Grace & Jeff Buckely

Jeff Buckley was a singer/songwriter who became famous in the late 1990s with the release of his only studio album, Grace. 

After touring extensively, developing a tremendous following, and receiving critical acclaim, Buckley was ready to begin recording material for his sophomore album. The next day, while waiting for his band to arrive in Memphis, he decided to swim fully clothed in Wolf Harbor, a tributary of the Mississippi.  

Tragically, he got caught in the wake of a passing tugboat and dragged underwater, and he drowned.  His autopsy showed no signs of drugs or alcohol, and his friend, who remained on shore, verified that he had not intended to end his own life.  

The title song of the only album he would ever record had these haunting lyrics: 

There's the moon asking to stay
Long enough for the clouds to fly me away
Well it's my time coming, I'm not afraid, afraid to die
My fading voice sings of love
But she cries to the clicking of time, oh, time
Wait in the fire, wait in the fire
Wait in the fire, wait in the fire

Reportedly, Buckley wrote this song after saying goodbye to his girlfriend at the airport and feeling the wave of emotions in the moment.  

I've loved this song for a long time because, even though the title is "Grace," Buckley never uses the word once in the song. The lyrics, though, reveal something about Buckley's understanding of grace.  

There's something about how he phrases this particular stanza, which is the most crucial part of the song, that speaks to a person who regrets things done and left undone. He feels his beloved's love wash over him, realizing he doesn't deserve its depth. 

When he sings "Wait in the fire" repeatedly, he also realizes how this grace is refining him, making him new.   

In an interview before his death, Buckley was asked why the idea of grace was so important to him and why he named both the song and the album Grace.  This is what he said: 

Grace is what matters in anything - especially life, especially growth, tragedy, pain, love, death. That's a quality that I admire very greatly. It keeps you from reaching out for the gun too quickly. It keeps you from destroying things too foolishly. It sort of keeps you alive.

The irony of that last line is not lost on me, considering Buckley's untimely and tragic passing right as he realized his dreams.  

But when you look closely at the one line from the song where he sings, "Well, it's my time coming. I'm not afraid, afraid to die."  Something is haunting and beautiful about it.  It was grace, after all, that gave him the feeling of peace that enabled him to no longer fear what lay ahead. 

None of us knows what lies around the bend in life's journey. But when we learn to embrace the grace we are given, we can face whatever comes with serenity.  

And the grace we are given by God far surpasses any we might receive from others. God's grace covers us completely, but because we don't often stop to think deeply about just how all-encompassing it is, we frequently miss out on the experience of that realization.  

The grace of God surrounds us, is within us, and is also something that we ought to let flow through us to a world in need of it.  

May we learn to wait in the fire of the grace of God and be refined, renewed, and become the best and truest versions of ourselves because of it.  

And may the grace and peace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with us all, now and forever.  Amen.