While we were visiting my parents last week, I stumbled upon a of biographical/documentary of Johnny Cash, so Dad and I were in a trance for about 2 hours! As I watched the film, I was reminded of the endearing nature of Johnny Cash to much of pop culture in America. The reality is that Cash was in many ways the proto-type version of rebels for decades to come, yet his life was as integrated with faith as his music. He oscillated between the sacred and the profane like many of the people who followed his trailblazing path in country music. Indeed, American music (Blues, Country, folk) capture the contrast of light and dark, good and evil better than any other type of art form!
Cash was influential and well respected to say the least, but the thing that owned his life was a recognition of his identity as "a child of God" and the need to remind others of the compassion, mercy, healing, grace and redemption found in God.
A song from his renewed career at the hands of producer Rick Rubins in the late 1990s until Cash's death was part of the documentary. The song, entitled "Redemption" was one I had never heard before but it was a deeply moving song for me that night. The lyrics are below:
From the hands it came down From the side it came down From the feet it came down And ran to the ground Between heaven and hell A teardrop fell In the deep crimson dew The tree of life grew And the blood gave life To the branches of the tree And the blood was the price That set the captives free And the numbers that came Through the fire and the flood Clung to the tree And were redeemed by the blood From the tree streamed a light That started the fight 'Round the tree grew a vine On whose fruit I could dine My old friend Lucifer came Fought to keep me in chains But I saw through the tricks Of six-sixty-six And the blood gave life To the branches of the tree And the blood was the price That set the captives free And the numbers that came Through the fire and the flood Clung to the tree And were redeemed by the blood From his hands it came down From his side it came down From his feet it came down And ran to the ground And a small inner voice Said "You do have a choice." The vine engrafted me And I clung to the tree
The clip from the film showed Cash playing in a small singer/songwriter type venue with people of all ages around him who came to hear some of his legendary songs I'm sure, but even their he spoke of the theme of redemption in his own life and how his story had found meaning in the grand story of God's redemptive plan for all of creation.
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