Thursday, October 2, 2008

John Mark McMillan lyrics (The Medicine)

Reckoning Day

The lions in the street bend their heads
For the reckoning day
Cause the interstate’s giving up her dead
For the reckoning day

Would you come alive everybody
Would you come alive everyone
Get up out of bed for the sound of the song unsung

Bury all your guns in the sand
Cause the temperature’s changed
And the blood shot eye of the sun
Stains the bones of the slain

Would you come alive everybody
Would you come alive everyone
Get up out of bed for the sound of the song unsung

The hour’s gonna take you apart
On the reckoning day
If the property lines of your hearts
Are drawn in the clay

Would you come alive everybody
Would you come alive everyone
Get up out of bed for the sound of the song unsung

The tide water’s taxing the shores of the washing away
The flood stands high at the doors
Of the houses you made

Would you come alive everybody
Would you come alive everyone
Get up out of bed for the sound of the song unsung

Lift up your head
Oh you gate
Lift up your eyes
All you who wait
Daughter and son
Ashes and dust
Come untied from the weight of the age




The Medicine

Driving by those trucker stops
The cheap motels made of concrete rocks
With a hole inside your chest
The size of a city block
And I remember the day
When you said you weren’t afraid to die
I don’t think you’re brave for it
I just think you’re more afraid of being alive

If I had the medicine
I’d give you the medicine
Cause I miss you son
I’d bring you back home if I was the one
But it’s four and ten
In the belly of the four AM
And your staring down the weekend
To silence the pain
And I’m wide awake
And there’s blood on the promenade

Here’s to waking up with that stone between your ribs
And you’re lying down again
You just pretend you don’t know what it is
When everyone around you says that you’re not the one to blame for it
But you’re the only one feeling the pain for it
So you’re gonna take matters into your own hands yea

If I had the medicine
I’d give you the medicine
Cause I miss you son
I’d bring you back home if I was the one
But it’s four and ten
In the belly of the four AM
And your staring down the weekend
To silence the pain
And I’m wide awake
And there’s blood on the promenade

If I had the medicine
I’d give you the medicine
Cause I miss you son
I’d bring you back home if I was the one
But it’s four and ten
In the belly of the four AM
And your staring down the weekend
To silence the pain
And I’m wide awake
And there’s blood




Skeleton Bones

Peel back our ribs again
And stand inside of our chest
We just want to love you
We just want to love you yeah

Peel back the veil a time
Let us see you with our naked eyes
We just want to love you
We just want to love you yeah

Skeleton bones
Stand at the sound
Of eternity on
The lips of the found
Grave stones roll
To the rhythm of the sound of You
Skeleton bones
Stand at the sound
Of eternity on
The lips of the found
Yeah so separate those doors
And let the sun of resurrection in

Oh let us
Adore the son of glory
Dressed in love
Open up your gates
Before him
Crown him
Stand him up

We want your blood to flow inside our body and
We want your wind inside our lungs
We just want to love you
We just want to love you yeah

Skeleton bones
Stand at the sound
Of eternity on
The lips of the found
Grave stones roll
To the rhythm of the sound of You
Skeleton bones
Stand at the sound
Of eternity on
The lips of the found
Yeah so separate those doors
And let the sun of resurrection in

Oh let us
Adore the son of glory
Dressed in love
Open up your gates
Before him
Crown him
Stand him up

Everything that breathes
Everything that breathes
Everything that breathes
Oh let us

Adore the son of glory
Dressed in love
Open up your gates
Before him
Crown him
Stand him up


Carbon Ribs

A thousand pairs of fiery eyes
Burn like a serpent down the highway 5
As the long amber tail to Los Angeles unwinds
I’ve got this resurrection down inside my skin
But for all my revelating
I just can’t make sense
Our of this gravity we’re in

Cause I’m a dead man now
With a ghost that lives
Within the confines of these carbon ribs
And one day when I’m free
I will sit
The cripple at your table
The cripple by your side

A thousand miles of pain I’m sure
Led you to the threshold
Of my heart’s screen door
To tell me what it is I’m dying for
Gravity comes
Like a cold cold rain
To lead me to the rope again
But someone is standing in my place

Cause I’m a dead man now
With a ghost that lives
Within the confines of these carbon ribs
And one day when I’m free
I will sit
The cripple at your table
The cripple by your side
The cripple at your table
The cripple by your side

And I sit beside you
And I sit beside you
And I sit beside you
And I sit beside you


Dress Us Up

Dress us up in your righteousness
Bring us in with a ring and a kiss
When you walk into the room you know we can’t resist
Every bottle of perfume always ends up on the floor in mess

You make us sparkle and you make us shine
Like the stars who sing on your chorus line
Through space and time we’ll harmonize
Where deeps meets deep like the ocean meets the sky

The sun and the moon
They come out of their grave just for you
The dead man and the cynical too
Come out of their grave
And it’s just for you

Cause the love of God is stronger
The love of God is stronger
The love of God is stronger
Than the power of death

Dress us up in the blood of a man
Who opened up his veins so that we would overcome
Hell and the grave in the power of his love

After these dark days he showed us how it’s done
And he still does

You make us sparkle and you make us shine
Like the stars who sing on your chorus line
Through space and time we’ll harmonize
Where deeps meets deep like the ocean meets the sky
Yeah

The sun and the moon
They come out of their grave just for you
The dead man and the cynical too
Come out of their grave
And it’s just for you

Cause the love of God is stronger
The love of God is stronger
The love of God is stronger
Than the power of death

His love is stronger, his love is stronger
His love is stronger, his love is stronger


Death in His Grave

Though the earth cried out for blood
Satisfied her hunger was
Her billows calmed don raging seas
For the souls of men she craved
Sun and moon from balcony
Turned their head in disbelief
Their precious love would taste the sting
Disfigured and disdained

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a king
Laid down in grief
But awoke with the keys
To hell on that day
Firstborn of the slain
The man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

So three days in darkness slept
The morning sun of righteousness
But rose to shame the throws of death
And over turn his rule
Now daughters and the songs of men
Would pay not their dues again
The debt of blood they owed was rent
When the day rolled anew

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a king
Laid down in grief
But awoke with the keys
To hell on that day
Firstborn of the slain
The man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

On Friday a thief
On Sunday a king
Laid down in grief
But awoke with the keys
To hell on that day
Firstborn of the slain
The man Jesus Christ
Laid death in his grave

He has cheated
Hell and seated
Us above the fall
In desperate places
He paid our wages
One time once and for all


Belly of the Lion

Dance and dance
We call living and dying
In the valley of the city
In the belly of the lion
Work all week long
All week long
You can lose your soul
In the concrete riverbeds
Rolling with the flow
Of the currents of the walking deads
Five o’clock comes and you’re a rolling stone

Days like these we’ve got nothing to sing about
Days like these I don’t know what I think about
Days like these who would’ve known
Days like these we’ve got nothing to sing about
Days like these I don’t know what I think about
Days like these who would’ve known

Listen to the rhythm
Of the pawn shop shore
Got you falling off your hinges
Like that old screen porch
It’s the interstate slipping in your pores again
You can ride the vein
From the corner store to Amsterdam
You can bleed the train
From the courthouse to the Vatican
But Friday she’s a ghost
And gonna slip right through your hands again

Days like these we’ve got nothing to sing about
Days like these I don’t know what I think about
Days like these who would’ve known
Days like these we’ve got nothing to sing about
Days like these I don’t know what I think about
Days like these who would’ve known

So dance and dance
We call living and dying
In the valley of the city
In the belly of the lion
Work all week long
All week long
You can lose your soul
In the concrete riverbeds
Rolling with the flow
Of the currents of the walking deads
Five o’clock comes and you’re a rolling stone
Days like these we’ve got nothing to sing about
Days like these I don’t know what I think about
Days like these who would’ve known
Days like these we’ve got nothing to sing about
Days like these I don’t know what I think about
Days like these who would’ve known


Philadelphia

You step through me
And the screen door hits the wood
And you’re packing all your things
You say you’re moving out there to Hollywood
And I can’t do a thing
You say there’s nothing for you
In this cardboard town
And every bridge you cross
You’re gonna burn it to the ground
You won’t listen to a word that I’m telling ya

So who’s running through the halls
In the houses of pain
That are staring back at me
Like the ocean from a plane
I swear I’ve seen your eyes
In the ghost of Philadelphia

I think about you late at night sometimes
When I can’t sleep
Cause I can hear the train
It’s always there
You just don’t know it
Till a quarter to three
You just can’t hear it in the day
When everybody’s got your number
In a plexiglass glass town
Where the birds ain’t got wings
But not on makes a sound
Cause they all know how to fly
Just I wouldn’t buy what they’re selling ya

So who’s running through the halls
In the houses of pain
That are staring back at me
Like the ocean from a plane
I swear I’ve seen your eyes
In the ghost of Philadelphia

I run into your old man every now and again
Mostly in the spring
Reminds me of our younger and more genuine days
You weren’t so out of reach
Still for all your running
You just can’t change a mile
Of the things you carry around
In the closet of your mind
And the days keep coming man
They never fail ya

You’re never gonna run away
From what you’re hanging round your head
You’re never gonna run away
From what you’re hanging round your head
You’re never gonna run away
From what you’re hanging round your head
You’re never gonna run away
From what you’re hanging round your head
And I’m never gonna run away
From what you said


Out of the Ground

The lights come out
And follow you around the block
Where the freight train stopped
For you
Cause I can hear you walking in
The city till the pavement ends
With houses crumbling
For you

Cause I’m
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
For you

We’ve run from it
But it sleeps like the current quits
And would’ve stained my lips
But not for you
We fall apart at the seams
From day to dark
But it’s seeping into our sleep
For you

Cause I’m
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
Coming up from out of the ground
For you, for you, for you

One by one
Come undone
Come alive
Come alive


Ten Thousand

Then thousand glimmering like coals in our chest
Ball bearing drawn to the magnetic breath
Of ten thousand weeping with wings on their tears
Amidst ten thousand voices for ten thousand years

For ten thousand graves yawning unlocked and unlatched
Now ten thousand holes with rocks on their backs
Ten thousand tombs gaping wide singing the praise
Of ten thousand bodies unlaced and unlaid
As the ten thousand highways unfold their doors
For the ten thousand standing on Nineveh’s shores
Where the blood of a husband silences wars

For the girl who rises to meet him
And she sings
World, I’ve overcome you
World, I’ve overcome you
World, I’ve overcome you
By my song and the blood of a son

Ten thousand rivers
Run red like my veins
Where the bones of men hum
Like a rattling cage
For sinew to cling to
And wind to remain
In ten thousand lungs for ten thousand days
Breathing like a choir
Of holes in the ground
Where the cynical have lain
Where the cynical go down
Save the gravity of time
Lets go of her drowned
Like ten thousand sparrows
Unlocked and unwound
As the ten thousand highways unfold their doors
For the ten thousand standing on Nineveh’s shores

For the girl who rises to meet him
And she sings
World, I’ve overcome you
World, I’ve overcome you
World, I’ve overcome you
By my song and the blood of a son

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Living, or Living

I want to be a dead man
I want to preach to dying men;
Every man is either dying in his life
Or dying in His Life.
Ever man is either living this life
Or living for Christ;
There is no in-between.
You cannot live for the world
And for Jesus at the same time,
But you can be dead and alive
At the same time.
Dead with Christ
Alive in His resurrection
ALIVE!
Crucified,
Dead,
Buried,
Resurrected.
All together one
All together separate.
My sin is with Christ.
I'm dead with Christ.
Christ left me and my sin in hell
I live now
Only as much as Christ
Lives in me.
AND CHRIST LIVES POWERFULLY!

Friday, August 8, 2008

When We Find Our Knees

I left my old self
On the shores of the Jordan
The waters swallowed death
And I was reborn
The life before was
Dust and ashes
Until You looked my way and breathed
Now I'm standing in the masses
When I should be on my knees

I look all around me
See half-dead men and some stopped breathing
Others are alive but sleeping
We're all just waiting for You to say the Word
And You're waiting for us to start weeping
We want a movement for the ages
We want to be that generation
Who tastes not death until You we see
And You're patiently waiting
For us to find our way
Onto our knees

Have I ever thought I was the one
Who took the cross and won the war?
If the answer's no
Then why are my knees so fragile
And my feet so worn?
I ran away from You for miles
Now I'm asking that You let me join
As my will bends beneath the
Weight of the Heaven knowing Lord

Because my kingdom's crashing while
I've yet to see Yours come
Lay to waste my best intentions
Drain corruption from my lungs
That I might not breathe
Unless You teach me what that means
No more will I sing about Your love
Unless I live it in the streets

Friday, June 13, 2008

Chase You Down

"Chase You Down"

I am standing here in need
Of a Savior of a King
I am down on my knees
Begging for You to meet with me

It's not enough to say
That You're enough for me
So I lay my life down down
Down at Your feet

You set me free
I'll spend forever chasing You down
You took my sins on that tree
I'll spend forever chasing You down

It's not enough to say
That You're enough for me
So I lay my life down down
Down at Your feet

I'm on my knees
Only getting up
If it's to chase you down

I'm standing here redeemed
Staring at a King
That I'll spend my forever
Chasing You down

(May 30 2008) R.g.

Sunday, April 6, 2008

A Dead Man Living

Will I die to myself and follow this kamikaze Rabbi? Well, how do you know when you're dead?

Ask yourself this: When was the last time you saw a dead man react to the intentions of the world around him?

A dead person is unresponsive to the ways of the world.

Jesus will bring us to life and when He does, we'll react the way He would react.

We will weep over the things He would weep over.
We will pray the way that He would pray.
We will know the Word the way He knows the Word.
We will turn over tables in temples perverted, because 'Zeal for His house will overcome us.'
We will make our way to our final destination of sacrifice
Carrying the cross that He gave us to bear.

The best part is: We won't have a choice.


-rg.

The Needy Church

John 2:16-17 "And he told those who sold the pigeons, 'take these things away; do not make my Father's house a house a trade.' His disciples remembered that it was written, 'Zeal for your house will consume me.'


-----------------------------------------------------

(The Needy Church) *tentative title*


God will never call you to a church to mock it or critique it. God is either calling you to a healthy church to serve, a sick church to help serve it and make it well, or He's not calling you to that church. But He will never call you to a church to critique it and leave it in the same helpless condition in which you came to it.


-rg.

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

What Would Jesus Say to the Lost?

Luke 15:4-7


This passage of scripture can be interpreted in a couple of different ways. The way I’ve always thought of it was that Christians are a group of 99 sheep, and we are willing to sacrifice the other 98 sheep with us, or go as a group of 99 after one that has strayed away from the faith. God has recently taught me a deeper meaning to this scripture, and shown me that He is the Shepherd, and He is the one willing to leave His flock and go after 1 lost sheep.

“What man of you, having a hundred sheep, if he has lost one of them, does not leave the ninety-nine in the open country, and go after the one that is lost, until he finds it?” Jesus poses this question in such a way that it seems like the answer is, “any Shepard would do this.” And the way I’ve always understood it was in this manner. The truth is that no Shepherd in his right mind would leave 99 capable sheep to search after a single lost sheep.

The question that we get asked on many occasions is “why are you doing this? Why would you waste your spring break toting around drunk people from club to club, hotel to hotel, and so on?” The answer is simply, “because Jesus would.” Jesus would risk losing every sheep He has in order to find one sheep, willing to surrender their will back to the Shepherd.

And do you want to know the best truth that you could hear right now? Jesus is on this van, in pursuit of your heart, because His will is that none should perish, and that all should come to repentance (2 Peter 3:9). I know that there is so much controversy surrounding Biblical teachings, and the Biblical text. But the one thing that is certain is that Jesus was a lover. If He wasn’t God, He died in such a way that it would be worth following in His footsteps, because He’s the only one that has every truly loved. Jesus believed that He was God, and He loved humanity so much that He surrendered Himself to the most horrific death in order to save the life of everyone whose ever lived. If He wasn’t God, then he saved no one. However, if Jesus was the way, the truth, and the life; and if Jesus was in fact God, He is a Shepherd that will leave 99 of His sheep to seek out one that is willing to turn back to Him. That is crazy love.

If Jesus were standing with you right now, He wouldn’t notice that you were about to spend your evening in a club soliciting yourselves to the desire of your hearts. He wouldn’t point out how much alcohol you’ve had tonight. Jesus wouldn’t remind you of the person you slept with last night who didn’t love you, and who you didn’t love. Jesus wouldn’t take the drugs away from you. He would simply remind you how much He loves you. And He would ask you to fall in love with Him so that you could be freed from your chains of bondage. So that you could be free from your addictions. So you could be free from your struggle with self-esteem. So that you could find peace in your spirit in this corrupt life that we live.

If I told you that I am NOT in need of Jesus since I’ve already accepted Him as Truth, I would be lying. Jesus saves me everyday (1 Corinthians 15:31). Jesus reminds me everyday of the love that He has for me. He reminds me every time I slip up that I don’t love Him as much as I say I do. But He has enveloped me. He has gripped me in such a way that to breathe without Him burns my lungs. That His love is caught up like a fire in my bones, and to keep His word inside of me cremates my insides (Jeremiah 20:9).

So this is the Truth that I leave you with: No matter what your opinions about Jesus are, and no matter what you decide to do tonight, Jesus will be there with you. Jesus did not come to make bad people good. If He had come to make bad people good, then the fruit of His ministry has been a failure for 2,000 years. There is no one worthy of the love of Jesus Christ, not one. But there are billions of people who are desperately in need of the love of Jesus Christ, and that’s true. If Jesus didn’t come to make bad people good, what then? Jesus came to bring dead people back to life, and He does that by His truth.

This is not a plea. If the intentions of your heart, and the actions of your life continue in such a way that they oppose the truth of Christ, that will be okay. Jesus doesn’t need you. He desperately wants you though. The remedy of Christ is not for those who think they’re okay it’s for those who know they are not okay. We’re all in need of a doctor. This is your prescription for life: Jesus has overcome the world. Resist Him and you resist freedom. Accept Him and you accept freedom. Who doesn’t want to be free?