25th Day of Easter - As the Ruins Fall

As the Ruins Fall - text by C. S. Lewis. Music and performance by Phil Keaggy

It occurred to me when this song came to mind yesterday that there is probably no other song I can think of that has influenced my life and theology as much as this one. I memorized all the words as I listened in my college dorm room, but certain lines pop...”All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you, I’ve never had a selfless thought since I was born...Peace, reassurance, pleasures are the goals I seek, I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin. I talk of love - a scholar’s parrot may talk Greek - but self-imprisoned always end where I begin.”  Those words remind me of my need for Christ and  the utter failure of my own righteousness. No trite platitudes here!

C. S. Lewis’s text (full poem below)  is as meaningful  today as it was back in the 70s, but the tune may not have held up as well to contemporary listeners. Phil Keaggy is an amazing guitarist and one of the giants of the Jesus Movement. His Wikipedia entry is worth reading if you have the time. I actually enjoy this rough recording of a live performance more than album recording I learned in my dorm because, though as a flutist it pains me to say it, the flute part gets a little long.

As the Ruins Fall - Love Broke Through album (1977)

As the Ruins Fall - Live Performance 2010

As The Ruin Falls

C. S. Lewis

All this is flashy rhetoric about loving you.
I never had a selfless thought since I was born.
I am mercenary and self-seeking through and through:
I want God, you, all friends, merely to serve my turn.

Peace, re-assurance, pleasure, are the goals I seek,
I cannot crawl one inch outside my proper skin:
I talk of love—a scholar’s parrot may talk Greek—
But, self-imprisoned, always end where I begin.

Only that now you have taught me (but how late) my lack.
I see the chasm. And everything you are was making
My heart into a bridge by which I might get back
From exile, and grow man. And now the bridge is breaking.

For this I bless you as the ruin falls. The pains
You give me are more precious than all other gains.