Welcome back to The Gospel According to, where we connect all things bright and beautiful in this world with the ultimate source of light, beauty, and truth. This week, we’re focusing on “Remedy,” an Adele song that is very close to my heart. This is a beautiful song on its own terms, but it becomes ✨exquisite✨ when we look at it from a different angle. Enjoy!
Fandom: “Remedy” by Adele
Nugget: When we go through every kind of difficult circumstance, emotionm, or moment, God is our Remedy. His love is a shelter, a safe place. He knows our pain and loves us through it.
The Horizontal View: unconditional Love
As always, let’s begin by examining the overall theme of this song from a horizontal, or human-to-human, perspective. The first verse speaks of a difficult past, the need to escape, and a moment when the artist finally took a free breath. Then the song’s tone shifts, almost as though a second voice is speaking, promising to always be there for her, even when it hurts and nothing makes sense. This second speaker promises that their love will be an impermeable shelter, that nothing will keep them away. The only thing speaker 1 can say to this is “Your love, it is my truth.” As in, their love is the only thing that is worth holding onto in this world.
How amazing must it be to have this kind of love in your life, romantic or otherwise! I am so grateful for the people in my life who love me this way, and I hope I’m the same way to them.
The Vertical View: God is my Remedy 💖
Now let’s turn and look at this already-beautiful love song from a vertical, or God-to-human, perspective. There’s so much goodness here! Let’s take it line by line:
I remember/ all of the things that I thought I wanted to be/ So desperate/ to find a way out of my world and finally breathe
This line describes my life when I fixed my eyes on my own wishes and desires. Instead of being content with who God made me, I was constantly looking for a way out– of my body, my school, my family’s financial situation, everything.
When I turned my attention to God instead, He gave me eternal life, which in Hebrew is shalom Adonai– peace with God. AKA, the biggest sitg of relief you could possibly imagine.
“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” Romans 5:1 ESV
Right before my eyes I saw/ my heart it came to life
This line can mean one of two things, depending on where you are in relation to Christ. For someone who has never surrendered to the Lord, this line can mean coming to know Him for the first time– and seeing the world with new eyes as a result.
Here’s a post that specifically talks about this true-love feeling 😊
“Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. The old has passed away; behold, the new has come.”2 Corinthians 5:17
For more on how to begin a relationship with Jesus, see this post 😊
For someone who does know the Lord, “my heart, it came to life’ means the ongoing process of sanctification. As my understanding of God’s character and His heart towards me grows, and as I become more like Christ and obedient to His word, my heart becomes more and more alive in Him.
“And we all, with unveiled face, beholding the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from one degree of glory to another. For this comes from the Lord who is the Spirit.” 2 Corinthians 3:18 ESV
This ain’t easy, not meant to be, every story has its scars
Walking with the Lord was never meant to be easy. Every believer will tell you this: life is still hard. We still live in a broken world, and sometimes God allows us to have experiences we would avoid if we could– but He grows us in the midst of them.
When the pain cuts you deep, when the night keeps you from sleeping/ Just look, and you will see: I will be your Remedy
This song is so beautiful because it acknowledges the pain of life, but also promises to be with you through it. Think of what a Remedy is– to me, it speaks of a parent’s soothing touch, a warm blanket wrapped around your shoulders, a mug of chamomile tea on a cold night. It promises a shoulder to cry on, with loving ears to listen as you process what’s going on inside. That, my friends, is true love.
And that is what God offers us, too. The Bible, especially the Psalms, is full of emotional honesty and promises that God will never leave us.
3 Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our affliction, so that we may be able to comfort those who are in any affliction, with the comfort with which we ourselves are comforted by God. 5 For as we share abundantly in Christ’s sufferings, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too.” 2 Corinthians 1:3-5 ESV
Just look, and you will see…
In almost the same words, these lyrics line up with God’s character. “I lift my eyes up to the hills; where does my help come from? My help comes from the LORD, who made heaven and earth.” So good!
When the world seems so cruel, and your heart makes you feel like a fool…
This line speaks of both internal and external conflict, which we all face on a daily basis. As a highly emotional and introverted human, I have been especially subject to the former. Here are some verses that again line up almost exactly with the meaning of these lyrics:
“Why are you cast down, O my soul,
and why are you in turmoil within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,
my salvation and my God.” Psalm 42:5
22 “For I delight in the law of God, in my inner being, 23 but I see in my members another law waging war against the law of my mind and making me captive to the law of sin that dwells in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.” Romans 7:15-25
No river is too wide or too deep for me to swim to you/ Come whatever, I’ll be the shelter that won’t let the rain come through
Aside from the river imagery, Romans 8:38-39 gives the same promise of unconditional love, backed up by a God who simply cannot fail. In the same way, Isaiah 4:6 and Psalm 91 give us a strong image of God as our shelter. He is a safe place to run to, regardless of how big or small your heart-problem may seem.
“For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39 nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.” Romans 8:38-39 ESV
“There will be a booth for shade by day from the heat, and for a refuge and a shelter from the storm and rain.” Isaiah 4:6 ESV
“He who dwells in the shelter of the Most High will abide in the shadow of the Almighty. 2 I will say to the LORD, “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.…”” Psalm 91:1-2 ESV
Your love, it is my truth
This is our response to everything promised by God in His Word to hold Him, and Him only, as our foundation. He is the only one who is capable of speaking truth 100% of the time, and His is the only true love we’ll ever find.
I hope you were encouraged by this post about “Remedy” by Adele and the faithful, sheltering love of God. Please let me know if you were, and feel free to share any moments when you’ve needed a safe place.
Happy fangirling!
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Thank you so much for stopping by! I’m glad that you were encouraged 😊