page 16

'I Ain't Got Nobody . . .

Cutting through the smoke-filled air, the spotlight trimmed a hole of light on the stage. The cabaret drinkers hushed their chatter and sat back expectantly. Standing in the light, the young negress stretched out her arms to the people. The combo slid deftly into a blues beat and the song came on, "I ain't got nobody and nobody's got me." The husky voice projected an ache, a yearning that was answered by the crowd. Most of the young men and their girls felt secure, they got somebody. Older men and wo sighed and wondered how it was that they could still feel the sweet sting of self pity, even when marriage had been rated a success. Everyone who listened was reminded that the hope of happiness lies in other people. For some people, thats no hope at all.

The quality of life and the possibility of happiness is the framework of relationships that each of us owns.. Those who are alone die slowly—in pensioners back rooms, on metho benches, even in big suburban homes. 'I ain't got nobody'.

Jesus Christ didn't over sing blues numbers. Warning songs, hope songs, judgment and victory ballads, yes— but not blues. Why? Because blues songs grow out of miseries, out of nostalgia, out of craving for the impossible he or she or something. No miseries, because he lived as one who knew God too well. He knew Him with a fierce joy and a deep content. He knew Him, the Maker of the universe as Father and himself as the Father's most loyal loving son. He showed the gladness and peace that comes from an assured and comforting relationship which he spelled with a capital Loving Obedience. Before he surrended his life he breathed out this: "I pray for those who believe in me . . . I pray that they may all be one.

O Father, may they be one in us, just as you are in me and I am in you".

That's the way we are asked to look at life; as a relationship to God by Jesus Christ the God-Man, which in turn regulates our relationship with every other person. The hope-song broadcast from the heart of Jesus was "O Father, may they be one in us". This, we have to say, is God's promise to men. This, apart from Jesus Christ is what none of us have got. You can't kid yourself about relationships, you have them or you don't, You know Jesus Christ or you don't. It's not your I.Q., nor your degree, nor you future prospects, now what people think about you, but the message. Jesus prayed, remember, "I pray for those who believe in me because of the message." The message was the testimony about him made by a group of men and women, who write the New Testament, preached it, carried it, lived by it and died for it. They did all this because they were sure that the authority, that drew them to him, that was so personal, so painful, so joyful and so surprising, was given to him because he was God.

The beginning of most lasting loves is a confession. The confession of love liberates us and binds us at the same time in its plea for acceptance. The relationship of marriage is based upon mutual love, mutual acceptance, mutual confession and mutual forgiveness. Relationship with God by Jesus Christ also involves acceptance, Men gift of God, makes possible that new relationship with him which may fairly be described as eternal life. Mutual love is the on-going expression of this relationship. Confession for us means not only the acknowledgment that we often fail God, but also that he has done something for us. This message then is, "If you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved."

Blues music comes out of human loneliness and lastness. All loneliness comes out of sin, ours and other men's. To get the message, and to confess it, is to sing a new song.