The ever continuing brilliance of U2

I have to admit that most of the songs I have heard off of U2's most recent offering No Line On The Horizon (ok, so this really came out over a year ago) doesn't really do anything for me -- I say this as someone who has seen U2 live three times as many times as I have any other artist.  I really found this last album to be a big disappointment.  Then, I watched a re-play of a show they did for the BBC on a building top about the time the album came out and heard Breathe.  I have read where Bono said that is the best song on the album -- I agree, that guitar line grabs you by the spine and won't let you go.  As is often the case with so many U2 songs, Bono seems to hide little uplifting, very spiritual lines in songs. In doing more digging on this song I have discovered several different versions they do in live performances:




I also looked up the lyrics on several "lyric pages" that have the lyrics all wrong.  Anyway, this version has these lines that will give me a great deal to reflect on as I drive across south Arkansas at 7:00 tomorrow morning:


Every day I, die again and again I'm reborn
Every day I, have to find the courage
to walk out into the street with arms out
people we meet are not knocked down  (another version has:  not knowing defeat, neither down or out)
there's nothing you have that I need,
I can breath
Breathe now

I find it so powerful to think about how true that is, how we have to find the courage each day to get up and face a world that grows in hatred for Christians each day.  Each day we have to find the courage to walk out with arms out to the people we meet.  It is Christ that I find that courage.  It is in knowing that Christ died on the cross for my sins and finding rebirth in the love of the Holy Ghost each day.

I also think the line "there's nothing you have that I need" is a direct statement to the world, and should be one we as Christians make at every opportunity.  The world has nothing to offer us.  The world is sin, the world is devil's playground and we should reject its siren song.  It is only through God's grace that rejecting sin is possible.  It is, as Bono sings later in this song, "I've found grace that's all I've found, now I can breathe."