A spiritual/philosophic question: "Grace makes beauty out of everything?"

[octopus]

Last night, for the first time since last weeks horrors I actually turned on some music. I got good and loaded on red wine and listened to, among other things, ATYCLB.

Sullen and brooding, I eventually came across Grace. I sat there listening to "Grace makes beauty out of ugly things...Grace makes beauty out of everything".

Before last Tuesday, in my little world, I thought those lines could be true. Now, thinking of last week, I just can't imagine finding any beauty in any form of it. Do we just wait and see what God has in store for us before we can find any beauty in any of this?

I know these are just lines in a song, but it may go deeper than that... I just don't know where.

 

[Dreamboat Annie]

-bump-
I think this thread deserves another chance.

 

[80sU2isBest]

As a Christian, when I speak of Grace, it means that God has forgiven my sin, and given me his righteousness. That is what I think Bono means when he say "grace makes beauty from ugly things".

 

[popkidu2]

Well, I ain't a christian, although I was brought up as one, but I wouldn't mind commenting on this.

"Grace makes beauty out of ugly things"

First of all...Bono's words ain't the Gospel...but anyway

Look at WWII for example. Here's a lesser know fact. Many of the medical advances that we've made could not have been made without the nasty ugly horrible experiments the nazi's performed. Harsh, but true.

Look at Europe. Would the nations of Europe have become democratic states without WWII. Sure, we had communism in the USSR, but everyone is coming around slowly but surely. Pre-WWII, that wouldn't have been the case. We still have the Austro-Hungarian empire, monarch everywhere....democracy was a farce before the war.

I think that many good things come out of ugly things. Whether or not beautiful things will come of the US terrorist attacks is to be seen. We have the capacity to kill outselves as a human race. Let's hope we don't do it.

 

[U2junkie]

I could be all washed up on this one but my take on this song, from the beginning was this:

"Grace, it's the name for a girl, it's also the name.......that could change the world"...(forgive me if I don't have the lyrics exact).....Right there, I thought, Yes, Bono....the world does NEED Grace..
and if the world had it, the ugliness in it could turn beautiful. The problem is...the world doesn't HAVE it. That's my take on the song.

Maybe this is tragedy is, in many ways, a wake-up call. Unfortunately, the call may be too late. I pray it's not. And the world could use all the prayers it can get right now.

 

[martha]

I think of it on a personal level. You can make beauty from ugly things if you look for it. Look at the beautiful courage of the rescue workers in NYC. Look at the way that strangers are willing to help other strangers. Watch the way people come together to express both their sorrow for what happened and their love for each other. Grace is a movement of the heart. Don't wait; look for the Grace that God put in you and act on it. Renew someone else's faith in Grace and you can rediscover your own faith in it.

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...a highway with no one on it, a treasure just to look upon it...

"The skeletal structure of your foot is not normal." -- my podiatrist 8-6-01

 

[DebbieSG]

It means even more now. Grace gives us the peace and hope to carry on despite all the grief that is around us. We are reminded there is a greater good. I don't think we could deal with the anger and violence around us if God didn't put His grace into our souls, and that helps us respond with humility and compassion.

 

[foray]

hi octopus, I had the same 'U2 moment' yesterday too, talk about coincidences. I was wondering about that line in Grace as well, but unlike you, I said to myself how true those words are. Other than the Christian context 80su2isbest mentioned, I think that it takes humility and grace for a person to admit that something good came out of something ugly. Like this tragedy of Black Tuesday, it has united people not only in America but around the world. For eg, I was involved in a 'cold war' with a friend but after the world was shocked by the incident, we've been talking again. Amazing huh.

foray