9.20.2012 LARRY NORMAN - I'VE GOT TO LEARN TO LIVE WITHOUT YOU

i've got to learn to live without you

1. you came into my life
you took me off the shelf
you told my name to me
and taught me what to do
(note: sounds like God when He saves a person..but referring to a woman?
but then you went away
and left me by myself
(note: God is the only one who never does this. He says, I will never leave nor forsake you.)
i feel completely lost
and lonely without you
(note: this should only be how we feel when we are still separated from God by our sin. in God we have everything. psalm 16.11..'in Thy presence is fulness of joy; at Thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore.)
why'd you go baby
i guess you know
(note: yes i do know...i do what i  see as best for me. i don't really care about you unless i want you for something.)

chorus
i've got to learn to live without you.
i've got to learn to live without you
i've got to learn to live without you
(note: yes, we all need to learn to live without anything or anybody, if that's what God has planned for us.)
without you-
it's just no good without you

2.today i thought i saw you
walking down the street
with someone else
i turned my head and faced the wall
i started crying and my heart fell to my feet
but when i looked again
it wasn't you at all.
why'd you go baby
i guess you know
note: even if she doesn't, God does.
'My people have committed two evils.
they have forsaken me the fountain of living waters
to hew out for themselves cisterns
broken cisterns
that can hold no water.' jeremiah 2.13

it took me a number of times listening to this song before i realized that despite the mournful voice, norman's song is ironic.
irony-
1. a pretense of ignorance and of willingness to learn from another in order to make the other's false conceptions conspicuous by adroit questioning-called also socratic irony.
- do you think that another person (thing) can give you life? ie. you came into my life, you took me off the shelf
- do you think that another person (thing) can give you true, ultimate meaning and purpose? ie. you told my name to me and taught me what to do?
-experience people and things for a while..then let me know what you think.

2. the use of words to express something other than and especially the opposite of the literal meaning
-only God can give life that is full of meaning and purpose. every time you turn to someone/thing else you will be profoundly disappointed...unless God does not want you to find Him.

3. incongruity between the actual result of a sequence of events and the normal or expected result.
-person connects deeply with person = profound, lifelong happiness. always true!