Soundtrack to a Soul
Week 15 of 52 Churches in 52 Weeks:
--
Johnny Cash and All That Goes Away at First Baptist Church of Hendersonville
“(Ten) went from being “in a relationship” to “single”.”
It was Facebook official. Just an hour earlier, she ripped up the script, leaving our empire in dirt as she drove off into the sunset with her new future riding shotgun. The journey necklace which symbolized our 3-year relationship had been traded in for a newly minted “Single” status that she proudly wore on social media like a For Sale sign to any interested suitors with high testosterone. I had been ignorant to all the warning signs. She had recently turned 21 in which her ID was now a Golden Ticket into the alcoholic retelling of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory. No longer was she bound to the repressions of our relationship and was free to be wooed by the Oompa-Loompa doo-ba-dee-douchebags who wanted to hit on her with their orange tanning bed complexions.
I was relegated to a puzzle-maker, piecing together what caused the break-up through clues on her Facebook feed. I knew it wasn’t emotionally healthy, but my mind needed to know. I would scroll through tagged photos at college parties, new accepted friend requests, and those horrible Marilyn Monroe quotes, you know, the ones before she reportedly overdosed. The worst was when a random guy posted an ominous “proud of you” post that gained an instant thumbs-up like. Proud of what? In the blink of an eye, the girl who was my sweetest sunshine now felt like a million miles away, turned into someone I no longer knew.
A part of her wanted to maintain a friendship, requesting that I be demoted from “The One” to just one more of her 400+ Facebook friends. She sent a few texts in an attempt to mind-dump her feelings when she wasn’t numbing herself at the nightclubs with UV mixers and LMFAO remixes. Despite every fiber of my being wanting to maintain contact, I couldn’t settle on a friendship when she meant much more than that. I hopelessly scoured the internet for answers to truly reconcile with her, trying everything I could to ignore the reality of the situation.
Her Chamber of Secrets was unveiled one night when a new muggle friend posted a picture of her on Facebook. She looked gorgeous with bouncy curled hair and was dressed to the nines, rapt in a lustful embrace with a guy that only Lord Voldemort could have conceived. It was the first romantic photograph she had taken with a guy who wasn’t me. The guy she previously said was “just a friend” from her science courses had slithered between us and was constricting his elongated arms around her waist. The picture didn’t look real. It was like one of those magically animated portraits from Hogwarts in the Harry Potter movies. Her smile was painted on while her sky blue eyes were indecisively alive, shifting looks between me through my computer screen, then to the deceptive hissing smirk of He Who Shall Not Be Named in the photo. His snake eyes remained still, taunting at me through the photograph that was now permanent in time. I researched his timeline and noticed the same weekend Ten had made plans with a former roommate to celebrate her 21-dom, He Who Shall Not Be Named and his best pal had coincidentally befriended the same roommate on that weekend. She had developed feelings for this guy, and was seeing him behind my back. I had no idea. And what made it even worse:
Despite her betrayal, I was still in love with her.
The photo served as a eulogy for any hope of reconciliation in the near-future. I pulled the trigger by deleting all our photos together, blocking her from any associations we had in social media, then burying our mementos into a coffin box that will never be seen again. Questions started to flood my self-worth: How long had my dream relationship been a lie? Why didn’t I keep Christ as the focus? What have I become?
When my sunshine had been taken away, dated 500-year-old Protestant hymns collaborated with sermon themes that were designed for a general congregation were no longer cutting it for me at church. The Bible, written 2000 years earlier, wasn’t giving me the spiritual guidance that I was seeking from a sudden break-up that was suffocating my identity. I still was a believer in Christ, but I needed something more, something different given the gray skies shadowing over me. I needed something to directly speak to my pain.
Then I listened to Johnny Cash’s rendition of “Hurt”.
“Hurt” wasn’t just Johnny Cash’s epitaph before his death. To me, it was a song of salvation that soundtracked my soul, a New Age Testament that I could relate to when imprisoned to emotional isolation. While I was being authentic to my discarded heart, every word acted as a counselor when grieving a significant loss, helping me to catalog the deepest parts of my wounds to derive inspiration from. The song held a significant potency to the feelings that I had collected throughout my lifetime. It captured the essence of my break-up, exemplifying the highs from the black-and-white memories of my past relationship and the somber cruelty of my colored present. The inclusion of Jesus’ crucifixion served as an epiphany that even through the betrayal and enduring pain I was feeling in my personal Revelations, I had power through Christ to resurrect my future to rise again. Even after death, Johnny Cash was a sinner-turned-saint who’s recorded words gave rebirth into my soul.
Discovering Johnny’s dark Christian spin on other covers, like “Ain’t No Grave”, “The Man Comes Around”, and “Solitary Man” were gospel to my ears, speaking to my Christian roots as I allowed myself to feel the full range of emotions that was inherited from the betrayal of someone valuable I held dear to my heart. If I was going to be hurt, I was determined to channel my pain to get a reward from it. I used my grieving time for self-reflection and healing that focused on me to grow as a better man; physically, professionally, and spiritually in Christ. It served as a crucial lesson bestowed upon my self-esteem when it hanged in a sort of limbo, allowing me to access the deepest parts of myself to help learn who I am, and why.
A week after the photo was posted online and discovering “Hurt”, Ten came over for the last time so we could exchange belongings, essentially me trading her Harry Potter Blu-ray collection for my aviator sunglasses. I essentially had to break-up back, needing to disappear while she could live out her new life. I prophesied that the rebound relationship she had entered along with the fake friendships she was forming on a daily basis were going to be her temporary downfall, but better yet, would lead to her rejuvenation to become something better within herself. She needed to experience the extremes to appreciate the contrasts in life, feel the pain with the pleasure, experience sadness to fully know happiness. But the one thing that absolutely killed me if she was going to become the amazing person that I knew she would become, I had to make the hardest sacrifice of my life.
If I truly loved her, I needed to let her go.
Shortly after recording “Hurt”, Johnny Cash passed away in September 2003, remembered at a private funeral held at First Baptist Church of Hendersonville, Tennessee. He died due to complications with diabetes, but several say he died of a broken heart after the death of his wife, June Carter, who was laid to rest four months earlier.
After receiving some last-minute vacation time, I wanted to take 52 Churches in 52 Weeks on a road trip with the first stop in downtown Nashville. I’ve never been a country fan, so the only place I wanted to tour was the new Johnny Cash Museum followed by attending a service at First Baptist of Hendersonville. With the chronology of my life experiences while writing this publication combined with this church journey, I was excited to learn that the Thursday night I would be in town would have a gathering that was specifically geared for millennial Christians. It was a perfect fit.
January 22, 2015–8:00 pm AXIS College-Age Ministry Gathering: First Baptist Church of Hendersonville, Tennessee (in the Hearthside Room)
Being 31, I’ve worshiped at a few churches during 52 Churches in 52 Weeks where I was the youngest in attendance. For Week 15, this was a role-reversal as I was the oldest in attendance for First Baptist’s inaugural AXIS, a faith-based get-together that is targeted for college-age millennials who seek a faith-based community. Walking in was like being in a Hollister flyer. All the guys who greeted me at the check-in desk looked like they just finished an appointment with Zac Efron’s personal hairstylist. I had a momentary regret that I should have brought a surfboard and sprayed on some cologne that smells like a beach to fit the hip look.
The interior design of the Hearthside Room was fantastically set-up. The room consisted of 12 chairs split between the aisle, with a beverage location in the back for complimentary coffee or water. The front portion of the room had a flatscreen TV that was surrounded by stereo speakers and microphones, with a crackling fireplace and wooden wall-hanging of Tennessee behind it. What really set the tone was the low-lit lamps that illuminated a welcoming oasis for everyone, making it a relaxing setting to mingle with fellow young adult Christians. This also helped distract me from the wonders of my new smartphone I had purchased two days earlier, where I felt the need to Google the latest advancements in men’s hair follicle restoration.
The gathering kicked off with the musical talents of a young lady outfitted in a camouflaged jacket and a plaid-shirted male with a magnificent Rollie Fingers curly mustache. They both played guitar and passionately performed the songs while the lyrics were displayed on the TV screen like karaoke for Christians, allowing everyone to sing along.
AXIS was led by Matt, who previously served as an assistant for a state senator before finding his calling to become a minister. Being 23 years old, Matt was superbly articulate in his message, explaining the genesis of AXIS with First Baptist’s desire to facilitate a church gathering for the unique set of circumstances that face 18–25 year-old Christians in today’s day-and-age. The message was centered on community, taking the New Testament theme of being together to encourage one another in Christ given the hardships that we face throughout life. The accompanying text was from Hebrews 10:18–25. When Matt asked everyone to follow the scripture with him, I was rather surprised to see the majority of the room pull out their smartphones to click an app to follow the text. After going to so many churches in the Dairyland, this was the first time I’ve seen today’s technology replace a hardcover Bible.
I’m not much of a Bible verse guy due the literal interpretation, but one passage that struck a chord with me was the very first passage.
Where there is forgiveness of these, there is no longer any sacrifice for sin. — Hebrews 10:18
Sacrifice.
As Matt explained, sacrifice implies giving up something that has a lot of worth to us. For Christ, he carried the burden of the cross to die once and for all, so that we would have access to the Father. In the Old Testament, this would mean sacrificing something valuable, such as a calf which may have been the only source of food for a household, with putting all their trust in God to help provide. With Jesus have atoned for our sins, we could move forward in confidence with faith in Christ.
When I contemplated this idea, I never realized how much the sacrifice of losing the one I had cared for would so deeply strengthen my faith during a volatile time. My pain helped to erode the weaknesses that was present in myself, then formed an identity where I could be brought closer to Christ.
Music is a way to express yourself, relate to the world. It can act as a moment, an epiphany, a mistake, a joy. It can be your friend, serve as a therapist, catalogue an identity. If I took anything out of this day by visiting the Johnny Cash Museum and the talented vocalists at First Baptist, it helped me to realize how powerful music is as a medium of spirituality.
What I appreciated about Matt and First Baptist was it’s initiative to be proactive for it’s millennial believers, rather than be hands-off that nearly all churches do. Several believers within the 18–25 age demographic are simply forgotten after the church invests numerous years of Sunday school lessons and confirmation classes to teach them the ways of Christ, and when the consequences of decisions are felt full force during the college years, my experience has seen that the idea of “fun” is with those holding a Big ‘Ol Bottle rather than seeking out a community of friends holding a Big ‘Ol Book. AXIS is a sanctuary in its own regards, and despite myself living 1000's of miles away, I was glad to be apart of it’s first get-together of what looks to be many.
While I had regrets of not being a better Christian boyfriend when Ten left to experience a new college life, the last couple of years I discovered that the break-up was the best thing to ever happen to me. The only thing that was holding me back from doing something truly amazing, was me. I truly believe, that one of the greatest challenges in life is being yourself in a world that’s trying to make you like everyone else. There will always be someone with better hair, someone will always be funnier (as evident with this blog), someone will always be younger, but they will never be me. My life is improved tremendously by taking time to self-reflect and take a chance on being myself. I just needed to take that one extra step off my comfortable little ledge and explore the amazing possibilities that is offered in this lifetime.
That’s music to my ears.
