Musical Musing “Make You Feel My Love” Joan Osborne (Bob Dylan)

There are times that music has such a profound effect on me that I just don’t know how to begin expressing the feelings that it triggers within me. I just know that I have to hear it again. And again. I was driving home this week from a spur of the moment solo trip to Arkansas to visit a friend when this started playing. I’ve mentioned before that John has a habit of expanding my library by burning CDs of new music and adding them to the rotation of MP3 disks that we play in the car… sort of creating our own little radio station in the car (which, by the way, is why I have no idea what the local radio stations are or what they play or when they switch over to Christmas music or anything. Not the foggiest). This was another case of that. I’m guessing that this collection of Joan Osburn music caught his attention, because when I told him the song had been written by Bob Dylan, he was surprised, and had to go find Dylan’s version (and then shared that, and a youtube video of Phil Keaggy, and then tonight I found that Garth Brooks covered it, too.)

“Make You Feel My Love” is sung by an unidentified lover to their unidentified beloved, only named with the pronouns “You” and “Me” and the possessives that accompany them. The lover opens by naming situations which could lead to feelings of isolation and lonliness, and closes each verse with a promised action to counter those feelings, with the goal of the beloved feeling the lover’s love.

The song continues, even admitting that though the beloved isn’t certain of the future of the relationship between them, the lover promises ever grander gestures of devotion. Indeed, some of these promises are so grand that no relationship on earth could ever possibly fulfill them. No man or woman is capable of keeping every promise made. So why does it strike me so profoundly that as I lay in bed tonight, curled up in my own beloved’s arms, that I wept with joy?

Phil Keaggy explains why in his video on youtube. I listen to this song, and from the first time I heard it, I didn’t hear a woman singing to a lover; I heard a Savior wooing his Bride. I don’t know if Dylan intended it to have such clear Christian overtones (given his period of Gospel music, and his time working directly with a church, I certainly wouldn’t dismiss the possibility, even though this was written in 1992, long after that period in his career). Still, I can’t deny that they’re there, and there’s no real stretching to find them, either.

“I could hold you for a million years.” Jesus promises to never leave us or forsake us.
“I’d go hungry…” Jesus fasted for 40 days in the wilderness, and resisted the temptation of Satan to turn a stone into a loaf of bread, knowing that His purpose on earth was more important than His hunger for food.

“I’d go black and blue” Jesus was nearly stoned in his own village. He was literally punched in the face by guards, chained by temple guards, likely beat during the time they held Him. He was scourged, whipped to within an inch of his life… to pay to price you owed for your sins (and that I owed for mine).

“I’d go crawling down the avenue” Jesus was forced to carry his own cross beam to the site of the crucifixion after his scourging. He collapsed several times, and the guards had to pull another man out of the crowd to help carry it.

“You ain’t seen nothing like Me yet” Jesus is described as the One and Only, the Only Son of God. Crushed, beaten, bruised, crucified, and buried, He raises Himself to life again, leaving His tomb empty save for the cloths He’d been hastily wrapped in. And unlike other religious figures, Jesus is about Love, not a set of rules you have to keep: He’s fulfilled them all. Those rules exist to show you all the ways you fall short, to point to your need for Him. So He came in love to fulfill them all and provide the path back to a loving, living relationship with Him.

“Go to the ends of the earth for you” Jesus is God in human flesh, stepped from the glory of heaven to the limits of earth, from immortality to mortality, from the Creator of all things to the earth He created, and during His ministry on earth, He walked from one end of Judea to the other, giving of Himself, healing and forgiving without hesitation, loving unconditionally and changing lives radically. He stepped into time to touch our lives in a very intimate and personal way, and then…

“No, there’s nothing I wouldn’t do” He even died in the place of the guilty to redeem us into relationship with Him. (And if you question the died in place of the guilty, questioning if we’re really guilty or not… consider this: Barabbas, who was freed on the demand of the people, was a notorious murderer, and it was in HIS place that Jesus was crucified. There would have been 3 crosses that day no matter what… but Barabbas was meant for the 3^rd. Jesus took his place. Jesus, who gave life, took the place of a man who took it.)

I know. You’re still not sure about this whole Jesus guy. You’re not sure if the claims about Him could be true. Or even if they are, what about all the ugliness that’s been done in His name? What about all those people who say they follow Him and are ugly to each other and to you? Why be part of that?

Because you aren’t perfect. Because I’m not perfect. None of us are. He is. He loves you perfectly. But the rest of us? Pft. We’re still flawed. We’re all still works in progress. We’re told to make it our intentional goal to be as much like Jesus as we possibly can, and some of us aim at the wrong target. When we read the Bible, they like the parts that let them be like the Pharisees, judging everyone. Jesus still loves them, even if they’ve got their heads up their butts. He’s just working to dislodge their heads (the world is a much more pleasant experience when you’re not stuck on yourself that way. None of us fart roses). I tend to prefer the parts that show God as loving, eager to forgive, slow to anger, and going to great lengths to make us feel His love. Look at Jonah, and the ends that God went to for the Ninevites. Look at the way that God provided for the the Egyptians and the neighboring nations through Joseph. In Ezekiel, God pleads with the Israelites to turn and repent. God even gives Egypt 9 chances to let the Hebrews leave before the final judgment takes their firstborn from them. Noah pleads for Sodom and Gomorrah on his nephew, Lot’s, behalf, asking God to spare the cities if even 10 righteous men can be found, a condition agrees to. Just 10! And Moses similarly sees similar mercies and compassions from God for the people. And that’s the Old Testament… where people argue that God is angry and vengeful and merciless!

I don’t deny there are other parts in there… things I can’t explain away easily. Sometimes, when I look at context, I can sort it out and it kinda sorts out in my head and still fits. Sometimes, I still left scratching my head in wonder and confusion. But I know this: There is more of the Bible that talks about God’s goodness, His love, His mercy, His grace, and the lengths to which He goes to woo His people to Him than there isn’t. That says a lot.

I’ve got to agree with Phil Keaggy on this one. I listen to this and I hear my Jesus singing it, and I weep. Even today, my Jesus is still pleading with us. Oh, Beloved, won’t you listen? I can’t begin to tell you what you’re missing; I can’t put it into words that fit empirical reasoning and rational explanations. I just know, listening to this, Beloved, that if you wait… oh, please don’t wait… if you wait and you miss this opportunity to know the love of a Savior who would go to the ends of the Earth for you… there are no words for how much you’ll wish you could change your mind. There’s nothing, nothing in all the world, like the love of my Jesus.