Something

When I was at the store the other day I heard a song I haven’t heard in a long, long time. James Taylor’s “Something In The Way She Moves.” For anyone who’s never heard it, it’s completely different from the Beatles’ song that sounds like it’s similar. The Beatles’ song is called “Something,” and starts out “Something in the way she moves, attracts me like no other lover,” and James Taylor’s song is “There’s something in the way she moves or looks my way or calls my name, that seems to leave this troubled world behind.” Both songs are old favorites of mine, songs that I always hoped someone would think of me when they heard them, but very different songs with very different sounds and sensibilities to them.

I don’t know why the Lord has me writing about those songs just now. Maybe it’s because they’re part of a long ago past, songs that I used to listen to and long to have someone think of me that way. But there’s also something else that He spoke to me when I heard the James Taylor song – something that has to do with the fact that I don’t look for someone else to help me leave the troubles of the world behind any more. It’s not that I don’t have my share of troubles – Jesus tells us that we will have trouble in this life. But He also tells us that He has overcome the world (John 16:33), and so when troubles come we can trust in Him to help bring us through them. As I walked around the store the other day, I listened to the lyrics of the song, and it’s still a beautiful song, but it doesn’t mean the same thing to me that it did once. When I looked up the Beatles' song as I started to write this, I realized that didn’t mean the same thing to me any more either. Things have changed – I’ve changed – and I didn’t even notice the whole time how much I was changing.

Sometimes when I talk to friends and family about the ways that the Lord has changed my life, they’ll say it’s because I’m getting older, I’m maturing, I’m growing up. And yes, there is a certain truth to that, but I know that it wasn’t on my own that I started to change in this way. If I’d been left to my own devices, I’d still be doing the same things I always did, only doing them as I got older and older and less and less able to cope with the messes I was making and that were being made around me. But somehow, over a very short period of time, I’ve been changed in ways that I can’t even tell you how they happened or even really what they are. It’s not to say that I don’t get upset at things, but now the things that upset me are upsetting for different reasons than they once were. I don’t just get angry and hurt because someone lied to me or about me, I get angry because of the waste of time and the injustice that their lies promote. I’m looking at things in a much more outward- centered way, rather than a self-centered one. Don’t get me wrong, I have my moments when I want it to be all about me, but I don’t live my life with myself at the center any more because I have a new focus, a God-centered focus, so when I’m tempted to have a pity party, I can look at Him and He reminds me that I don’t want to go to that party any more.

In James Taylor’s song, he talks about not caring what the words are that this woman says, “It isn’t what she’s got to say. Or how she thinks or where she’s been. To me the words are nice the way they sound.” At one time in my life I thought that was really sweet – just to be able to comfort and encourage someone by the sound of your voice – I wanted to be able to do that! But there’s something that I’ve learned that’s even more powerful, and now I don’t just want to soothe people with a sound of soothing, but I want to encourage and strengthen and empower people with words that have meaning, deep meaning, to them. It's not about what I and my words can do, it's about what God and His word can do.

It’s true that there are some people who have the presence of God so strong around and in them that they can make us feel better just by the sound of their voice and just by being there with us. The Spirit of God can work that way – sometimes silence in His presence is all we need. But there is a deeper speaking that happens, even in silence – the words without words, the communication of a loving touch, the laying on of hands in silent prayer. In the Beatles' song, “Something,” there is a lyric that says, “Something in the way she knows, and all I have to do is think of her.” I’ve had that experience before with someone who I love – that he just needed to think of me and I knew what he was thinking of. That kind of communication is beautiful in its simplicity – sometimes our words are too much for some moments.

James 1:19 tells us, “Everyone should be slow to speak, quick to listen, and slow to get angry,” and Proverbs is full of words against using too many words, things like, “A fool takes no pleasure in understanding, but only in expressing his opinion,” (Proverbs 18:2) and, “Do you see a man who is hasty in his words? There is more hope for a fool than for him.” (Proverbs 29:20) Ephesians 4:29 tells us, “Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear,” and 1 Thessalonians 2:3-4 says, “For our appeal does not spring from error or impunity, or any attempt to deceive, but just as we have been approved by God to be entrusted with the Gospel, so we speak, not to please man, but to please God who tests our hearts.”

To me that’s an astonishing thought – that we can speak without wishing to please others, and that we can choose to speak only to please God. When we speak with Him in our minds and our hearts, when we ask Him to help us to speak His words, we always end up speaking the right words at the right time, no matter what we thought we should be saying. I’ve heard Pastors say just as they were about to start a sermon that they had something prepared for that day but the Lord had told them they had to say something else. And when they brought that word, it was a powerful word. I’ve had times when the Lord has told me to say something to someone, something that I didn’t even really understand myself why I was saying it to them, but it’s been a word they needed to hear. And I’ve had times when someone has said something to me that they didn’t understand why they were saying it, but that word has been the difference between weakness and strength in my life, the difference between giving up and going on.

When I think of those two songs about a woman and the something about her that these men are singing about, I don’t see it any more the way I did once that it is her outward beauty, the sound of her voice, the way she walks, the way she wears her hair and clothes. I think about the Spirit that must be in that woman, and that’s what I want someone else to see in me. I truly want to have myself decrease so that the Lord can increase, so that when people look at me, they see Him. The Spirit of God is the only something that is worth anything to anyone – it is the only way to healing and light and life and joy and peace. It’s the something that is everything and more, and like the faith that is written about in Hebrews 11:1, it is the substance of things hoped for and not seen.

Blessings,

Jannie Susan