Don Moen - Glory To God Lyrics

Video

Don Moen Glory to the Lord

Meaning & Inspiration

Don Moen’s version of this is all organ and choir, a bit too clean for where I’ve been, but the words… they hit different when you’re still shaking from the cold.

“Peace, peace on the earth, good will toward men.”

I’ve spent a long time sitting in places where there wasn’t any peace. I’m talking about the kind of noise that happens in your own head when you know you’ve burnt every bridge you crossed. You sit in the dark, and the silence isn’t quiet—it’s judgmental. It reminds you of everything you broke. So when I hear about "peace on earth," I don't think about snow falling on a calm night or a Hallmark card. I think about the guy sitting in a ditch, wondering if he’s even allowed to look up at the sky anymore.

Luke 2:14 is where this comes from. The angels weren't singing to the guys in the palace; they were singing to the shepherds. Those guys were the bottom of the rung, the outcasts, the ones who smelled like the sheep. That’s who got the announcement. That’s who the "good will" was for. It wasn't for the people who had their lives in order. It was for the ones who were working the night shift, dirty and forgotten.

There’s a weird tension in that for me. If the peace is for "good will toward men," does that mean I had to be good to get it? Because if that’s the criteria, I’m disqualified. I’ve got nothing but my own wreckage to show for the last few years. But then I remember: the Savior was born in a barn. Not a house. A place for animals. A place that probably smelled like the mess I’ve made of my own life.

Maybe "good will" isn't a reward for being decent. Maybe it's just the fact that He showed up in the dirt. He didn't wait for the world to clean itself up before He arrived. He just came.

I’m still dusting the ashes off my jacket. My hands are still rough from the things I had to do to survive out there. I don’t know if I’m ready to call it "Glory to God" yet, not in the way the choirs do. But there’s a flicker of something. A peace that doesn't make sense because, by all accounts, I shouldn't have made it back home at all. Yet, here I am.

It’s messy. It’s definitely not resolved. I still feel like I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop, for the Father to tell me to get back out to the pig pen. But if the angels were right, and if that kid in the manger really is the point of it all, then maybe peace is just the audacity to believe that you’ve been found, even when you’re still wearing the dirt of the road. It’s a strange, heavy gift. I’m still figuring out how to carry it.