Month: May 2004

So, I’m in it for good now. Signed my officers covenant on Tueday…Saturday is the public commissioning. I knelt at the Mercy Seat for a good while…something deep inside me asking “what on earth are you doing?” but being drowned out by the voice of God just cherring me on that day.

I reflected on the time I gave my life to Christ. I reflected on how far God had brought me. I reflected on the time I knelt with Tracy as a 16 year old and committed ourselves to officership, and I reflected on kneeling on our wedding day. I just wanted to lie down on my face during that service. I felt so priveleged that God had called my to service in this way.

The covenant clearly did not mean to much to some of my fellow cadets and that saddened me a little. But, for me, I have a sense of completion, yet a sense of begining too.

What kind of officer will I be? What will God do?

My son, Benjamin, has recently been watching the movie Shrek on DVD. We are now all very familiar with it, we can all say the words and know whats coming next (not to mention have a giggle because we know a funny bit is coming up!). But really, there is one moment in the film, a song actually, that has been in my mind for the last little while as we have watched it. It has really spoken to me. Here it is: –

“I’ve heard there was a secret chord

That David played and it pleased the Lord

But you don’t really care for music do you?

It goes like this – the fourth, the fifth

The minor fall, the major lift

The baffled King composing Hallelujah

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah

Your faith was strong but you needed proof

You saw her bathing on the roof

Her beauty in the moonlight overthrew you

She tied you to a kitchen chair

She broke your throne, and she cut your hair

And from your lips she drew the hallelujah

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah

Maybe I’ve been here before

I know this room, I’ve walked this floor

I used to live alone before I knew you

I’ve seen your flag on the marble arch

Love is not a victory march

It’s a cold and it’s a broken hallelujah

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah

There was a time when you let me know

What’s real and going on below

But now you never show it to me, do you?

And remember when I moved in you

The Holy Dark was moving too

And every breath we drew was hallelujah

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah

Maybe there’s a God above

And all I ever learned from love

Was how to shoot at someone who outdrew you

And it’s not a cry you can hear at night

It’s not somebody who’s seen the light

It’s a cold and it’s a broken hallelujah

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah

Hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah, hallelujah”

Ok, maybe the theology isn’t that great, and maybe not Christian, but what really spoke to me was the concept of a broken hallelujah. The idea of King David strumming out his hallelujah in spite of his sin, in spite of the enemies of his kingdom and of his soul. It reminds me that to live the victorious Christian life, that on the days when you can’t fly a flag on the marble arch, we can offer our broken hallelujah…the victory in that lies in that we praise God through our situations as opposed to feeling neglected, rejected and forgotten by God. He is so faithul and I am so thankful and enriched by those times when I have cried that broken hallelujah, from a broken me to a faithful God. I think its called singing through the rain.

yours

Andrew