.” 1st John 3:4
The people of Sodom had character flaws like all of us, we have chosen to feed our addictions (to drugs, or to television, to sports, to social media, to climbing the corporate ladder) instead of feeding our children the love and attention and instruction they need. We feed our pleasure instead of our principles and often even our video game consoles over our commitments, but those are matters of Character and choices not of Justice. Matters of Justice is when oppression has taken place, when choices and rights and dignity have been taken away for the selfish advantage of others, through brute strength or through evil cunning. The Scriptures remind that Johnny Cash the country singer wrote about the Silent Sin of Sodom that never gets addressed from our pulpits, because it’s a familiar darkness, the deep, deep well of everyday apathy. My grandmother, who worked at Sun Studios when Elvis and Johnny Cash played there, would often say as I walked into the house after school “well here comes the man in black”, at the time I was a little annoyed thinking she was just making fun of fashion choices which she probably was. A year ago though I heard the song she was referencing and would consider that an honor today.
“The Man in Black” by Johnny Cash
Well, you wonder why I always dress in black
Why you never see bright colors on my back
And why does my appearance seem to have a somber tone
Well, there's a reason for the things that I have on
I wear the black for the poor and the beaten down
Livin' in the hopeless, hungry side of town
I wear it for the prisoner who is long paid for his crime
But is there because he's a victim of the times
I wear the black for those who've never read
Or listened to the words that Jesus said
About the road to happiness through love and charity
Why, you'd think He's talking straight to you and me
Well, we're doin' mighty fine, I do suppose
In our streak of lightnin' cars and fancy clothes
But just so we're reminded of the ones who are held back
Up front there ought to be a Man In Black
I wear it for the sick and lonely old
For the reckless ones whose bad trip left them cold
I wear the black in mournin' for the lives that could have been
Each week we lose a hundred fine young men
And I wear it for the thousands who have died
Believin' that the Lord was on their side
I wear it for another hundred thousand who have died
Believin' that we all were on their side
Well, there's things that never will be right I know
And things need changin' everywhere you go
But 'til we start to make a move to make a few things right
You'll never see me wear a suit of white
Ah, I'd love to wear a rainbow every day
And tell the world that everything's okay
But I'll try to carry off a little darkness on my back
Till things are brighter, I'm the Man In Black
“He has told you, O man, what is good; and what does the LORD require of you but to do justice, and to love kindness, and to walk humbly with your God?” Micah 6:8
Injustice by its very definition oppresses those who are Just, and the more the Light recedes the faster the Darkness gains territory, either through the Righteous being removed from the Earth or from the Righteous losing their influence in the Earth. We have allowed over 40 million mothers to murder their babies in the Secret Place (in the womb), how many of them would have been righteous adults who fought for the fatherless, the orphan, the widow and the foreigner? How many of the 5 Million Jews we have allowed to be murdered in the Holocaust would have given us cures for cancer like Dr. Gerson is said to have done? How many fatherless boys could have been Firemen or Soldiers or Police Officers or Boys and Girls Club Directors if they had a father figure to guide them that wasn’t wearing a bandanna after the original ran off to chase a dollar? How many fatherless girls could have been Nurses or Teachers or Social Workers of Founders of Charities if they weren’t pregnant by a stranger’s child when they are 15 years old because their mother modelled the swinging door to the bedroom for her? What have we robbed the world and our generation of? What servants have we stolen or seduced away from the Kingdom of God and from the role He had designed them for?
“Your princes are rebels and companions of thieves. Everyone loves a bribe and runs after gifts. They do not bring justice to the fatherless, and the widow's cause does not come to them.” Isaiah 1:23
Injustice is to rob the world of Light and to allow for Injustice robs us of any right to complain about the darkness or to blame it on the Creator. We are called to be a Kingdom of Priests upon the Earth, and the Priest was called to also be a Judge and Judges worked on behalf of a King to bring Justice to that King’s Kingdom. We are commanded to act Justly and also to love Mercy, to show no partiality and to hate corruption, but we only want justice for everyone else and mercy for ourselves. Rather than remove the evil from our hearts, we agree that we will see no evil in the hearts of other in they turn a blind eye to the evil in ours, and the world slowly goes blind.
“My brothers,[a] show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. 2 For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, 3 and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, “You sit here in a good place,” while you say to the poor man, “You stand over there,” or, “Sit down at my feet,” 4 have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts?: James (Jacob) 2:1
Bleed and Speak is also inspired by some things I saw growing up. In the town I was growing up in there were these little girls in our town whose last name was King, all of them under the age of six when I was in Elementary School. Everyone could see they were skinny as rails, that they walked to school without coats in the Winter, and everyone whispered that they were probably being molested in more ways than one. Everyone knew but no one could or would or knew how to do anything. I was only in Elementary School myself but I burned with anger every time I saw their “father” getting his beer and cigarettes at the local gas station, and when their mother marched five dirty and hungry little girls into a country café to feed her donkey-like face while they just sat there and watched her at with empty tummies. I wondered why the adults didn’t do anything, and I also wondered why I didn’t have the courage to confront their father who looked uncannily like a rat in red flannel, or their mother who looked like Meth Head Barbie.
Just as much as I hated their “parents”, I also hated myself for not doing anything about the situation. This became a recurring theme in many situations in my life, “Why” I didn’t do anything about so many situations that I saw. Sometimes it was because I wasn’t a police officer, or wasn’t a social worker, or wasn’t a congressman, or wasn’t a preacher, and sometimes simply because I wasn’t brave, or wasn’t strong, and unfortunately, sometimes I just wasn’t interested or decided it just wasn’t worth the hassle. Misguided or not, a lot of young people share this zeal to “just do something”, even if they don’t understand the issues or the causes or the culprits they want to “just do something about it” which led to the Communist Youth Revolution in China which brought Communism and the Hippie Movement which brought Fatherlessness and the Occupy Wall Street which brought Lawlessness and Black Lives Matter which brings Racism and Anarchy. Then we get older and we realize many times that we don’t understand the issues, or are confused as to the causes and there are so many strawmen targets that we have no idea who is really the “man behind the curtain” so our Zeal slowly flickers down to embers until its simply an economic boycott or a shared Facebook Meme or at best a strongly worded letter some congressman or CEO won’t bother to read.
I have also myself getting just too “busy”, busy building a ministry, ironically enough too busy in “Ministry” work to do something God directly commanded to be done, “Do Justice and Love Mercy”. Busy with my children, too busy to help children just like them, in situations I pray my children are never in, and if they are I pray that someone will not be too “busy” with their own children to take action on their behalf. Sometimes I have been too “Comfortable” even though “Comfortable” has rarely been an adjective that defines of life of the military, or paying the bills with barely above minimum wage jobs, or terrible marriages or life without parents and resources in general. Even with so little “comfort” to sacrifice, there are many people I could have helped but I just kept walking on. Addictions are also a reason for apathy, my own and everyone else’s. Addicted to fast food so I was too out of shape to go on that post Tsunami Trip to South East Asia to help dig wells, too addicted to porn at one point to leave the apartment to go help a neighbor, too addicted to a bad relationship to show up for a Bible Study I promised to show up for, too addicted to social anxiety for me to help a pastor I know make connections in Nashville because I would have to interact with room full of near strangers to introduce him to everyone, too addicted to me and my wants and my fears and my comfort and my own self-destruction to show up for my sacred duty as a Kingdom of Priests upon the Earth (as Exodus 19:6 reminds us that we are).
The older I get, and I assume the older we get, the more reluctant we become in demanding Justice because we have our own pile of sins heaped up against us that could crush us if the Hand of God was not holding it back for either the sake of mercy or for a later time or for a tipping point when it all falls down on us. When we are young we see ourselves as innocent because we have only walked in our shoes and the shoes of very few others, but as the years pass we spend so many seasons in other people’s shoes, including the shoes we hated because we did not know the awful path that led to their wayward path. When I was in my teens I was so angry at my Dad for how he treated my mom and my brother (and me as well, but honestly mostly them because they loved him somehow and it hurt them worse) that the only time I prayed was when I was demanding that God strike him dead somehow. Instead of God taking my father from the Earth, He allowed my mom to be taken instead when I was 14, and let my father live until I was 20. In my heart this seemed to be more like the “gods” of the Greeks and Romans who do this sort of thing for humor than the God of the Hebrews that was known for Justice for the oppressed, and this led to a deep, deep questioning of the goodness and the character and of course of the Justice of the God of the Bible.
“The righteous man perishes, and no one lays it to heart; devout men are taken away, while no one understands.
For the righteous man is taken away from calamity; he enters into peace; they rest in their beds who walk in their uprightness.” Isaiah 57:1
Time and Grace would show however that my mom passing away was an act of Mercy for her as she avoided years of sickness and living with my Dad (as she knew that her leaving him through divorce would finally send him over the edge of self-destruction and she would live with a terrible guilt). She finally passed away, leaving against her will and in worry about her sons, but she missed the next 6 years of my father going completely off the deep end from pot and pills and alcohol to shooting up in the kitchen with Crips and Bikers with my 6th Grade little brother in the next room. Some of her most fervent prayers I believe were for me and my brother to be saved, and for my father to be saved as well (I think the thought of him in perdition really haunted her as best as I could tell). If she had lived I would have most likely lived forever in the town we grew up in, and if I didn’t fall into the deep abyss of addiction I would have fallen into a deep abyss of religion, and probably would have spent most of my days working in a factory or at a saw mill or maybe teaching Elementary School or becoming a Baptist Preacher or something comfortable and expected that would keep me walled up inside the comfort zone of her being near. This book would have certainly not been written, and chances are that I would have never joined the Air Force or went to college in Nashville or lived in Europe again or studied Martial Arts or Foreign Language and it is very, very unlikely that I would have sought out the 1st Century Faith of the Apostles instead of just towing the Denominational line of the Churches around me, and me giving up X-mas would have broken my poor mother’s heart as well.
My mother dying which I saw only injustice in pushed me over the edge of sanity for a while but it only when we lose our minds can we see the Mind of God, how He thinks and how He operates, because His Ways are not our ways and His superior means of acting seem like insanity to us. In other words, “God works in Mysterious ways” and most often we have to lose our minds enough to realize that our reasoning and our thinking and our logic are futile and our thoughts cannot be trusted, but His can because He is the only One truly in His right mind. Human beings are always living in various levels of crazy. Her dying pushed my little brother through the same Valley of Deep Darkness until he came out with a deeper understanding than most would that went down the paths he chose, and if the rumors are true, it pushed my Dad to get down on his knees in a small Baptist Church and a river of tears fell from the face of one of the biggest and roughest rednecks that most people in town had probably ever known, begging for forgiveness for years of a rebellious heart. While she prayed to live to see my brother and I graduate high school, have children, and these things common to a mother’s heart, her greater prayer was to see all of us in the Kingdom one day and I think her passing away was the only way that she could see her greater prayers answered through time and pain.
“You have kept count of my tossings; put my tears in your bottle. Are they not in your book?” Psalm 56:8
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