Shed a Little Light

The group I sing with on Sundays has been practicing this song for a few months. We sang our version this morning, just one week and one day shy of the day we –as a nation– set aside time to remember and honor the contributions of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

The song actually ends at the 4-minute mark; after that, JT takes time to introduce his band.  I wish I had a video of our group singing, but I don’t.
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What we didn’t know when we picked this song was what was going to happen in Arizona yesterday. We didn’t know that our pastor was going to preach about,  didn’t expect to hear a message specifically about a faith-based perspective on how to make sense of such a horrific tragedy. Being one week prior to Martin Luther King Day, I didn’t even expect to hear his name mentioned.  But much like Diana Butler Bass wrote in her blog post yesterday, these things were all addressed from the pulpit (in fact, the pastor quoted some of what DBB wrote). And then we sang this song that we had been practicing and planning on singing for the past several months:

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Let us turn our thoughts today
To Martin Luther King
And recognize that there are ties between us
All men and women
Living on the Earth
Ties of hope and love
Sister and brotherhood
That we are bound together
In our desire to see the world become
A place in which our children
Can grow free and strong
We are bound together
By the task that stands before us
And the road that lies ahead
We are bound and we are bound

There is a feeling like the clenching of a fist
There is a hunger in the center of the chest
There is a passage through the darkness and the mist
And though the body sleeps the heart will never rest

Shed a little light, oh Lord
So that we can see
Just a little light, oh Lord
Wanna stand it on up
Stand it on up, oh Lord
Wanna walk it on down
Shed a little light, oh Lord

Can’t get no light from the dollar bill
Don’t give me no light from a TV screen
When I open my eyes
I wanna drink my fill
From the well on the hill
(Do you know what I mean?)

Shed a little light, oh Lord
So that we can see
Just a little light, oh Lord
Wanna stand it on up
Stand it on up, oh Lord
Wanna walk it on down
Shed a little light, oh Lord
Shed a little light

There is a feeling like the clenching of a fist
There is a hunger in the center of the chest
There is a passage through the darkness and the mist
And though the body sleeps the heart will never rest

Oh, Let us turn our thoughts today
To Martin Luther King
And recognize that there are ties between us
All men and women
Living on the Earth
Ties of hope and love
Sister and brotherhood