I Will Really Be Here

Tomorrow morning if you wake up and the sun does not appear,
I will be here.
If in the dark we lose sight of love, hold my hand and have no fear.
I will be here.

I will be here, and you can cry on my shoulder;
When the mirror tells us we're older I will hold you
And I will be here, to watch you grow in beauty
And tell you all the things you are to me
We'll be together.
'Cause I will be here.

Tomorrow morning if you wake up and the future is unclear,
I will be here.
As sure as seasons are made for change, our lifetimes are made for years.
I will be here.

I will be true to the promise I have made
To you and to the One Who gave you to me.
I will be here.

A little while ago, Amy and I sang a Steven Curtis Chapman song (the partial lyrics of which are above) at a wedding. It was fun, and the song says some really nice things about commitment between a man and a woman, doesn't it?

A little while later we sang it again, this time in the living room of a man and woman, the latter being just out of the hospital after brain surgery to remove a potentially deadly tumor. And this isn't just any man and woman; these are Amy's parents. Now the song isn't just nice; now it grips your heart and makes you really think about waking up to a sunless world, about crying on the shoulder of that one to whom you've committed your suddenly tenuous life.

I haven't much thought about music in this way since Tom went through a time of draining sickness, how that music put to words aren't just empty platitudes when someone is lying on a bed wasting away, not just another pretty melody when you woke up this morning beside your wife and the future was, actually, unclear.

People don't usually speak in poetry, and thus this is one of the great powers of music it seems, to say things that you might not otherwise say, and in a way that you never could.

I love you mom (both of you).