Verse Twenty-Two

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About this song

The rich young man of Mark 10, years later. He knows it was worth everything, and he still can't open his hand. Written from the devotional The One He Let Walk.

Lyrics

[Intro]

[Verse 1]
I came running through the crowd,
every key I owned was ringing on my belt.
"Good Teacher," I said, too loud,
and gray dust rose on the linen where I knelt.

[Verse 2]
He asked why I called Him good,
then He named the laws I'd kept since I was ten.
"All of them," I said, and stood,
asked what I still lacked, and He looked at me then.

[Chorus]
He looked at me a long while,
and He named the only thing I couldn't pay.
Nobody ran to stop me.
He loved me, and yet He let me walk away.

[Verse 3]
I walked home the long way round,
counted up the fields, the olive press, the grain.
Looked back once. There was no sound
but my keys, still ringing, all along the lane.

[Chorus]
He looked at me a long while,
and He named the only thing I couldn't pay.
Nobody ran to stop me.
He loved me, and yet He let me walk away.

[Instrumental Interlude]

[Bridge]
Word came round that spring:
camels, and a needle's eye.
Then the other thing,
from a hill against the sky.
If He'd asked me twice,
I'd have sold it all, I swear.
Or a lower price.
But He left me standing there.

[Verse 4]
Every morning, gate by gate,
I unlock it all and count it like a prayer.
Leave the last one open late,
and I watch the road as if He might be there.

[Final Chorus]
He looked at me a long while,
and He named the only thing I wouldn't pay.
Nobody ran to stop Him.
He loved me, and yet I let Him walk away.

[Outro]
A tenth was always enough.
I've been tithing mint and dill since I was ten.
All of it? That's just a bluff.
Open high, and wait for them to call again.

Down the road in Jericho
a tax man gave up half, and He was his guest.
Half. That's all. So now I know
it was never everything. It was a test.

Who'd have fed the men I keep?
My grandfather cleared these hillsides stone by stone.
Sell the press? Then sell the sheep?
And walk behind Him with nothing of my own?

It was worth it. Now I know.
Every hillside, every press, the stone, the grain.
But my hand won't let them go,
so I lock the gate and count the keys again.

[End]

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