Work in progress

We sang a song this morning. 'He called me to his banqueting table, etc tra le la la le,' and there's a line in it 'You do all things well, just at our lives,' that I can never sing. I'm doing fine until it comes to that line when I just stop singing. It sounds to me as if I'm saying, 'Look at my life, how good I am,' when I know about all the rubbish and badness that's in my life. Well, it seems that I'm not the only person who struggles.

After we'd sung it, the lad who was leading worship, who's a lovely lad, said, 'I struggle with that line.' Then when the speaker came up to the microphone he said, 'Before I begin I want to say that I also used to struggle with that line.' And I'm thinking, 'Good grief, is there anyone who can sing it?' But then John, the speaker, went on (and I'm précising this), 'I used to look at the list of things that are wrong in my life but then I started to look at things that are different in my life, that are better, because of God.'

He also said that we become more aware of what's wrong in our lives when we're close to God - and thus how much we need forgiveness and God - but by looking at the changes God has already wrought he is able to sing that line. And that his life, my life, is a work in progress. So I guess that's the way I'll have to look at it next time we come to sing that song.