Daily Word of Grace # 100 (August 3, 2020)
One of my all-time favorite Saturday Night Live skits is “More Cowbell”, which was a parody of an episode of the VH1 television series Behind the Music, specifically about Blue Oyster Cult’s 1976 hit “(Don’t Fear) The Reaper.” In the sketch the band is in the studio recording and Gene (Will Ferrell) is fiercely playing the cowbell, so much so that the rest of the band can’t stay focused and the recording session begins to break down. But to the band’s surprise, famous record producer Bruce Dickinson (Christopher Walken) has the opposite response: “It was sounding great, but I could’ve used a little more cowbell.” After a couple more failed takes the band begins to fall apart, and yet even so Bruce Dickinson still insists, “I gotta have more cowbell….Guess what? I got a fever, and the only prescription is more cowbell!” One of the many reasons this skit is so hilarious is because the one thing destroying the song, Gene’s ridiculous cowbell playing, is still the one thing about which the record producer insists. In our own lives we do the same thing. Each of us in our own way insists on metaphorically playing some kind of cowbell, persisting in some kind of destructive behavior when it is the very thing wreaking havoc in our lives. The only prescription for this is not more cowbell, but more grace—and thankfully God gives us exactly that in Jesus Christ (John 1:16).
Love and Prayers,
Dave