wordplay

UMH 623: Here, O My Lord, I See Thee

2010-06-06T21:12:00.007+08:00

Here, O my Lord, I see thee face to face;

here would I touch and handle things unseen;

here grasp with firmer hand eternal grace,

and all my weariness upon thee lean.

This is the hour of banquet and of song;

this is the heavenly table spread for me;

here let me feast, and feasting, still prolong

the hallowed hour of fellowship with thee.

Here would I feed upon the bread of God,

here drink with thee the royal wine of heaven;

here would I lay aside each earthly load,

here taste afresh the calm of sin forgiven.

Too soon we rise; the symbols disappear;

the feast, though not the love, is past and gone.

The bread and wine remove; but thou art here,

nearer than ever, still my shield and sun.

Feast after feast thus comes and passes by;

yet, passing, points to the glad feast above,

giving sweet foretaste of the festal joy,

the Lamb's great bridal feast of bliss and love.

UMH 465: Holy Spirit, Truth Divine

2010-06-05T22:03:00.004+08:00

Holy Spirit, Truth divine,

dawn upon this soul of mine;

Word of God and inward light,

wake my spirit, clear my sight.

Holy Spirit, Love divine,

glow within this heart of mine;

kindle every high desire;

perish self in thy pure fire.

Holy Spirit, Power divine,

fill and nerve this will of mine;

grant that I may strongly live,

bravely bear, and nobly strive.

Holy Spirit, Right divine,

King within my conscience reign;

be my Lord, and I shall be

firmly bound, forever free.

Chapter 18

2010-05-24T14:28:00.004+08:00

Or, rather—here I am. I am in Rome, and I am in trouble. The goons of Depression and Loneliness have barged into my life again, and I just took my last Wellbutrin three days ago. There are more pills in my bottom drawer but I don't want them. I want to be free of them forever. But I don't want Depression or Loneliness around, either, so I don't know what to do, and I'm spiralling in panic, like I always spiral when I don't know what to do.

- An excerpt taken from Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Chapter 17

2010-05-24T02:09:00.006+08:00

I'd stopped taking my medication only a few days earlier. It had just seemed crazy to be taking antidepressants in Italy. How could I be depressed here?

I'd never wanted to be on the medication in the first place. I'd fought taking it for so long, mainly because of a long list of personal objections (e.g: Americans are overmedicated; we don't know the long-term effects of this stuff yet on the human brain; it's a crime that even American children are on antidepressants these days; we are treating the symptoms and not the causes of a national mental health emergency…). Still, during the last few years of my life, there was no question that I was in grave trouble and that this trouble was not lifting quickly. As my marriage dissolved and my drama with David evolved, I'd come to have all the symptoms of a major depression—loss of sleep, appetite and libido, uncontrollable weeping, chronic backaches and stomachaches, alienation and despair, trouble concentrating on work, inability to even get upset that the Republicans had just stolen a presidential election…it went on and on.

When you're lost in those woods, it sometimes takes you a while to realise that you are lost. For the longest time, you can convince yourself that you've just wandered a few feet off the path, that you'll find your way back to the trailhead any moment now. Then night falls again and again, and you still have no idea where you are, and it's time to admit that you have bewildered yourself so far off the path that you don't even know from which direction the sun rises anymore.

I took on my depression like it was the fight of my life, which, of course, it was. I became a student of my own depressed experience, trying to unthread its causes. What was the root of all this despair? Was it psychological? (Mum and Dad's fault?) Was it just temporal, a "bad time" in my life? (When the divorce ends, will the depression end with it?) Was it genetic? (Melancholy, called by many names, has run through my family for generations, along with its sad bride, Alcoholism.) Was it cultural? (Is this just the fallout of a postfeminist American career girl trying to find balance in an increasingly stressful and alienating urban world?) Was it astrological? (Am I so sad because I'm a thin-skinned Cancer whose major signs are all ruled by unstable Gemini?) Was it artistic? (Don't creative people always suffer from depression because we're so supersensitive and special?) Was it evolutionary? (Do I carry in me the residual panic that comes after millenia of my species' attempting to survive a brutal world?) Was it karmic? (Are all these spasms of grief just the consequences of bad behaviour in previous lifetimes, the last obstacles before liberation?) Was it hormonal? Dietary? Philosophical? Seasonal? Environmental? Was I tapping into a universal yearning for God? Did I have a chemical inbalance? Or did I just need to get laid?

What a large number of factors constitute a single human being! How very many layers we operate on, and how very many influences we receive from our minds, our bodies, our histories, our families, our cities, our souls and our lunches! I came to feel that my depression was probably some ever-shifting assortment of all those factors, and probably also included some stuff I couldn't name or claim. So I faced the fight at every level. I bought all those embarrassingly titled self-help books (always being certain to wrap up the books in the latest issue of Hustler, so that strangers wouldn't know what I was really reading). I commenced to getting professional help with a therapist who was as kind as she was insightful. I prayed like a novice nun. I stopped eating meat (for a short time, anyway) after someone told me that I was "eating the fear of the animal at the moment of its death." Some spacey new age massage therapist told me I should wear orange-coloured panties, to rebalance my sexual chakras, and, brother—I actually did it. I drank enough of that damn Saint-John's-wort tea to cheer up a whole Russian gulag, to no noticeable effect. I exercised. I exposed myself to the uplifting arts and carefully protected myself from sad movies, books and songs (if anyone even mentioned the words Leonard and Cohen in the same sentence, I would have to leave the room).

I tried so hard to fight the endless sobbing. I remember asking myself one night, while I was curled up in the same old corner of my same old couch in tears yet again over the same old repetition of sorrowful thoughts, "Is there anything about this scene you can change, Liz?" And all I could think to do was stand up, while still sobbing, and try to balance on one foot in the middle of my living room. Just to prove that—while I couldn't stop the tears or change my dismal interior dialogue—I was not yet totally out of control: at least I could cry hysterically while balanced on one foot. Hey, it was a start.

I crossed the street to walk in the sunshine. I leaned on my support network, cherishing my family and cultivating my most enlightening friendships. And when those officious women's magazines kept telling me that my low self-esteem wasn't helping depression matters at all, I got myself a pretty haircut, bought some fancy makeup and a nice dress. (When a friend complimented my new look, all I could say, grimly, was, "Operation Self-Esteem—Day Fucking One.")

The last thing I tried, after about two years of fighting this sorrow, was medication. If I may impose my opinions here, I think it should always be the last thing you try. For me, the decision to go the route of "Vitamin P" happened after a night when I'd sat on the floor of my bedroom for many hours, trying very hard to talk myself out of cutting into my arm with a kitchen knife. I won the argument against the knife that night, but barely. I had some other good ideas around that time—about how jumping off a building or blowing my brains out with a gun might stop the suffering. But something about spending a night with a knife in my hand did it.

The next morning I called my friend Susan as the sun came up, begged her to help me. I don't think a woman in the whole history of my family had ever done that before, had ever sat down in the middle of the road like that and said, in the middle of her life, "I cannot walk another step further—somebody has to help me." It wouldn't have served those women to have stopped walking. Nobody would have, or could have, helped them. The only thing that would've happened was that they and their families would have starved. I couldn't stop thinking about those women.

And I will never forget Susan's face when she rushed into my apartment about an hour after my emergency phone call and saw me in a heap on the couch. The image of my pain mirrored back at me through her visible fear for my life is still one of the scariest memories for me out of all those scary years. I huddled in a ball while Susan made the phone calls and found me a psychiatrist who would give me a consultation that very day, to discuss the possibility of prescribing antidepressants. I listened to Susan's one-sided conversation with the doctor, listened to her say, "I'm afraid my friend is going to seriously hurt herself." I was afraid, too.

When I went to see the psychiatrist that afternoon, he asked me what had taken me so long to get help—as if I hadn't been trying to help myself already for so long. I told him my objections and reservations about antidepressants. I laid copies of the three books I'd already published on his desk, and I said, "I'm a writer. Please don't do anything to harm my brain." He said, "If you had a kidney disease, you wouldn't hesitate to take medication for it—why are you hesitating with this?" But, see, that only shows how ignorant he was about my family; a Gilbert might very well notmedicate a kidney disease, seeing that we're a family who regard any sickness as a sign of personal, ethical, moral failure.

He put me on a few different things—Xanax, Zoloft, Wellbutrin, Busperin—until we found the combination that didn't make me nauseated or turn my libido into a dim and distant memory. Quickly, in less than a week, I could feel an extra inch of daylight opening in my mind. Also, I could finally sleep. And this was the real gift, because when you cannot sleep, you cannot get yourself out of the ditch—there's not a chance. The pills gave me those recuperative night hours back, and also stopped my hands from shaking and released the vice grip around my chest and the panic alert button from inside my heart.

Still, I never relaxed into taking those drugs, though they helped immediately. It never mattered who told me these medications were a good idea and perfectly safe; I always felt conflicted about it. Those drugs were part of my bridge to the other side, there's no question about it, but I wanted to be off them as soon as possible. I'd started taking the medication in January of 2003. By May, I was already diminishing my dosage significantly. Those had been the toughest months, anyhow—the last months of the divorce, the last ragged months with David. Could I have endured that time without the drugs, if I'd just held out a little longer? Could I have survived myself, by myself? I don't know. That's the thing about a human life—there's no control group, no way to ever know how any of us would have turned out if any variables had been changed.

I do know these drugs made my misery feel less catastrophic. So I'm grateful for that. But I'm still deeply ambivalent about mood-altering medications. I'm awed by their power, but concerned by their prevalence. I think they need to be prescribed and used with much more restraint in this country, and never without the parallel treatment of psychological counselling. Medicating the symptom of any illness without exploring its root cause is just a classically hare-brained Western way to think that anyone could ever get truly better. Those pills might have saved my life, but they did so only in conjunction with about twenty other efforts I was making simultaneously during that same period to rescue myself, and I hope to never have to take such drugs again. Though one doctor did suggest that I might have to go on and off antidepressants many times in my life because of my "tendency toward melancholy." I hope to God he's wrong. I intend to do everything I can to prove him wrong, or at least to fight that melancholic tendency with every tool in the shed. Whether this makes me self-defeatingly stubborn, or self-preservingly stubborn, I cannot say.

But there I am.

- An excerpt taken from Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Chapter 16

2010-05-23T13:40:00.011+08:00

Depression and Loneliness track me down after about ten days in Italy. I am walking through the Villa Borghese one evening after a happy day spent in school, and the sun is setting gold over St Peter's Basilica. I am feeling contented in this romantic scene, even if I am all by myself, while everyone else in the park is either fondling a lover or playing with a laughing child. But I stop to lean against a balustrade and watch the sunset, and I get to thinking a little too much, and then my thinking turns to brooding, and that's when they catch up with me.

They come upon me all silent and menacing like Pinkerton Dectectives, and they flank me—Depression on my left, Loneliness on my right. They don't need to show me their badges. I know these guys very well. We've been playing a cat-and-mouse game for years now. Though I admit that I am surprised to meet them in this elegant Italian garden at dusk. This is no place they belong.

I say to them, "How did you find me here? Who told you I had come to Rome?"

Depression, always the wise guy, says, "What—you're not happy to see us?"

"Go away," I tell him.

Loneliness, the more sensitive cop, says, "I'm sorry, ma'am. But I might have to tail you the whole time you're travelling. It's my assignment."

"I'd really rather you didn't," I tell him, and he shrugs almost apologetically, but only moves closer.

Then they frisk me. They empty my pockets of any joy I had been carrying there. Depression even confiscates my identity; but he always does that. Then Loneliness starts interrogating me, which I dread because it always goes on for hours. He's polite but relentless, and he always trips me up eventually. He asks if I have any reason to be happy that I know of. He asks why I am all by myself tonight, yet again. He asks (though we've been through this line of questioning hundreds of times already) why I can't keep a relationship going, why I ruined my marriage, why I messed things up with David, why I messed things up with every man I've ever been with. He asks me where I was the night I turned thirty, and why things have gone so sour since then. He asks why I can't get my act together, and why I'm not at home living in a nice house and raising nice children like any respectable woman my age should be. He asks why, exactly, I think I deserve a vacation in Rome when I've made such a rubble of my life. He asks me why I think that running away to Italy like a college kid will make me happy. He asks where I think I'll end up in my old age, if I keep living this way.

I walk back home, hoping to shake them, but they keep following me, these two goons. Depression has a firm hand on my shoulder and Loneliness harangues me with his interrogation. I don't even bother eating dinner; I don't want them watching me. I don't want to let them up the stairs to my apartment, either, but I know Depression, and he's got a billy club, so there's no stopping him from coming in if he decides that he wants to.

"It's not fair for you to come here," I tell Depression. "I paid you off already. I served my time back in New York."

But he just gives me that dark smile, settles into my favourite chair, puts his feet on my table and lights a cigar, filling the place with his awful smoke. Loneliness watches and sighs, then climbs into my bed and pulls the covers over himself, fully dressed, shoes and all. He's going to make me sleep with him again tonight, I just know it.

- An excerpt taken from Eat, Pray, Love by Elizabeth Gilbert

Eleanor Rigby by The Beatles

2010-02-07T09:55:00.006+08:00

Ah, look at all the lonely people

Ah, look at all the lonely people

Eleanor Rigby picks up the rice in the church where a wedding has been

Lives in a dream

Waits at the window, wearing the face that she keeps in a jar by the door

Who is it for?

All the lonely people

Where do they all come from?

All the lonely people

Where do they all belong?

Father McKenzie writing the words of a sermon that no one will hear

No one comes near

Look at him working, darning his socks in the night when there's nobody there

What does he care?

All the lonely people

Where do they all come from?

All the lonely people

Where do they all belong?

Ah, look at all the lonely people

Eleanor Rigby died in the church and was buried along with her name

Nobody came

Father McKenzie wiping the dirt from his hands as he walks from the grave

No one was saved

All the lonely people (Ah, look at all the lonely people)

Where do they all come from?

All the lonely people (Ah, look at all the lonely people)

Where do they all belong?

Set The Fire To The Third Bar by Snow Patrol featuring Martha Wainwright

2010-02-04T07:19:00.010+08:00

I find the map and draw a straight line

Over rivers, farms, and state lines

The distance from A to where you'd be

It's only finger lengths that I see

I touch the place where I'd find your face

My finger's in creases of distant dark places

I hang my coat up in the first bar

There is no peace that I've found so far

The laughter penetrates my silence

As drunken men fight flaws in science

The words mostly noises, ghosts with just voices

Your words in my memory are like music to me

And miles from where you are

I lay down on the cold ground and I,

I pray that something picks me up and

Sets me down in your warm arms

After I have travelled so far

We'd set the fire to the third bar

We'd share each other like an island

Until exhausted close our eyelids

And dreaming pick up from the last place we left off

Your soft skin is weeping a joy you can't keep in

And miles from where you are

I lay down on the cold ground and I,

I pray that something picks me up and

Sets me down in your warm arms

And miles from where you are

I lay down on the cold ground and I,

I pray that something picks me up and

Sets me down in your warm arms

Fields Of Gold by Sting

2009-11-25T01:02:00.020+08:00

You'll remember me when the west wind moves
Upon the fields of barley
You'll forget the sun in his jealous sky
As we walk in fields of gold

So she took her love for to gaze awhile
Upon the fields of barley
In his arms she fell as her hair came down
Among the fields of gold

Will you stay with me, will you be my love
Among the fields of barley
We'll forget the sun in his jealous sky
As we lie in fields of gold

See the west wind move like a lover so
Upon the fields of barley
Feel her body rise when you kiss her mouth
Among the fields of gold

I never made promises lightly
And there have been some that I've broken
But I swear in the days still left
We'll walk in fields of gold
We'll walk in fields of gold

Many years have passed since those summer days
Among the fields of barley
See the children run as the sun goes down
Among the fields of gold

You'll remember me when the west wind moves
Upon the fields of barley
You can tell the sun in his jealous sky
When we walked in fields of gold
When we walked in fields of gold
When we walked in fields of gold

Russian Roulette by Rihanna

2009-11-24T07:24:00.007+08:00

Take a breath, take it deep

Calm yourself, he says to me

If you play, you play for keeps
Take the gun, and count to three
I’m sweating now, moving slow
No time to think, my turn to go

And you can see my heart beating
You can see it through my chest
That I’m terrified but I’m not leaving
I know that I must pass this test
So just pull the trigger

Say a prayer to yourself
He says close your eyes, sometimes it helps
And then I get a scary thought
That he’s here means he’s never lost

And you can see my heart beating
You can see it through my chest
That I'm terrified but I'm not leaving
Know that I must pass this test
So just pull the trigger

As my life flashes before my eyes
I’m wondering will I ever see another sunrise
So many won’t get the chance to say goodbye
But it’s too late to think of the value of my life

And you can see my heart beating
You can see it through my chest
That I'm terrified but I'm not leaving
Know that I must pass this test

You can see my heart beating
You can see it through my chest
That I'm terrified but I'm not leaving
Know that I must pass this test
So just pull the trigger

I Will Follow You Into the Dark by Death Cab for Cutie

2009-10-02T07:05:00.019+08:00

Love of mine, someday you will die

But I'll be close behind

I'll follow you into the dark

No blinding lights or tunnels to gates of white

Just our hands clasped so tight

Waiting for the hint of a spark

If Heaven and Hell decide that they both are satisfied

Illuminate the 'NO's on their vacancy signs

If there's no one beside you when your soul embarks

Then I'll follow you into the dark

In Catholic school as vicious as Roman rule

I got my knuckles bruised by a lady in black

And I held my tongue as she told me, "Son, fear is the heart of love."

So I never went back

If Heaven and Hell decide that they both are satisfied

Illuminate the 'NO's on their vacancy signs

If there's no one beside you when your soul embarks

Then I'll follow you into the dark

You and me have seen everything to see

From Bangkok to Calgary

And the soles of your shoes are all worn down

The time for sleep is now

But it's nothing to cry about

'Cause we'll hold each other soon

In the blackest of rooms

If Heaven and Hell decide that they both are satisfied

Illuminate the 'NO's on their vacancy signs

If there's no one beside you when your soul embarks

Then I'll follow you into the dark

Impossible Is Nothing

2009-09-04T12:48:00.026+08:00

Impossible is just a big word thrown around by small men who find it easier to live in the world they've been given than to explore the power they have to change it. Impossible is not a fact. It's an opinion. Impossible is not a declaration. It's a dare. Impossible is potential. Impossible is temporary.

IMPOSSIBLE IS NOTHING

Desert Song by Hillsong

2009-05-23T14:27:00.062+08:00

This is my prayer in the desert

When all that's within me feels dry

This is my prayer in my hunger and need

My God is the God who provides

This is my prayer in the fire
In weakness or trial or pain

There is a faith proved of more worth than gold

So refine me Lord through the flame

I will bring praise

I will bring praise

No weapon formed against me shall remain

I will rejoice

I will declare

God is my victory and He is here

This is my prayer in the battle

When triumph is still on its way

I am a conqueror and co-heir with Christ

So firm on His promise I'll stand

I will bring praise

I will bring praise

No weapon formed against me shall remain

I will rejoice

I will declare

God is my victory and He is here

All of my life

In every season

You are still God

I have a reason to sing

I have a reason to worship

All of my life

In every season

You are still God

I have a reason to sing

I have a reason to worship

All of my life

In every season

You are still God

I have a reason to sing

I have a reason to worship

All of my life
In every season

You are still God

I have a reason to sing
I have a reason to worship

I will bring praise

I will bring praise

No weapon formed against me shall remain

I will rejoice

I will declare

God is my victory and He is here

This is my prayer in the harvest

When favour and providence flow

I know I'm filled to be emptied again
The seed I've received I will sow

Stronger by Hillsong

2009-02-14T23:43:00.014+08:00

There is Love
That came for us
Humbled to
A sinner's cross
You broke my shame
And sinfulness
You rose again victorious

Faithfulness
None can deny
Through the storm
And through the fire
There is truth
That sets me free
Jesus Christ who lives in me

You are stronger
You are stronger
Sin is broken
You have saved me
It is written
Christ is risen
Jesus You are Lord of all

No beginning
And no end
You're my hope and my defence
You came to seek
And save the lost
You paid it all
Upon the cross

You are stronger
You are stronger
Sin is broken
You have saved me
It is written
Christ is risen
Jesus You are Lord of all

So let Your name
Be lifted higher
Be lifted higher
Be lifted higher

So let Your name
Be lifted higher
Be lifted higher
Be lifted higher

So let Your name
Be lifted higher
Be lifted higher
Be lifted higher

So let Your name
Be lifted higher
Be lifted higher
Be lifted higher

You are stronger
You are stronger
Sin is broken
You have saved me
It is written
Christ is risen
Jesus You are Lord of all

You are stronger
You are stronger
Sin is broken
You have saved me
It is written
Christ is risen
Jesus You are Lord of all

Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith by Matthew Stover

2009-01-24T12:57:00.150+08:00

This story happened a long time ago in a galaxy far, far away. It is already over. Nothing can be done to change it.
It is a story of love and loss, brotherhood and betrayal, courage and sacrifice and the death of dreams. It is a story of the blurred line between our best and our worst.
It is the story of the end of an age.
A strange thing about stories—
Though this all happened so long ago and so far away that words cannot describe the time or the distance, it is also happening right now. Right here.
It is happening as you read these words.
This is how twenty-five millennia come to a close. Corruption and treachery have crushed a thousand years of peace. This is not just the end of a republic; night is falling on civilisation itself.
This is the twilight of the Jedi.
The end starts now.

The dark is generous.
Its first gift is concealment: our true faces lie in the dark beneath our skins, our true hearts remain shadowed deeper still. But the greatest concealment lies not in protecting our secret truths, but in hiding from us the truths of others.
The dark protects us from what we dare not know.
Its second gift is comforting illusion: the ease of gentle dreams in night’s embrace, the beauty that imagination brings to what would repel in day’s harsh light. But the greatest of its comforts is the illusion that the dark is temporary: that every night brings a new day. Because it is day that is temporary.
Day is the illusion.
Its third gift is the light itself: as days are defined by the nights that divide them, as stars are defined by the infinite black through which they wheel, the dark embraces the light, and brings it forth from the center of its own self.
With each victory of the light, it is the dark that wins.

The dark is generous, and it is patient.
It is the dark that seeds cruelty into justice, that drips contempt into compassion, that poisons love with grains of doubt.
The dark can be patient, because the slightest drop of rain will cause those seeds to sprout.
The rain will come, and the seeds will sprout, for the dark is the soil in which they grow, and it is the clouds above them, and it waits behind the star that gives them light.
The dark’s patience is infinite.
Eventually, even stars burn out.

The dark is generous, and it is patient, and it always wins.
It always wins because it is everywhere.
It is in the wood that burns in your hearth, and in the kettle on the fire; it is under your chair and under your table and under the sheets on your bed. Walk in the mid-day sun and the dark is with you, attached to the soles of your feet.
The brightest light casts the darkest shadow.

The dark is generous, and it is patient, and it always wins—but in the heart of its strength lies weakness: one lone candle is enough to hold it back.

Love is more than a candle.
Love can ignite the stars.

- Adapted from Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith by Matthew Stover, based on the story and screenplay by George Lucas

Waiting On The World To Change by John Mayer

2009-01-09T18:47:00.014+08:00

Me and all my friends

We're all misunderstood

They say we stand for nothing and

There's no way we ever could

Now we see everything is going wrong

With the world and those who lead it

We just feel like we don't have the means

To rise above and beat it

So we keep waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

We keep on waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

It's hard to beat the system

When we're standing at a distance

So we keep waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

Now if we had the power

To bring our neighbors home from war

They would've never missed a Christmas

No more ribbons on their door

When you trust your television

What you get is what you got

Cause when they own the information, oh

They can bend it all they want

So while we're waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

We keep on waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

It's not that we don't care

We just know that the fight ain't fair

So we keep on waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

We're still waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

We keep on waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

One day our generation

Is gonna rule the population

So we keep on waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

No we keep on waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

We keep on waiting, waiting

Waiting on the world to change

The Time Has Come by Hillsong United

2008-08-24T13:07:00.032+08:00

Found love beyond all reason
You gave Your life Your all for me
And called me Yours forever
Caught in the mercy fallout
I found hope found life found all I need
You're all I need

The time has come
To stand for all we believe in
So I for one am gonna give my praise to You

Today today it's all or nothing
All the way
The praise goes out to You
Yeah all the praise goes out to You
Today today I live for one thing
To give You praise in everything I do
Yeah all the praise goes out to You

Found love beyond all reason
You gave Your life Your all for me
And called me Yours forever
Caught in the mercy fallout
I found hope found life found all I need
You're all I need

The time has come
To stand for all we believe in
So I for one am gonna give my praise to You

All we are is Yours
And all we're living for
Is all You are
Is all that You are Lord

The time has come
To stand for all we believe in
So I for one am gonna give my praise to You

Today today it's all or nothing
All the way
The praise goes out to You
Yeah all the praise goes out to You
Today today I live for one thing
To give You praise
In everything I do
Yeah all the praise goes out to You

In everything I do
Yeah all the praise goes out to You

Any Other World by Mika

2008-08-22T21:22:00.012+08:00

In any other world

You could tell the difference

And let it all unfurl

Into broken remnants

Smile like you mean it

And let yourself let go

Cause it's all in the hands of a bitter bitter man

Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in

Take a bow, play the part of a lonely lonely heart

Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in

To the world you thought you lived in

I tried to live alone

But lonely is so lonely, alone

So human as I am

I had to give up my defences

So I smiled and tried to mean it

To let myself let go

Cause it's all in the hands of a bitter bitter man

Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in

Take a bow, play the part of a lonely lonely heart

Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in

To the world you thought you lived in

Cause it's all in the hands of a bitter bitter man

Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in

Take a bow, play the part of a lonely lonely heart

Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in

To the world you thought you lived in

Say goodbye to the world you thought you lived in

Say goodbye

In any other world

You could tell the difference

I never ever, I forget my story

My face is not sad, but sometimes, I am sad

Devotion by Hillsong United

2008-08-03T21:05:00.011+08:00

I've been running, trying to be one who sees

I've been working, salvation out on my knees

There is nothing better than knowing that we are redeemed

I'm believing, trusting in creative hands

I am praying for our world to bow to Your plan

And this one thought is unmistakable

I take up my cross and follow You Lord

When You stand the tall trees and mountains bow

When You speak the fiercest of oceans is still

And I see the sinner seek devotion

The lost become chosen

And I fall to my knees

I'm forgiven by a Saviour who did not deserve death

He was blameless and I was lost in shamefulness

I'm delivered but it doesn't seem right

Unless I keep my eyes focused on the Saviour who gave His life

In the middle of a world that denies it believes

It is breaking apart at the very seams

There is one thing to be alive for

And it's to take up my cross and follow You Lord

When You stand the tall trees and mountains bow

When You speak the fiercest of oceans is still

And I see the sinner seek devotion

The lost become chosen

And I fall to my knees

I will take up my cross and follow Lord where You lead me

I will take up my cross and follow wherever You go

And I will take up my cross and follow Lord where You lead me

I will take up my cross and follow wherever You go

When You stand the tall trees and mountains bow

When You speak the fiercest of oceans is still

And I see the sinner seek devotion

The lost become chosen

And I fall to my knees

When You stand the tall trees and mountains bow

When You speak the fiercest of oceans is still

And I see the sinner seek devotion

The lost become chosen

And I fall to my knees

I fall to my knees

Crazy by Simple Plan

2008-08-02T22:13:00.010+08:00

Tell me what's wrong with society

When everywhere I look I see

Young girls dying to be on TV

They won't stop 'til they've reached their dreams

Diet pills, surgery

Photoshop-ed pictures in magazines

Telling them how they should be

It doesn't make sense to me

Is everybody going crazy

Is anybody gonna save me

Can anybody tell me what's going on

Tell me what's going on

If you open your eyes

You'll see that something is wrong

I guess things are not how they used to be

There's no more normal families

Parents act like enemies

Making kids feel like it's World War III

No one cares, no one's there

I guess we're all just too damn busy

And money's our first priority

It doesn't make sense to me

Is everybody going crazy

Is anybody gonna save me

Can anybody tell me what's going on

Tell me what's going on

If you open your eyes

You'll see that something is wrong

Is everybody going crazy

Tell me what's wrong with society

When everywhere I look I see

Rich guys driving big SUVs

While kids are starving in the streets

No one cares

No one likes to share

I guess life's unfair

Is everybody going crazy

Is anybody gonna save me

Can anybody tell me what's going on

Tell me what's going on

If you open your eyes

You'll see that something

Something is wrong

Is everybody going crazy

Can anybody tell me what's going on

Tell me what's going on

If you open your eyes

You'll see that something is wrong

Pick It Up by Planetshakers

2008-07-14T00:22:00.015+08:00

I was lost

Now I'm found

Put my feet on solid ground

Now I sing 'cause I am free

So I'm laying down my life

And I'm taking up my cross

I'm taking up my cross

Laying down my life

All for the glory of Your name

I'm living my whole life

All for You, Jesus

Taking up my cross everyday

I was blind

Now I see

Love has got a hold on me

Now I sing cause I am free

So I'm laying down my life

And I'm taking up my cross

I'm taking up my cross

Laying down my life

All for the glory of Your name

I'm living my whole life

All for You, Jesus

Taking up my cross everyday

I'm taking up my cross
Laying down my life
All for the glory of Your name
I'm living my whole life
All for You, Jesus
Taking up my cross everyday

I choose to stand for my generation

I'm taking up my cross

Laying down my life

All for the glory of Your name

I'm living my whole life

All for You, Jesus

Taking up my cross everyday

I'm taking up my cross
I'm taking up my cross

I'm taking up my cross

High School Never Ends by Bowling for Soup

2008-07-09T21:37:00.013+08:00

Four years you think for sure

That's all you've got to endure

All the Total Dicks

All the Stuck-up Chicks

So superficial, so immature

And then when you graduate

You take a look around and you say "Hey, wait!"

This is the same as where I just came from

I thought it was over

Aw that's just great

The whole damn world is just as obsessed

With who's the best dressed and who's having sex

Who's got the money, who gets the Honeys

Who's kinda cute and who's just a mess

And you still don't have the right look

And you don't have the right friends

Nothing changes but the faces, the names, and the trends

High school never ends

Check out the popular kids

You'll never guess what Jessica did

And how did Mary Kate lose all that weight

And Katie had a baby so I guess Tom's straight

And the only thing that matters

Is climbing up that social ladder

Still care about your hair and the car you drive

Doesn't matter if you're sixteen or thirty-five

Reese Witherspoon, she's the Prom Queen

Bill Gates, Captain of the chess team

Jack Black, the clown

Brad Pitt, the quarterback

I've seen it all before

I want my money back

The whole damn world is just as obsessed

With who's the best dressed and who's having sex

Who's in the club and who's on the drugs

Who's throwing up before they digest

And you still don't have the right look

And you don't have the right friends

And you still listen to the same shit you did back then

High school never ends

The whole damn world is just as obsessed

With who's the best dressed and who's having sex

Who's got the money, who gets the Honeys

Who's kinda cute and who's just a mess

And I still don't have the right look

And I still have the same three friends

And I'm pretty much the same as I was back then

High school never ends

Here we go again

Gollum's Song

2008-07-07T21:42:00.021+08:00

Where once was light

Now darkness falls

Where once was love

Love is no more

Don't say goodbye

Don't say I didn't try

These tears we cry

Are falling rain

For all the lies you told us

The hurt, the blame

And we will weep

To be so alone

We are lost

We can never go home

So in the end

I'll be what I will be

No loyal friend

Was ever there for me

Now we say goodbye

We say you didn't try

These tears you cry

Have come too late

Take back the lies

The hurt, the blame

And you will weep

When you face the end alone

You are lost

You can never go home

Food For Thought

2008-07-07T17:37:00.035+08:00

"Yesterday is history, tomorrow is a mystery
But today is a gift; that's why it's called the PRESENT."

- From the movie Kung Fu Panda

Saviour King by Hillsong

2008-06-05T15:53:00.018+08:00

Let now the weak say I have strength

By the spirit of God that raised Christ from the dead

Let now the poor stand and confess

That my portion is Him and I'm more than blessed

Let now our hearts burn with a flame

A fire consuming all for Your Son's holy name

And with the heavens we declare

You are our King

We love You Lord

We worship You

You are our God

You alone are good

Let now Your church shine as the bride

That You soar in Your heart as You offered up Your life

Let now the lost be welcomed home

By the saved and redeemed those adopted as Your own

We love You Lord
We worship You
You are our God
You alone are good

You asked Your Son to carry this
The heavy cross
Our weight of sin

I love you Lord
I worship you
Hope which was lost
Now stands renewed
I give my life to honor this
The love of Christ
The Saviour King

Only One by Hillsong United

2008-06-02T23:47:00.019+08:00

I stand before You now my Saviour

Shouting Your praise

You've changed my world and made my heart sing

And everything I have

I lay it at Your feet

Everything is different now with You my God

You broke my chains of sin

You're always there to lift me when I fall

You never let me go

Lord I give You my all

Now that I've found You everything around me is changing

Nothing will be the same

Now that You've saved me

Cos I'll be the one to shout Your fame forever

And I'll be the one to sing Your praise my Saviour

You are the strength inside of me

You are the light that lets me see
My Only One