The Rabbit Room

I wish there was a repeat option on here! Beautiful.

Nice, Ron. Can’t wait for the record.

Ditto!

Wonderful. Makes ME long for home.

Wow sounds great Ron. Nice recording. Did you use your 54′s on guitars? Looking forward to the release.

Loved the music and lyrics! The name is fantastic, and so I cannot wait to hear the rest. In God’s Grace, m

Love this. Ron and Rebecca, I’m so excited for this project to come out!

This is beautiful. thanks for sharing this.

Nice!

Stellar works, as always, Ron. Thanks.

What a well crafted song!! The lyrics and melody are haunting!!

Great job Ron!

This. Is. Good. Happy that your gifts found each other, and encouraged by the example of collaboration you are setting.

I love everything about this song – you’d barely got through the first verse and I already loved it. Beautiful sound – very moving. Thankful for both of you – perfect combination.

Susan

I’m grateful for the encouragement, Rabbits. It’s a gift to be appreciated by folks like you.

By the way, the words to this song were written after reading C.S.Lewis’s essay “Transposition.” It’s one of my favorite essays of all time. If you’ve never explored it, I think it’s worth the dig.

Blessings,
Becca

Bummer, can’t play it on my iPhone because of its format.

[...] a rough mix of “Colors,” a song from Ron Block’s upcoming solo [...]

Nice Ron !!! Your dad got my old accordion when he was on Hawthorne Blvd in a trade for a Ventura acoustic guitar !! However, I’ve since seen the folly of my past and own another one although I don’t let many folks know that..

Best to you on the new cd as well !!

Really lovely. Kept expecting reference to the divine, but that was beautifully intimated nonetheless.

Erik, the divine is in there. I’ll expand the imagery a little, if you are interested.

As we walk through this world, we run into glimpses of beauty, glimpses of love, glimpses of dreams. These glimpses can be joyful, but they are never strong enough to fulfill us completely. There is often hunger, loneliness, and sadness caught in our earthly strivings for contentment, because we only end up grasping a whisper of what we had hoped to find.

C.S. Lewis believed that earthly joys and sensations point to Someone and something beyond what we have ever experienced. Our present world is merely a shadow of the heavenly joys yet to come. Even though we can find many pleasures in the company of the Lord’s Spirit on earth, it is still as if we burn these years in an atmosphere of limited language and two dimensions.

Soon, though, we will be home. For eternity, every longing awakened during our earthly lives will be met in Christ at last.

Thanks Becca, your comments are very helpful. Not having read the essay, I feel the “divine” message is a little too encoded, in particular, from the point of view of an unbeliever. For example, longing for home cannot be embraced in the same sense by an unbeliever as one who has been redeemed.

I’m always looking for wonderful new songs (Ron being a great source in the past) that may touch the hearts of those who may be called, and encourage them to seek answers, and open their hearts to the wonderful news of the gospel. I’m afraid this song, as beautiful as the lyrics are, without someone to explain them, may not be a great fit for that purpose, but I will certainly get Ron’s next album and be fed as I have been in by his previous albums.

Cheers,

Erik

Thanks for the feedback, Erik. It’s always helpful to hear different viewpoints. Ron has a unique gift for combining beauty with truth, and he has blessed my life in so many ways. I think you’re going to love his new record.

Cool comments, Ron. As I read them, I was put in mind of the diversity of Scripture.

There are places where the Biblical text is linear, exhortative, and clear – like the second half of Paul’s epistles. In those sections, God’s Word is straightforward about what is to be believed, known, understood.

Then, there are other segments where God has inspired poetry running over with imagery. I will never forget reading the phrase “deep calls to deep” in Psalm 42 for the first time. Those words caught in my soul before my brain could understand them. Or consider the piercing (but often baffling) imagery of the prophetic books. We could unpack the images of Isaiah or Revelation for the rest of our earthly lives, and perhaps never completely understand them. Jesus, likewise, told stories that seemed frustratingly vague to most of the people listening to Him. Even the disciples who had lived with Him daily often needed further explanation.

These variances in genre are part of what excite me most about God. He is so creative in His communication! He is not so lofty that He refuses clarity. He is not so simple that He refuses poetry.

That a God so multi-faceted would continue to manifest His voice through a plethora of artistic styles makes sense to me. I think he uses the creations of His children to continue the diversity He has already begun. That’s why I can celebrate a wide span of artistic endeavors within the Christian community, as long as they are theologically sound. The God of many tongues (personalities as well as nations) is using all manner of things to woo His children home.

Hey Ron:

God has so gifted you both spiritually and musically, and the fruits of your life works have greatly fed me in both ways throughout your musical career.

It sounds like we’re both seeking a similar place with regard to glorifying God in the music we compose and share. As a worship leader, I’ve spent many years focused on music that helps invite God’s presence to minister and feed my church family, thus preaching to the choir as you put it.

But as we are all ambassadors of Christ and commanded to spread the gospel to the ends of the earth, I have a longing to reach the hearts of unbelievers through God-given spiritual and musical gifts. But not being much of a composer, I’m always searching for songs that–as you put it–weave the gospel and the longing into works that can touch hearts and assist the Holy Spirit in winning hearts to our Savior Jesus Christ.

Of course salvation is entirely of God, through grace by faith alone, and I cannot save anyone, but I do so want to help Him as He chooses to use us in this purpose!

Keep your wonderful music coming, Ron! It has been a pleasure watching your life from afar, ever since we were acquaintances in your young, west coast days.

Blessings,

Erik

Ron, sorry to bother you with such a trivial thing. My old cassette version of the original Weary Hearts album has vanished, the one with Eric including the Stanley’s “Wings of Angels.” I have scoured the web to see if anyone has a copy. Do you know if it could be found? No worries if you don’t answer. I just learned much of that album as a kid, and consider it one of my “roots” influences. I just wanted to hear it again because it was so amazingly good for a bunch of young prodigies doing one of their first works.

Cheers,

Erik

In the discussion of spiritual and not spiritual concerning this new CD: Two devote believers are the masters of this great piece. AKUS would be mostly considered a secular band and I haven’t yet seen Miss Alison take out her bible and smacking anyone around. She’s usually moot on the subject but some of the songs she sings capture people that don’t belong to the choir as Ron would say. I have read so many posts where atheists knock AK’s religion but yet are strongly drawn to some of gospel songs mostly written by Ron. One person said they don’t believe in God but mention the song touched them in such a way that they may reconsider. I think Ron’s is correct that this new CD will possibly go out beyond the choir and draw interest from others that get touched by the words and then later on investigate more of Ron’s stuff. I think this is going to be a big one for Mr. Ron and Ms Rebecca. Either or, God’s leading is with them and He has his purpose. I could never judge anything Mr. Ron does musically. “Who can blame you and Pains of a trouble life were GREAT!

I think everybody – Christian or otherwise – knows what it’s like to yearn for a “home.” It all lies in where this home is found. For some it is the perfect earthly space, for others, it is setting their sights on what is eternal, and yet, for some it is even both.

For me, the song was a representation of a few things. The eternal home and peace that can be found in Salvation (something that goes with us no matter where we are,) and also the sense of being in a chaotic place, or maybe even just a place that isn’t “home,” and longing for rest, certainty, and safety.

The Answer may or may not be clear in this to a believer, and I don’t think the sentiment would be lost on an unbeliever. The song still has the power to make a person think and feel. It can make one look deeper, ask questions, and hopefully find an answer if that is what a person is searching for. I love gospel tunes, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with a song that outright proclaims the Answer or the Truth, but often times, we find the truth and answers we’ve been looking for in subtle places. A song need not blare, “THIS SONG IS ABOUT GOD” for us to receive it in a spiritual and/or emotional way and subsequently have some of our inquiries answered without having it directly handed to us.