I think the reason I like this early stage of The Voice the most is that we learn the background stories of the singers before they go out for their “blind audition.” Quite often there is a very powerful story behind what brought the singer to that point. Last night there was a young man (maybe 18 or so) whose father was a musician. His father was his hero and best friend, but tragically his father was diagnosed with a cancerous brain tumor, which began a long, painful fight with cancer. The young singer told the story of how he and his brother, just boys themselves, finally went into their father’s room and told him it was okay to stop fighting, that they would miss him but that they couldn’t see him suffer any longer. He died within days. It was at that time the young man decided he was going to become a singer to honor his father and to carry on his legacy. After we saw that “video package,” Danielle and I (and millions of others around the world) thought, “Please let this kid get picked.” Unfortunately, whether it was nerves or something else, his voice didn’t come across very well. He was not chosen. Thankfully this show isn’t like the early years of American Idol in which Simon might say something like, “I’m sorry your dad died, but your voice is just plain rubbish and it makes me think of a dying animal caught in a trap.” The coaches on The Voice heard more of his story and were very empathetic and proud of him. They also encouraged him, reminding him that he is young and has time to work on the mechanics of being a good singer. “You’re 80% of the way there,” one of the coaches said. The young man began to weep on the stage. It was a difficult moment to watch, a moment of raw humanity.
There was another singer, an amazingly beautiful young woman (early twenties?) who was born into abject poverty in Jamaica. When she was two, her single mother left her and her siblings with family members and moved to the United States to try to find work. Her mother worked several jobs, sent money back to Jamaica, and finally was able to send for her children. This young woman was singing to honor her mother, to honor her Jamaican heritage, and to shine some light on the millions who live in squalor in the very poor nation of Jamaica. She chose to sing “No Woman No Cry” by Bob Marley, a song that comforts a woman living through terrible trials. As she spoke of her mother, tears began to leave dark trails from her eyes down over her cheeks. “I really hope she’s good,” I said to Danielle. Perhaps it was the emotion, I’m not sure, but like that young man she just didn’t come across that well in her singing. Ironically, it lacked emotion. It was “flat,” I think one of the coaches later commented. None of the coaches turned their chair. She told her story to the coaches. “I’m sorry, but that didn’t come across in your singing,” one of them commented, feeling bad for her. Then the young woman did something I’ve never seen any other “contestant” do. She asked, “Could I sing it for you a capella? I know you can’t choose me now, but could I just do this?” They were gracious enough to let her do it. With tears running down her face, she then sang “No Woman No Cry” beautifully with so much depth and emotion that all the coaches had chills and it moved the hearts of millions. What courage that took! They encouraged her to come back next year to give it another shot.
There were other stories as well: the rock singer who gave up his band to start a family, the preacher’s daughter who had been outcast from her church as she discovered in her teens that she was lesbian (her parents, who are both pastors, were there with her to support her and had not cast her out like so often happens), and there was the retail clerk working two jobs that after she sang one of the coaches called her, “Without a doubt the best country singer we’ve ever heard on this show.” It was good stuff and there’s two more nights of “blind auditions” this week. I’ll be watching because of the stories as much as the music.
I’m like this with the Olympics too. I tend to care more about the stories behind the athletes than the actual athletic feats themselves. I, like many others around the world, was inspired by Oscar Pistorius of South Africa, who was running on prosthetic “blades” and had fought for his chance to compete against “able bodied” runners. The courage and perseverance of Guor Marial was awe inspiring. He is the Sudanese marathoner who took up competitive running “after running for his life since he was a young boy in Sudan, growing up in the middle of one of the deadliest wars of the 20th century. He learned to run as he fought to escape from those who killed his siblings and relatives and later kidnapped and enslaved him.” There was also the brave story of Tahmina Kohistani, “the lone woman in the Afghan delegation, who endured threats and taunts to keep her out of the Games” as well as the first two female athletes ever to compete from Saudi Arabia, Wojdan Ali Seraj Abdulrahim Shahrkhani and Sarah Attar, “who represent a country where women are not only banned from participating in sports, they're even banned from watching sports events in major stadiums.” How inspiring!
It is no accident that people who are relentless in pursuit of their dreams, whether as an Olympic athlete or on The Voice or many other arenas of life, have stories of hardship in their past. Does that young man wish his father was still with him? Of course he does, as he should. But some good has come out of the terrible; he has developed perseverance, drive, and a purpose. Does that young woman wish her mother would not have lived in poverty and had to work her fingers to the bones? I would imagine so. But some good has come out of the bad; she has an example in her mother of fierce determination and love. It is the same with the Olympic athletes I mentioned too. They probably wish they had not suffered. But they did, and some good has come from it. It doesn’t make what happened to them good, but it does show that some good can come from the bad.
I don’t know what you are facing today. Maybe you or someone you know is suffering. Maybe you are sick or exhausted or feel all alone. Maybe somebody did something to you a long time ago that has scarred you. I have no idea why you are going through this or why someone you love is going through this. I will never tell anyone, “This is God’s will for you.” First of all, I don’t know that and secondly, who does it make God if we believe that cancer ravaging the body of a helpless little child is God’s will? Every day I, and billions of others, pray for an end to suffering, but it does not come. Many of us, however, continue to believe in God and that God is a good God who loves us. It is impossible for us to reconcile suffering and God’s goodness in any way that will satisfy our understandable confusion and anger. What I have chosen to do is put my faith in God in Jesus Christ anyway, and to ask the Holy Spirit to give me more faith and courage than I currently have. My life is pretty idyllic right now but storms will come eventually. After all, the most peaceful beaches in the world get hit by hurricanes from time to time, don’t they? That is why I (and many others)hold on to the truth of Romans 8:28, “And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose.” To claim this biblical truth does not mean we believe God caused what is happening. Sometimes we cause our own difficult circumstances, but most of the time we don’t and we don’t know what did cause it. “Why is this happening to me?,” is a legitimate question to ask.
Tragically, much that happens to us we must simply endure as a part of living in our fallen world. We can either become bitter or we can allow ourselves to be made better in spite of it and through it. Do we continue to wish it didn’t happen? Of course we do. It is not how we would have written the script for our lives. Every day we miss someone who has died. We miss them so deeply that our chests ache and we lament that they didn’t have the chance to live out “the fullness of their days.” We struggle everyday with what someone did to hurt us or hurt someone we love. We look at our loved one lying in a hospital bed and we feel helpless, which in many ways we are. But it is happening to us; in most cases we can’t change that. It is happening. PERIOD. So we hold on to hope. We hold on like a drowning person grasping for anything that will float. We do our best to trust that somehow it is really true that from death God does bring life, that from Friday does come Easter Sunday, that from the cross does come the empty tomb, and that somehow, someday God will bring something good out of something so bad. Perhaps someday we will know the answers to our questions. But that day is not today. In the meantime, we can be thankful, at least, that sometimes the good that rises out of the rubble of the bad is nothing less than our voice, a voice we didn’t know we had, a voice that we can use, perhaps trembling at first, to sing out to the Lord in the midst of our trials, to sing out to the Lord a new song.
