A Thanksgiving Dissection

*Eek! I forgot to post this!
Well, maybe you can pull yourself from the Christmas lights and ornaments and get back into a Thanksgiving mood... or not. Anyway, here is the "How to determine the worldview of a song" post that I promised a while ago.*

First of all, I am not going to talk about dissecting a Thanksgiving turkey... : ) So don't worry!

Second of all, the term "dissection" refers to
a. my experience dissecting things in biology (And I actually surprised myself by enjoying it!)
b. An older post of mine called The Faith Currency where I "dissected" - or examined from a Christian worldview - the quote, "Have faith in yourself and in the future" which I saw on a piece of home decor.

But don't worry, I am not going to post any graphic photos of when I dissected the classic biology frog. But, I would like to do another worldview dissection... and since I really enjoy much of Josh Groban's music (as you might know from this post), I picked his song, Thankful.

I first listened to this song in October. I came across it on YouTube while searching for some other songs. You can listen to on Youtube here, with lyrics on the screen.

As a disclaimer, I am obviously not affiliated with Josh Groban, I'm just a teenage girl who enjoys beautiful music and beautiful voices. Secondly, I do not approve of everything in all his songs, nor am I, in posting this, trying to be rude or judgmental of him. Also, I hope I don't sound disrespectful... I just like to shout. If it helps, picture me saying the words smiling and simultaneously giving you a hug, if that is possible / makes you feel better.

That being said, I wanted to look through the lyrics of this sweet song and see if we can try and discover a worldview. (So alternately, if dissections make your stomach go a bit queasy, you can call this post, "How to figure out the worldview of a song - or a book, or a movie").

So here are the lyrics, with my response to each line. The lyrics of the song will be in red. (No copyright infringement intended).
"Somedays, we forget to look around us. Somedays, we can't see the joy that surrounds us." Agreed.
"So caught up inside ourselves, we take when we should give." Uh-huh.

CHORUS TIME!!!
"So for tonight, we pray for what we know can be, and on this day, we hope for what we still can't see." Whoaa, hold on! Shouldn't we be praying for what we can't see!? Why pray for only the possible, when God can do the impossible!? Just a thought there.
"It's up to us to be the change and even though we all can do much more..." Okay, sorta. But relying on ourselves to be the change? I don't think that's the greatest idea. Only Jesus can change hearts and change lives. He often uses us to do His work (isn't that awesome!? God, the Creator of the universe, using... us!?), but we should be looking to Him for change, not ourselves.
"[T]here's so much to be thankful for." Back to agreeing again.

Second verse:
"Look beyond ourselves; there's so much sorrow." That's so true. We find ourselves becoming so focused on ourselves that we don't realize all that we have to be grateful for.
"It's way too late to say, 'I'll cry tomorrow.'" Yes, there's a time for grief. I am guessing that the lyrics are referring to weeping for the sorrow around us, but I'm not sure, since I'm, uh, not the writer. Obviously. :)
"Each of us must find our truth. It's so long overdue." Hold it. Stop the horses (hold your horses, get it?) and halt the party. OUR truth!? There's only ONE truth, and that's Jesus. John 14:6 - "Jesus said to him, 'I am the way, the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through Me." (NKJV) No room for other truths there. Jesus is the ONLY way, the ONLY truth, the ONLY life. Sorry, but the phrase about finding "our truth" seems to me to imply that truth is relative...which, granted, is a very popular belief today here in America. I'm obviously not sitting here expecting Josh Groban, who I don't believe proclaims to be a Christian, to have perfect doctrinal beliefs, or even saying that I myself have perfect doctrinal beliefs, but I'm just trying to point out how a seemingly "good" and inspirational song has a few doctrinal quirks in it. I know there are many other feel-good, happy, and as said earlier, "inspirational"-type songs that aren't quite sound. I just want to encourage you to really study the lyrics of the music that you listen to, because what goes in your ears will affect how you think and act.
Oh, and as for being "long overdue", I guess I agree, cuz we need to be telling people about Jesus!

*The chorus plays again.*

Bridge: "Even with our differences, there is a place we're all connected. Each of us can find each other's light!" Christianity is a religion with doctrine that is not compatible with other religions. I do NOT think we should persecute or act cruelly towards those of other beliefs, but the kindest thing we can do for them is to tell them about Jesus. After all, He's the Light of the World, as it says in John 8:12, which reads, "Jesus spoke to them again, saying, 'I am the light of the world.  He who follows Me shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life." (NKJV again) The only way we can have light inside ourselves is if we have Jesus inside us, to guide us and lead us.

*The chorus again*

Again, I'm not trying to be disrespectful / rude / etc. here, I'm just trying to show you a little bit of how you can look at a song and figure out whether it's teaching are in line with the Bible or not. I'm not saying you can't listen to this type of music (that's up to you and God to decide), but I just want you to encourage you to be wary and careful of what you listen to. (I kinda sound like a mom talking now. :D).

I agree with Josh Groban in the sense that yes, the world needs more. So much more than we have to offer. And we should do whatever we can to make the world a better place. But making the world a better place, being the change that this broken world needs, and revealing the one Truth and the one Light is by telling others about Jesus. Yes, we have SO MUCH to be thankful for. But the biggest thing we have to be thankful for is that God didn't leave us in our lost, sinful, and awful condition. He gave His one and only Son Jesus, to be wounded, to be hurt, to bleed and to die so that we wouldn't have to suffer in eternity, apart from God. THAT's the biggest thing we have to be thankful for. And yes, God has most likely blessed you with many material possessions, a loving family, great friends, and more than that besides. God is an awesome and loving God. So shouldn't we be doing we can, to serve Him in our thankfulness?

Whew, this is a long-ish post. I hope you all had an AMAZING Thanksgiving. I'll also take this moment to say how thankful I am for YOU, my wonderful blog readers! I started this blog thinking maybe a couple friends would read it, but I ended up with 30+ followers and blogging friends whose e-mails / comments make my day! : ) Thanks for stopping by, reading and sometimes commenting. I am so thankful that God is allowing us to influence each other's lives. I love you girls!

Happy Thanksgiving!

"Klarabelle"