Beauty in song lyrics

[just a musing...]

Recently I'm finding i want a massive brain so i can store all the song words in the world. Last blog i quoted Chrles Wesley, and I'm straining to learn all of `An Can it Be`.

Dave linked this song on the NYFC forum today and nearly moved me to tears. I've heard this song before as a couple of album versions but came alive with the above linked live version. Extract from lyrics:

Man versus himself.
Man versus machine.
Man versus the world. Mankind versus me.
The struggles go on, The wisdom I lack, The burdens keep pilling up on my back.
So hard to breathe, To take the next step.
The mountain is high, I wait in the depths.
Yearning for grace, And hoping for peace.
Dear God... Increase!`Every New Day` - Five Iron Frenzy

Perhaps it's a gift from God to be able to write a lyrics that can send a tingle down your spine, and convict you in a way that stops your life in its tracks if even for a second.

I look beyond the empty cross
forgetting what my life has cost
and wipe away the crimson stains
and dull the nails that still remain
More and more I need you now,I owe you more each passing hour
the battle between grace and pride
I gave up not so long ago
So steal my heart and take the pain
and wash the feet and cleanse my pride
take the selfish, take the weak,and all the things I cannot hide take the beauty, take my tears the sin-soaked heart and make it yours
take my world all aparttake it now, take it now and serve the ones that I despise
speak the words I can't deny watch the world I used to love fall to dust and thrown away...`World's Apart` - Jars of Clay

Although these are only words - they're more than that. (IMO), they're more powerful than the properganda of Nazi Germany or of American Black Oppression and more beautiful than Shakespeare. not because of the words used, but because of the way God blesses them to convict, inspire, teach and reveal us...