More Than a Feeling

As a teenager in the 70s, I was totally into the rock music of the day, which is now considered “classic rock.” Why is called that today? Well, because no one has ever made better music than that era since then. One of my sons gave me the original Boston album on vinyl for my birthday. I can tell you exactly where I was in 1976 when I first heard that masterpiece. But had someone told me those songs would still be on the radio 40 years later, I would have thought they were crazy. Classic is the right description then, right?

With David Bowie dying last week and now Glenn Frey of The Eagles as I write this, the classic rockers, now all in their late 60s to 70s, are going to begin their final song fade. (Remember those?)

But I have a problem with what happens these days when an artist dies. Suddenly everyone goes and buys their music and they shoot to #1. With Bowie, he went to #1 on the US charts for the first time ever, knocking Adele out of the top spot—after he died. 19 of his projects entered the UK charts last week.

The really intriguing thing here is people buy the projects, they don’t just stream it for a few days and quit.

Did people suddenly start loving David Bowie music? Don’t think so. They want to own some because the creator died and won’t make anymore.

There’s something about us as humans that when we believe the supply is gone, we create demand. It’s an odd sidebar about sin.

Here’s the take-away today and I’m betting you were wondering how I was going to transition this one, right?

There are people in your family and your close circles of friends that will one day stop supplying love, care, and support to you and you will wish you could listen to their “song” just one more time. But they didn’t record albums of their thoughts for you to go download.

So, while you still have those precious people in your life, and none of us are guaranteed tomorrow at any age, let the people you love know it. Tell that person who always smiles and encourages you how much you appreciate them. What if we made 2016 the year of giving encouragement?

Be someone who decides love isn’t just produced on demand, but that you will have a constant supply to those around you.

And that supply is only found in the Author of Love—Jesus. He can help us keep going when we don’t feel like supplying and even when someone is demanding.

If I could speak all the languages of earth and of angels, but didn’t love others, I would only be a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. —1 Corinthians 13:1 NLT