One month before I graduated from high school, Hal David’s lyrics met up with Burt Bacharach’s music and Jackie DeShannon’s voice in the song, “What the World Needs Now Is Love,” addressing the world’s distress over the Vietnam War.
It was a time when many songs of love and peace captured and rescued the troubled souls of young listeners. Both students on campus, like me, and soldiers in Southeast Asia, like many of my lifelong friends, felt these lyrics to the core of our being:
“What the world needs now is love, sweet love.
It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of.
What the world needs now is love, sweet love.
No, not just for some, but for everyone.”
So, here we are again!
To be completely transparent, I must tell you that one morning this week, I woke from my slumber hearing and singing this song in my sleepy mind. This time, my dreams were of peace between Russians and Ukrainians, as well as between Hamas and Israel!
I could quite easily be found guilty of consuming too much news, whether online, in print, or on TV, to the point that the tragedies of war invade even my dreams! But at the same time, I’m quite sure I’m not the only guilty one. How about you or your children or grandchildren, whose vulnerable young minds especially concern all of us?
Again, remember the lyrics:
“What the world needs now is love, sweet love.
No, not just for some, but for everyone.”
But now, to quote angels in both the Old Testament and the New Testament, comes both Hannukah and Christmas with angelic messages that frequently begin with the words, “Fear not!”
These sacred days that are coming upon us are not just “Happy Holidays” … they are the “Happiest Holy Days” of all when God brings Himself into our world, which so very desperately needs eternal light and everlasting love!
Rest assured, people … this will be God’s LOVE that there will always be plenty of!
Editor’s note: Eden Prairie Local News (EPLN) contributor Pastor Rod Anderson also serves on the EPLN Board of Directors. He was the senior pastor of St. Andrew Lutheran Church in Eden Prairie.
Interested in contributing a faith-based column to EPLN? Email editor@eplocalnews.org.
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