Whether you consider this paradox or metaphor, it is one of the word plays — and play on ideas — that is one of the things I like best about the works of Michael Card.
This third segment of my 2006 concert bridges the space between the Baptism (segment 2) and this song on God’s Own Fool, by noting that both the stone that makes men stumble in the Baptism and the idea of God’s own Fool draw on the scriptural idea that God’s ways are not ours.
In God’s Own Fool Michael Card chooses his own way to bust open the condescension of the modern-day pabulum that sees Christ as a “good teacher”‘ “a wise man”, “a kind prophet”. Card very emphatically shows that scripture doesn’t allow us any of those options.
Decades before C.S. Lewis did the same thing when he declaimed that anyone who made the claims Jesus did could not be considered a “good man.” He had to be either a liar, a madman, or the Son of God. Michael Card gives this declaration a new formulation in God’s Own Fool — the more wise by God’s standard we are, the more out of our minds we will seem to the world. Jesus is our extreme example — and we are called to follow him.
Musically this song uses a straight head tone to deliver the best punch. Listening from eight years in the future I can appreciate the musicality of my lines, but realize I am reaching a bit, now and again, to hit those A4s that are the top pitch in the song — and there are a lot of them. Contrary to what you might expect, I know I hit them better with less effort today than I did then.
So listen and enjoy ….
At The Rainbow 
2 thoughts on “A Concert of Sacred Metaphors — Fools”