Change Gonna Come ✊😩
“We are hard pressed on every side, but not crushed; perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not abandoned; struck down, but not destroyed. We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus, so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body." ~ 2 Corinthians 4:8-10
In 1964, American Singer-Songwriter Sam Cooke released a song that would come to be voted among the greatest songs ever released.
Even without knowing the history of the genesis of the song, titled "A Change Is Gonna Come", just listening to it one could feel the very palpable emotions and struggles from which it was birthed.
The song itself carried with it the weight of frustration and exasperation of a people tired of dealing with the injustices of racism and souls longing for a better tomorrow.
In fact, the prompting to pen and produce the ballad came from the author's own personal brush with discriminatory treatment against himself and his family... and out of that encounter, Sam decided to cook up something that would share his own internal grief that would inspire and ignite a movement that bore much fruit that many still enjoy today.
The song also brandishes deeply powerful lyrics that speak of an acknowledgment of a long and arduous journey faced by a people, clinging to the hope that propels them onward: the assurance that a change is just about imminent.
This is so very reminiscent of the struggle faced by God's people for eons. We are pressed on every side, but not abandoned by God.
Sometimes we feel discouraged and sometimes we feel depressed, but there is always a hope that drives us forward: that God promised that He will never leave us... and that a glorious change is coming.
God gives us the assurance that he will never forsake His children here in this life... and He concretely lets us know that the day is coming when we shall be changed from mortal to immortality, in the twinkling of an eye and transported to eternal life with Him.
As it is in Sam Cooke's song, the breakthrough: the return of the Messiah, is a long time in coming and we may not know the exact day nor the hour, but we know for sure that that change is coming.
A line in the song says
"It's been too hard living, but I'm afraid to die
'Cause I don't know what's up there, beyond the sky"
Thankfully... we, as the people of God don't have to live with such dreadful uncertainty. We know what lies beyond the great gulf of the unknown... our new Heavenly home.
So encourage yourself, encourage someone else to keep on holding on and pushing on for Christ, because though it's been a long long time coming, we know that Change Gonna Come.