The rest of this series: Intro and Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 4

Jon Foreman, Switchfoot and Me

Ch. 5 – The Sound of Truth

Another album. Another step forward in life. I was now chasing two little girls (one of whom had no interest in sleep.) The only thing I remember noticing initially about Switchfoot’s album Nothing is Sound was the artwork. For some reason this album cover fixed in my mind and has remained one of my favorites.

As seems to be my tendency with this band, the music from this album came around to accompany me years later. In 2009 I had three little girls to keep up with, the confusion of a global recession to process, and was amid what I look back now and see was a season of intense personal crisis. The year opened with broken health and the shock and fallout of unexpected deaths, and ended with my husband’s job layoff and the beginning of watching a long line of friends lose their homes. At the time I was just trying to survive.

The beauty of that time was smiling little faces with bright eyes and full cheeks. The chatter of little girl voices and laughter filled our home, and days of tea parties, digging in the dirt, and styling doll hair were treasures I will never cease to be thankful for. To say our daughters were the light in the dark during that time would be an understatement. The beautiful miracle of small children looked me in the face every day, and it was an unspeakable gift.

During those days, we spent lots of time in the kitchen, because baking is such a happy occupation. Because we were living the days before MP3s or streaming, a little “boombox” cd player sat on my kitchen counter. One day I turned on a random, caseless CD that I hadn’t listened to before.

That’s the first time I remember hearing Stars.

When I look at the stars
When I look at the stars
I see someone else
When I look at the stars, the stars
I feel like myself

At that time star-gazing had become one of my most peace-giving ways of passing the time. This song captured what I was finding: in the middle of a fearful wrestling with my faith, the sight of the stars could always bring things back into perspective.

I was also captured by Happy is a Yuppie Word because it articulated the view of life I was attempting to come to terms with for the first time. (And since yuppie is a very dated word, here’s a definition.)

Jon Foreman’s repeated cry that “nothing is sound” echoed the desperate realization in my own heart, while his answer to that truth matched the shaky but persistent place I stood.

I don’t believe the emptiness
I’m looking for the kingdom coming down

Finally, the song I’ve turned to the same way I would turn to a hymn. Year after year it has been a trustworthy reminder of reality, when all the darkness hovers close; offering a question that changes everything… What if the darkness is proclaiming the light?

Oh Lord, why did You forsake me?
Oh Lord, don’t be far away
Storm clouds gathering beside me
Please Lord, don’t look the other way

I’m a crooked soul trying to stay up straight
Dry eyes in the pouring rain where
The shadow proves the sunshine
The shadow proves the sunshine…

Shine on me
Let my shadows prove the sunshine

The rest of the series: Intro and Chapter 1. Chapter 2. Chapter 3.

Jon Foreman, Switchfoot and Me

Ch. 4 – Upside-Down Beauty

The year was 2003.  Switchfoot was releasing the album that brought them to the forefront of mainstream attention. And I was chasing a two-year-old who we affectionately called “Forrest” because she never stopped running. In a way, Switchfoot and I were growing up together. They were growing into themselves as a band. And I was doing the same in my life. It was a time of young married life, young motherhood, and music as my constant companion since a half-hour drive lay between me and civilization any time I left the house.

I didn’t think too deeply about the songs on this album when they came out, but again the words fixed in my mind and began to form me in ways I wouldn’t realize until years later.

Dare You to Move was revisited on this album and was a huge hit. The other two big hits on this album carried some of the lines that have stuck with me and shaped my everyday thinking.

This is Your Life offers anchoring focus to a brain that likes to bounce back and forth between past and future and struggles with simply being present:

This is your life
And today is all you’ve got now
And today is all you’ll ever have
Don’t close your eyes

These words come to me again and again, particularly when I am flooded with worries about tomorrow. Echoing the words of Jesus, I sing these lines and am reminded that today is where I belong.

Meant to Live was the hit that brought Switchfoot the most attention, had all kinds of influence in the music world, and gave words to the unrest in every human heart:

We want more than this world’s got to offer…
And everything inside screams for second life.

Another song I’ve continued to go back to over the years is On Fire… a beautiful song of surrender.

When everything inside me
Looks like everything I hate
You are the hope I have for change
You are the only chance I’ll take

This album was such a huge success that 20 years later they have released a new recording of it, and a variety of artists have released covers of it. (This one’s my favorite). Oddly enough, the title track from the album never really crossed my radar until this time last year.

The Beautiful Letdown came into my life at a time when broken and losing hope were the mildest words I could use to describe the state I was in. Knowing Switchfoot’s own story surrounding this album, this song felt like having them enter into my pain.

It was a beautiful letdown
When I crashed and burned
When I found myself alone unknown and hurt
It was a beautiful letdown
The day I knew
That all the riches this world had to offer me
Would never do

Again they gave words to my experience, and then they offered me a direction to set my sights.

In a world full of bitter pain and bitter doubts
I was trying so hard to fit in
Until I found out
That I don’t belong here (I don’t belong)
I don’t belong here (I don’t belong)
I will carry a cross and a song where I don’t belong (I don’t belong)

Once more, these men were companions when I needed someone the most.

Over the years, one song from this album has stayed with me more than any other. The song that makes me think of growing little girls singing from the back seat, while I got lost in words that set my world right-side up by turning “normal” upside down.

Where’s your treasure, where’s your hope
If you get the world and lose your soul

Ah, the liberating gift of perspective.