Would you be well

I am probably not unusual in this feature, but I am of a sort who, when I find a song that moves me, I have to listen to it over and over for a time, until I have completely imbibed it. I will skip over the other songs on the album, repeating that one song until I am sufficiently saturated, then I can enjoy the rest of the album. Recently I realised that I enjoy Taylor Leonhard’s most recent album Hold Still but did not have any others, so I found her 2017 album River House, and quickly my current obsession became the song Would You Be Well. Even the title got me. And lyrics are very important to me in songs. Some people enjoy songs and barely notice or care about the lyrics; I am not one of those. But I do also need to like the tune, which I do here.

As someone who walks though life largely alone, and does not share most of my personal life with anyone (simply because I do not have good local friends who are available for such a thing and am not one for long phone calls - and my sisters are quite different to me and each live in different states and are both married with their own lives to work through), I have to work at times to process things and stay somewhere in the centre of the path. But I think being “well”, in a spiritual and psychological sense, is a life-long endeavour for us all - to not unravel here or get a little unhinged there or react badly to this or be excessively stressed over that, to remind ourselves what is above and beyond all the large and small disturbances of this life.

Lately I have been pondering “spiritual formation” and how it is not something that only benefits or is necessary for those who are considering a vocation in ministry, which is how I know it in my context, but is for all of us. Apparently this idea has a Catholic origin, so if you’re wondering what I mean, a quick google gave me this definition from Regent University: "spiritual formation is the ongoing process where believers learn and develop right relationships with God, self, and others as they are formed spiritually to act and behave in Christ-likeness." (Nothing so Catholic about that!) So I pause on occasion and ask myself what I am doing for my spiritual formation in how I spend my time. It has been a useful prompt and is, I believe, directly correlated to keeping “well”.

But without further ado, here is the song. Normally I am a little angsty about songs written from God’s point of view, as that is a risky theological undertaking. But this one is simple and it works for me. It doesn’t even offer solutions, it simply reminds us where to go. 

Would you be well

Would you be well from crushing anxiety
And live inside a peace you can't understand?
Would you be free from all that entangles you
Trade what you couldn't do for all that I have?

Would you be held safe in the solace of
A kinder and deeper love? I'll hold you tonight
Would you be seen for all that you really are?
Come let your weary heart lay in the light

Would you be well from fearing you couldn't be
As dear as you are to me? You'll always belong
Would you be free to stand on your legs again
And run like the holy wind that's blowing you home?

Would you be free to stand on your legs again
And run like the holy wind that's blowing you home?