Freedom: Songs for the Way of Love+

Freedom: Songs for the Way of Love+
Lest We Forget -the 1980s to Now.

A Change is Gonna Come – Brian Owens/T Owens/Sam Cooke
Wake Up Everybody – John Legend, The Roots, ft. M Fiona
People Get Ready – Eva Cassidy
The Rising – Bruce Springsteen
Freedom – Pharrell Williams
Break Your Heart – Natalie Merchant
His Eye Is on the Sparrow – Gladys Knight / Isaac Hayes
Glory – John Legend and Common
Pride (In The Name Of Love) – U2
One – Mary J. Blige and Bono
Stand Up for Something feat. Common – Andra Day
You Don’t Own Me ft. G-Eazy – Grace
Girl – Maren Morris
Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around – A-Bomb ft. R Kelly
Run the World (Girls) – Beyoncé
Are We A Nation? – Sweet Honey in The Rock ft. Yonas
I Find it Hard to Say (Rebel) – Lauryn Hill
Architects – Rise Against
Talkin ‘bout a Revolution – Tracy Chapman
Fast Car – Tracy Chapman
Prayer Of The Refugee – Rise Against
Mystery of Iniquity – Lauryn Hill
From Heads Unworthy – Rise Against
Preach – John Legend
Where Is The Love? – The Black Eyed Peas
Jesus Walks – Kanye West
Union – Black Eyed Peas ft. Sting
The Calling – Cloud Cult
Dear God 2.0 ft. Monsters of Folk – The Roots
Prayer – Sweet Honey in the Rock
Come Ye – Sweet Honey in the Rock
His Eye Is On the Sparrow – BWilson & Miss. Children’s Choir

(31 songs: 2 hours and 11 minutes)

Freedom: Songs for the Way of Love+
Lest We Forget from the 1980s to now.

Some thoughts…

Where is the source of our true freedom? Our reading for these times is straight from Paul’s Letter to the Galatians, via The Message Bible and interpreted by the late great Rev. Eugene Peterson:

“Christ has set us free to live a free life. So take your stand! Never again let anyone put a harness of slavery on you.

It is absolutely clear that God has called you to a free life. Just make sure that you don’t use this freedom as an excuse to do whatever you want to do and destroy your freedom. Rather, use your freedom to serve one another in love; that’s how freedom grows.

For everything we know about God’s Word is summed up in a single sentence: Love others as you love yourself. That’s an act of true freedom.

If you bite and ravage each other, watch out – in no time at all you will be annihilating each other, and where will your precious freedom be then?

My counsel is this: Live freely, animated and motivated by God’s Spirit. Then you won’t feed the compulsions of selfishness.

For there is a root of sinful self-interest in us that is at odds with a free spirit, just as the free spirit is incompatible with selfishness. These two ways of life are antithetical so that you cannot live at times one way and at times another way according to how you feel on any given day.

Why don’t you choose to be led by the Spirit and so escape the erratic compulsions of a law-dominated existence?

It is obvious what kind of life develops out of trying to get your own way all the time: repetitive, loveless, cheap sex; a stinking accumulation of mental and emotional garbage; frenzied and joyless grabs for happiness;

…trinket gods; magic-show religion; paranoid loneliness; cutthroat competition; all-consuming-yet-never-satisfied wants; a brutal temper; an impotence to love or be loved; divided homes and divided lives; small-minded and lopsided pursuits;

…the vicious habit of depersonalizing everyone into a rival; uncontrolled and uncontrollable addictions; ugly parodies of community. I could go on. This isn’t the first time I have warned you, you know. If you use your freedom this way, you will not inherit God’s kingdom.

But what happens when we live God’s way? The Holy Spirit brings gifts into our lives, much the same way that fruit appears in an orchard – things like affection for others, exuberance about life, serenity. We develop a willingness to stick with things, a sense of compassion in the heart, and a conviction that a basic holiness permeates things and people. We find ourselves involved in loyal commitments,

… not needing to force our way in life, able to marshal and direct our energies wisely. Legalism is helpless in bringing this about; it only gets in the way.

Among those who belong to Christ, everything connected with getting our own way and mindlessly responding to what everyone else calls necessities is killed off for good – crucified.

Since this is the kind of life we have chosen, the life of the Spirit, let us make sure that we do not just hold it as an idea in our heads or a sentiment in our hearts, but work out its implications in every detail of our lives.”

That is true freedom, in Christ+

love+peace,
mjh

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