You ever have a love you couldn't deny and a
life you couldn't survive at the same time? I
don't mean a high school crush or that two -week
fling that fizzled out when you realized they
put ketchup on spaghetti. I mean the kind of
love that gets in your teeth. The kind that sits
in the marrow and refuses to leave even when
you've begged it to. And yet, right alongside
it, a life that keeps grinding you down. A rhythm
that eats your good days and gnaws on your bad
ones. A road you can't seem to walk without leaving
blood in the gravel. That's where we're living
in this episode. We're not just unpacking a song
tonight. We're stepping into a story you might
already be in. And before you start telling yourself
this is about somebody else's bad decisions or
somebody else's heartbreak, just sit still for
a moment because you might hear your own footsteps
in here. This is Theology in Three Chords. I'm
your host, Brother Jim. Some folks call me the
semi -seminarian. Some folks call me red. Around
here, we treat folk songs like sacred texts.
We believe the same God who spoke through Isaiah
can still speak through a Max Stalling lyric
or a Jimmy Buffett turn of phrase. And you know
what? We're going to listen for that kind of
speaking in this one. Now here's how this works.
We drop the needle on the track, not just to
admire the melody or not along with the hook,
but to walk around inside it. We're looking for
the cracks where the light gets in, the moments
where the songwriter accidentally or maybe on
purpose preaches a gospel that maybe they didn't
even know they were holding. We'll follow the
characters where they go, ride shotgun through
the wrecks. See if the same grace that found
them might find us too. And while you're here,
I'd be grateful if you'd pull up a chair at our
little table. Click that subscribe button. Share
the episode with somebody who's got their own
love they can't deny. Life they can't survive.
And leave a comment telling me where this story
might have hit home. You never know. Your story
might be the thing that helps somebody else keep
going. Pour yourself a cup, turn the lights low,
and let's do what we do here. We're going to
step inside Mike McClure's Jack of Diamonds and
see where the ditch meets the high road and maybe
where the captain's voice still calls, I'll meet
you halfway. I'll see you on the other side.
So, let me ask you again. Have you ever had a
love you couldn't deny and a life you couldn't
survive at the same time? Not a postcard romance,
something rougher, truer. The kind that shows
up uninvited and takes your chair like it paid
rent. The kind you feel in your teeth when you
try to sing over it. You walk the house at midnight
because the rooms can't hold it and the quiet
keeps handing you questions you don't want to
answer. You pour glass to hush the noise, but
the ice is louder. You step out onto the porch,
the town's asleep, but your heart's up late,
tapping its foot, wanting a verdict you don't
have. That is the ache this song stands in. The
split down the middle where longing and survival
glare at each other like strangers who share
a last name. Jack of Diamonds doesn't tidy the
gap. It sits in it with you. And it tells you
the truth out loud. Well, the Jack of Diamonds
and the Queen of Hearts hit the road and hit
the dark, hit the brakes and tried to park, but
they slid off in a ditch. We know these two because
they live in our mirrors. The jack of diamonds,
a little shine, not much crown. A man with enough
charm to get dealt into the hand, not enough
wisdom to set the table. The queen of hearts,
I mean love with gravity. Tender and dangerous.
The kind of card that makes every other card
in the deck nervous. They launch fast, headlights
cutting the black gravel, sprays like a choir
of sparks. But speed isn't the same as direction.
And hit the dark is the honest line nobody wants
to say out loud. When the brakes finally matter,
it's too late. The ditch takes what the road
won't keep. You know what? We've all lived in
that skid. We've called it adventure because
we were proud, or escape because we were scared,
but the truth, it was drift, dressed up. We weren't
steering, momentum -wise. Sometimes, sometimes
the ditch's mercy stops the car you wouldn't
stop yourself. Well, they played the game while
the elevator ran down the shaft to the promised
land, hit the ground with a heavy hand, and the
conductor flipped a switch. cut to a box of soft
light and bad music. The elevator slides like
a lullaby, and we tell ourselves it's going somewhere
good. We play the game to pass the time, shuffle,
deal, pretend the odds are always in our favor,
but listen, the cable's grown. The promise is
underground. That's the wrong geography for a
promised land. The stop is hard enough to rename
your bones. Somewhere above the ceiling, the
conductor. Call him fate, temptation, the house
throws a switch with a bare hand. You didn't
choose the floor. You were delivered to it. And
we all know that ride. We've smiled on the way
down because it felt easier than looking up.
We've all called the descent progress because
momentum is flattering. Until the impact. When
gravity has a hold of you, bluffing will not
save you. But naming the floor you hit might.
So the devil came back on the prow, low and steady
with a heavy growl. Slowly growing darker now,
there's a rapping at the door. There's a sound
habits make when they remember you. It isn't
loud, it isn't patient. Low and steady. Like
it's done this walk with you before. The room
dims by degrees. You forgot what color your walls
were in real daylight. Then comes the knock.
Measured. Like the visitor thinks he has a key
and is just being polite. We know that knock.
We know that posture where your hand finds the
doorknob on its own because at least the old
trouble is familiar. We, not just you, we both,
you know it, we've gone quiet at 2 a .m. We've
stalled in the hallway with our palms sweating.
We've opened, we've closed. We've stood still
until the wrapping faded and felt both relieved
and lonely about it. The enemy rarely kicks in.
He waits. And grace teaches us how to wait him
out. Well, it's the four wands with the ace of
cups. Somehow, that just don't add up. Sorry,
fellas, lots of luck. Can't feel that anymore.
And now the deck changes languages. We're not
just shuffling spades and diamonds. We're handing
out emblems. Four wands is a homecoming. A canopy
strung with lights. The ace of cups is first
poor grace. Love that won't run dry. And in another
room, these two cards start a dance and end with
a toast. But here's the verdict. That just don't
add up. Wrong table. Wrong room. Write symbols
in a house with rigged math. Can't feel that
anymore. Lands like a doctor tapping your knee
and getting nothing. The reflex is gone. Some
of us have learned numbness as survival. Turn
the nerve off so the blade can't find it. Then
one day the good comes near and the switch is
still stuck. We watch our own heart like it's
behind glass. When your jaw nerve is asleep,
don't panic. Sometimes it's the splint that kept
you from shattering worse. So the first refrain,
I've called out to my captain. I said, sir, I've
gone astray. Am I too far gone to come back now?
He said, no, son. I'll meet you halfway. Here's
the question with teeth. No, decorate the prayer
pretty, just the old fear in a new accent. Am
I too far gone? And that half -sentence answer,
no, son, carries a father's palm on the back
of your neck. I'll meet you halfway as mercy
with its boots on. Not a map, not a lecture.
Movement. Start walking. I'm already walking.
And we hear this, and the room changes temperature.
We, plural. Because one of the holiest tricks
Grace pulls is convincing a whole crowd that
the answer was for them personally and being
right every time. Halfway isn't a bargain. It's
how love shortens a road that you can't on your
own. Well, a couple of things I've come to know.
The good times come, and they will surely go.
And liquor is like a torpedo. Tangles as it tears.
Tired truth. The high burns quick. The come down
lasts longer. And the bottle and whatever wears
the bottle's mask in your story doesn't just
hit, it binds you up. It tangles as it tears.
That's the perfect cruelty. The wound that won't
let you swim away from it. And we've learned
to sanctify our torpedoes as tools. It helps
me sleep. It helps me speak. It helps me forget.
Then we wake to find lines wrapped around our
ankles like eels. The ocean doesn't care if your
excuses are eloquent. It just continues to pull.
If you're tangled, it doesn't mean you're weak.
It means you've found the lines that need cutting.
It slammed into my sinking ship, wrapped itself
in barbed wire fence, wiped down and cleaned
the fingerprints by drunks that moved the chairs.
Now the camera backs up and shows the room at
a slant. The ship wasn't steady before it was
hit. Remember, it was sinking. The barbed wire
is the lie that pain can protect you. Wrap it
tight enough and no one will get in except you're
the one bleeding. Wipe down and clean the fingerprints.
We know this ritual. Clean what can be cleaned.
Explain what can be explained. And draft an alibi
that sounds like maturity. Then that last line,
slurred and brutal. Drunks that move the chairs.
The scene betrays itself. The center cannot hold
that the furniture has its own agenda. We've
walked into our own lives, knocked a shin on
what used to be in the other corner. Faith, trust,
breakfast, bedtime. We blink, squint, turn on
more lights. The room keeps lying. Or maybe we
do. You don't have to prove the room is straight.
You could admit it's crooked and ask for help
to level the house. This one's my favorite. Verse
8. Well, lazy burning turning lanes, lower lumen
hurricanes, twisting up the wetter veins of the
path of least resistance. Road and sky both misbehaving,
lazy burning turning, feels like driving through
a fever dream. Lanes that wander, shoulders that
melt off the side. The storms sit low like they
pay rent. Gauges spin, north forgets itself,
and the path of least resistance starts talking
to us like it's our friend. Come on, this way's
downhill. We know that voice because we used
it to coach ourselves through bad weather and
worse choices. We told our legs to rest while
the current had its say. We've woke up in another
county wondering who moved the state line. Ease
is not the same thing as peace. If the wind is
pushing, test its theology before you follow
it. So I crossed the road way up on high. For
love I could not deny. With a weathered brow
and my crooked eyes stared off in the distance.
Here is the hinge you can hear click. So I crossed,
not crawled back to the ditch, not rode the elevator
again. Crossed. Exposure. Risk. Traffic. And
not for thrill this time, for a love I cannot
deny. And the body keeps the score, weathered
brow, crooked eye. We can't get a makeover. We
only get direction. The gaze settles where the
road gets thin and clean. Their horizon looks
understated and trustworthy, and so you step.
We've made that shy, stubborn turn. We, plural.
Some of us limped into it. Some of us laughed
from nerves and cried three steps later. Some
of us called a friend and said nothing, letting
the silence witness the crossing. Don't wait
to feel holy. Just aim your feet and go. Wholeness
often shows up in motion. And now the second
refrain. I called out to my captain. I said,
Sir, I have gone astray. Am I too far gone to
come back now? He said, No, son, I will meet
you halfway. Say the question the same way. Let
the words wear a groove. The second time tastes
different because your mouth remembers the first
answer. Still you ask, and still the answer comes
like rain. Unsurprised, unfancy, but enough.
We're all standing in that mid -road motel lobby
somewhere, hands in pockets, dust on our cuffs,
waiting to hear if we get to check back into
a life that won't kill us. Clerk looks up with
a face we can't read and smiles. Like he knows
our dad. Repetition isn't faithlessness. It's
how hope practices breathing. One more time for
the scar tissue. Am I too far gone to come back
now? No, son. I'll meet you halfway. Same syllables,
same cadence, same answer. Louder somehow because
your ribcage finally made room for it. The line
lands like an arm across your shoulders. Simple,
warm, weight that blesses. Some truths don't
get truer. They just get closer. So I'll ask
you how we started and I'll mean it the same.
You ever had a love you couldn't deny and a life
you couldn't survive at the same time? If you're
standing in that split, hear this as clean as
a train whistle on a cold night. Halfway is already
happening. Put your foot on the high road. He's
already running towards you. When you feel the
ground turn from gravel to pavement under your
heel, don't look back to see how far you've come.
Just look up and see who's coming. So, here we
are on the other side of Jack of Diamonds. We've
been down in the ditch, dropped down the elevator
shaft, felt the hurricane twist the weather vanes
and crossed the high road with a crooked eye
toward the horizon. And if you're anything like
me, you're hearing that first question perhaps
a little differently now. You ever had a love
you couldn't deny and a life you couldn't survive
at the same time? At the start, maybe you were
picturing a woman, a man, a face you could still
see in the corner of your memory. But now, maybe
that love's not just romance. It's the kind of
love that feels like it's holding you together
even when your life's being pulled apart. Maybe,
maybe, maybe that's God's love. Maybe it's the
stubborn ember of your own soul. Maybe it's both.
Here's the thing. I'm not here to solve it for
you. Some songs, some questions aren't meant
to be tidied up. This one ends just like the
road does, still stretching out, still waiting
for you to take a step. And the captain's voice,
it's still the same answer, halfway. It's what
I love about this kind of storytelling. It's
not here to preach you into a corner. It's here
to walk with you down the middle, even if your
shoes are muddy and your map's upside down. And
if this conversation meant something at all to
you, if it stirred something in your chest or
gave you a little company on your high road,
do me a favor. Hit that like button. Share this
with somebody you know is fighting to keep a
love alive while holding the rest of their life
together. Subscribe so you don't miss the next
time we find gospel in the gravel. Leave a comment.
Tell me where this song met you. Because I read
every single one of them. Because here's the
truth. This podcast isn't just me talking into
a microphone. It's us. Building a long table
out here where the weary can sit. You bring your
story. I'll bring mine. And we'll see if between
the two of us we can hear the spirit humming
along under the static. Until next time, I want
to leave you with this. Whether you're stuck
in the ditch or halfway across the high road,
whether your love is tearing you up or holding
you together, grace is already walking toward
you. You might not see her yet. You might not
believe me yet, but she's coming. And when you
call out, because you will, the answer will be
the same. No, son, I'll meet you halfway. See
you next time. Chapter 6. Therefore, leaving
the principles of the doctrines of Christ, let
us go on.