Thoughts from Mark "Hat" Rackley

Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.

• Deuteronomy 6:5

“What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”
He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”

• Luke 10:26-27

“Look at me, I’m as helpless as a kitten up a tree
And I feel like I’m clingin’ to a cloud
I can’t understand
I get misty just holding your hand

Walk my way
And a thousand violins begin to play
Or it might be the sound of your hello
That music I hear
I get misty whenever you’re near

You can’t see that you’re leading me on
And it’s just what I want you to do
Don’t you notice how hopelessly I’m lost
That’s why I’m following you
On my own

When I wander through this wonderland alone
Never knowing my right foot from my left
My hat from my glove
I’m too misty and too much in love

Too misty and too much in love
Look at me”

• Johnny Burke, Misty

Back some time ago, I wrote a short story about Missy Matthews.  In the story, she admitted that Missy Matthews was a made-up name, and that Baldwyn had misspelled it.  It was supposed to be Misty, like the song.

For a few weeks, my earworm became Misty, alternating between the Johnny Mathis and Ray Stevens versions, probably due to my mood at the moment.

But usually, when I have an earworm like that, I butcher the lyrics really bad.  But these lyrics started getting to me.  I have mentioned before that love songs can be modified, usually just a few words, and you have a worship song.

We are indeed as helpless as a kitten up a tree.  We often feel like we are trying to cling to a cloud, especially when we do not use the strength and guidance we have available from the Holy Spirit.

If God were to walk our way, He would have Heaven’s orchestra playing, maybe more than a thousand violins.  Or, could we get misty just hearing God say ‘Hello.’  My wife passed away, as of this post coming out, five months ago.  I have called her cellphone, just so that it would switch to voice mail and I could hear her voice.  But to hear God’s Voice?  Wow!!

God leads us along, but we often do not follow.  Yet, when we have gone astray, there is that burning desire for us to follow God’s lead and return to Him.  We follow God because we are lost without Him.

On our own, we wonder through this land alone, not knowing our right foot from our left.

But me being “Hat”, I can tell the difference in a hat and a glove, but some of my caps, it might be hard to tell in the dark.

But then, it comes to the one troubling line of the song.

Is it possible to be too much in love with Jesus?  Our problem is that we do not love Jesus enough.  We stray from the path and we get into trouble.  Can we love God as much as we love the person in this song, the one making us misty?

But then, how do you sing the song if it were a worship song?

Here is the Johnny Mathis version of Misty.

Here is the Ray Stevens version of Misty.

The Johnny Mathis version seems a bit too romantic, and the Ray Stevens version seems too light-hearted to be a worship song, but the words still haunt me.  Does any of us live up to the greatest commandment, to love God with all our heart, soul, and strength?

Soli Deo Gloria.  Only to God be the Glory.