She Must And Shall Go Free Part I: Nobody Loves Me

In this Flood Zone Sunday Night series we will be listening to Derek Webb's album She Must and Shall Go Free song by song and discussing the teaching in the song as it relates to the church.

The first song on the album is titled "Nobody Loves Me":

I can always tell a liar
and I always know a thief
I know them like my family
because brother I’m the chief
I’m a dangerous crusader
because i need to tell the truth
so I’m turning over tables
In my own living room

then I might nail indictments up
on every door in town
because it’s not right or safe to let my conscience down
so I don’t care if...

(chorus)
nobody loves me, nobody loves me
nobody loves me but you

the truth is never sexy
so it’s not an easy sell
you can dress her like the culture
but she’ll shock ‘em just as well
because she don’t need an apology for being who she is
and she don’t need your help making enemies
so I don’t care if...

(chorus)

i’ll do whatever it takes to squeeze us into this wedding gown
i’ll say the words that rattle your nerves
words like sin and faith alone


There are 3 major things we can learn from this song.

1. We need each other: In the church we need to speak truth to one another reminding each other and ourselves of the Gospel every day. In Derek's companion album The House Show he tells a story of some interaction between Martin Luther and his congregation:

"The story that I love to tell all the time is that Martin Luther, in the 1600's a few years after the Reformation, had a church he was pastoring over and some members of the church came to him and said, "Pastor why is it that week, after week after week all you ever preach to us is the Gospel. It seems that certainly we are ready to move on to something else. We know this by now." Luther's response was "Because week after week you forget it. Because week after week you walk in here like people who don't believe the gospel. And until you walk in looking like people who are truly liberated by the truth of the gospel, I will continue to preach it to you." And until his dying day he did."

We need each other. We need to reveal sin in each other's lives, but always remember to "turn over the tables in our own living room" first. Then we can "nail indictments up on every door in town." (Matthew 7:4)

We, the church, need to encourage one another in the proclamation of the Gospel and the revealing of sin in our lives.

2. We Need the Truth, not Flattery: Unfortunately, while the church seems to be there for each other, we are often doing nothing more than covering over each other's sins so that we are not embarrassed by the exposure of our own sin. But we need the Truth! We don't need anything less that the Truth of our sin, because without it, we ignore the TRUE remedy. Here is Derek's take on it from The House Show:

"And if we stop hearing that every single day especially in light of "the great righteousness" that we like to prop up as an idol from time to time, then we are never going to grow, our hearts will never change and our communities will never be sanctified. Here's the truth, flattery at it's very best will encourage really nothing more in you and in your community than behavior modification. Modifying your behavior to act the way you should and to hide the things you do that are wrong and try to amplify the things that are right. But here's the truth, all the behavior modification in the world, will never change your hearts, and it will never change our communities. Jesus, however, does change our hearts and he will change our communities and that is why boldness is called for."

"The Truth is never sexy" but man it sure is freeing! People may not want to hear it (2 Timothy 4:3-4) but they, and we, definitely need it. So, let's stick to the Truth and allow it to work in the hearts of people (starting with our hearts first). She may be offensive (1 Corinthians 1:23), but for the sake of eternity it is worth offending people with her than hiding under flattery and false motivations.

3. We need to expose the greatness of our sin and the greatness of our Savior

I'll let Derek's words suffice for this one:

"We have got to be honest. We should have no fear about being honest with each other about who we really are. Not just offering up the sins that we feel safe confessing, but being completely bold and completely forthcoming about who we really are. And saying, "You know what, I am going to stop hiding from you, and stop hiding who I am, because I believe the Gospel is true. I can only admit who I really am to you because I believe Jesus is truly who He is as well". You're never going to be truly filled with joy, unless you truly know yourself for who you are. And until you are a real sinner with a real Savior, you will only be a hypothetical and theoretical sinner and therefore with a hypothetical and theoretical savior. If you confess, "Oh I know, I'm sinful;" but you can't honestly put your finger on one sin you've committed all day, because your view of sin is nothing more than this cultural hiding game, then you're not experiencing real joy. If all I can confess is a knowledge of how sin has affected me, but I not any of my real sins, if I don't really know that I'm sinful, then I don't really know and am not really encouraged by the fact that I've been saved, because SAVED FROM WHAT? If I'm not really sinful, then what's the big deal? What's the good news? It's just news.

But if you know yourself as exposed by the cross, then I believe that you will begin to experience true joy. Because you will not be constantly looking over your shoulder, constantly checking the knots in the great suit of fig leaves you've sewn for yourselves. But rather, you will be comfortably exposed in your sin, and boasting in your great Savior. He is REAL. Charles Spurgeon once said, "If your sin is small, your Savior will be small, but if your sin is great, then your savior will be great." And folks, our Savior is truly great. "

We are the bride of Christ, but we so often shackle ourselves to the expectations of this world, to reputations, to popularity, to "self-esteem", to the approval of the world, to plurality and syncretizing that we are no longer free to be who Christ lived for, died for, and created the chruch to be, hindering or halting the ministries of the church for our own earthly gain.

What does God want you to let go of so that you can trust him and cling to him more for the sake of the Truth and the freedom of the Church?