As we sit in the dark, waiting for resurrection, given up like foster children, remember Jesus came to ensure our adoption. And then dance like it’s 1995.
One of the best things about being a parent is watching your kids dance to the music of your youth.
Like “Galapagos” by the Smashing Pumpkins.
Our family was talking about Galapagos turtles at lunch one Saturday. It was very educational. The kids were very interested in Galapagos turtles. And I, being the Dad that I am, thought, “You know what would make this conversation even more interesting? This, beautiful, tender, deep-cut from Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, the Smashing Pumpkins’s gloriously bloated double-album from 1995.”
It had been years since I listened to this song. I still remembered most of the lyrics and did my best Billy Corgan impersonation, which, um, is something. There’s lots of talk about leaving and falling from grace here, but I didn’t know until literally two minutes ago that this song is about the crumbling of Corgan’s marriage to his longtime girlfriend, Chris Fabian.
In the liner notes to the 2012 reissue of Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, Corgan wrote, “Idealizing a failed romance can only get you so far, and once engaged I found that somewhere between my idealism and natural compassion for an identified other there lived a truth I was not yet willing to swallow about myself.”
He also notes that the song “stands up over time as a remnant of grace that I lost as I wrote it.” Which is really quite a thought, if you think about it. And not just because it comes from Corgan, who is a notoriously difficult and narcissistic figure in the annals of tortured guitar gods. Hearing him talk about grace, hearing him sing about the falling away from grace, about leaving, about finding himself orphaned from love is itself a small bit of common grace.
There’s another song our family has sung and danced to that’s also about leaving. About falling from grace. About finding oneself an orphan.
We were doing dishes one night after dinner. I don’t remember exactly who said what or why, but someone said something about a stranger. Again, the exact details escape me. But I heard “stranger” and because I was brought up in the fear of the Lord, I started into the bridge of “Jesus Freak,” the massive crossover hit from Christian rap / rock band dc Talk.
People think I’m strange
Does it make me a stranger
That my best friend was born in a manger?
Then Lindsey joined in. Then the guitar solo hit, and I started moshing in the kitchen with the silverware strainer, basket-thing in my hand. And before you knew it, our entire family took part in a dance party that lasted the entire Jesus Freak—also released in 1995. What a world.
It had been a minute since I listened to the entire album. Too much to get into right now. Kevin Max’s Twitter is too much to get into right now. But as I stood on the hearth of our fireplace, lip syncing to Kevin Max Smith—which is also quite something—and got to the words, “Alas my love, this guilty night / It gives me up like a foster child,” I realized at that very moment that I had forgotten that this simile was in there. It surprised me. Sobered me. As a 12- or 13-year-old who listened to this album constantly, I didn’t have a clue what was meant by a “foster child” was. Now I do.
That’s quite the comparison to make, if you think about it. Our guilt and sin have rendered us homeless. And only the God-Man’s destruction of death by his death could make our adoption possible.
O God, you made this most holy night to shine with the glory of the Lord’s resurrection: Stir up in your Church that Spirit of adoption which is given to us in Baptism, that we, being renewed both in body and mind, may worship you in sincerity and truth; through Jesus Christ our Lord, who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.
That’s the Easter Eve collect from the Book of Common Prayer. A beautiful blend of Romans 6 and Colossians 2 (baptism and identifying with Christ’s death) and Romans 8 and Ephesians 3 (adoption as children of God).
If you find yourself sitting up tonight, waiting for the glory of tomorrow morning, consider your adoption. Consider the One who fell from grace so you don’t have to. Consider the One who, though he died, will never leave you. Consider the One who was forsaken by the Father, if only for a moment, so that you can boldly cry out, “Abba! Father!”
Happy Easter Eve. And happy Easter.
