COMMENTARY: Faith in Finding Your Song

c. 2004 Religion News Service (Tom Ehrich is a writer and computer consultant, managing large-scale database implementations. An Episcopal priest, he lives in Durham, N.C. Visit his Web site at http://www.onajourney.org.) (UNDATED) “Here, an early birthday present,” says my wife, as she hands me a CD of songs by Mark Knopfler. We heard Knopfler a […]

c. 2004 Religion News Service

(Tom Ehrich is a writer and computer consultant, managing large-scale database implementations. An Episcopal priest, he lives in Durham, N.C. Visit his Web site at http://www.onajourney.org.)

(UNDATED) “Here, an early birthday present,” says my wife, as she hands me a CD of songs by Mark Knopfler.


We heard Knopfler a week ago in St. Paul, Minn., where he performed on “A Prairie Home Companion.” I was mesmerized by his music, even more by the sight of a middle-aged man with short gray hair sitting by himself on stage, taking guitar in hand, and, within a few bars, revealing himself as the real thing.

His group Dire Straits disbanded nine years ago. Now Knopfler is a solo act. His latest songs are about a coal miner dragging home at 5:15 a.m. after a night underground, passing a “churchyard packed with mining dead.” And a fisherman “wandering back in the dock.” And poor Elvis, a onetime king who lost his way in Hollywood. And a serenade to his children and friends: “You’re all that matters.”

I know those songs: coal miners dying young, fishermen wandering between hearth and sea, the lure of tinsel, and discovering what matters. I know about leaving the band and going solo, sitting alone on a stage, hoping to be received as the real thing but never quite sure if other folks are in tune with your song.

I know how music clutches your soul, and then grows with you and you with it, until your life becomes a CD of melodies: some fresh, some stale, some haunting, some soothing, and some needing another verse.

I know the elation that music can bring, but even more the sadness, the mellow and often bereft awareness of deep longings, an inner hand eager to strum a tune and be released, an inner voice straining to sing love close and the blues away.

I know that when Knopfler started to play in Minnesota, it was like the impact that Jesus had when he began to teach and his audience was stunned, suddenly realizing that he spoke with authority, or as I would put it, that he was the real thing. Knopfler was the real thing. No light extravaganza, no smoke, no showmanship to hide modest skills. Like any great musician, he simply started in. It took a dozen notes, and we all knew.

It takes time to find your song. We all have one, I believe. A skill, a voice, a word, an ear to listen, a heart to love, a story to share, some gift from God that makes us unique. It might be something we set out to achieve. More likely, life and God and we will compose a song that surprises us, that contains a truth we hadn’t planned on knowing.


There is tragedy in our songs. If we find our song too young, we can be left craving applause and wondering what remains for us to sing. If it comes too late, we can wonder about all the verses that we missed. We can overlook the song God gave us and strive for something less. We can find it and then lose it, for songs by their nature always wander the docks.

It takes faith not to lose heart as your song is being written. It takes courage then to sit alone and to offer yourself. Not every audience will be appreciative. Some will ask, “Where’s the smoke?” Some will ask, “Didn’t you used to be someone else?” Some won’t connect. Some will turn away. Many will demand something familiar.

Knopfler could have offered a reprise of “Sultans of Swing,” when he stood with his Dire Straits chums on stage before adoring throngs. But he is a father now, he almost lost it in a motorcycle accident 18 months ago, his hero guitarist Chet Atkins died, and life evidently feels different.

Now his heart longs to sing, “My darling girl, my darling girl, you’re all that matters in this wicked world, all that matters, all that matters.”

MO/PH END RNS

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