Sir Paul McCartney your Amazing Gift & GOD's Amazing Grace!

By Jake Jacobs

Last night my wife, daughter, her boyfriend and I experienced Sir Paul McCartney's ONE ON ONE Tour in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. WOW! & again I say WOW!! Paul and his tight band played 39 songs for well over 2 & 1/2 hours @ an amazing professional musical level. From his opening "A Hard Day's Night" to his closing "The End" the BEATLE-Sir Paul McCartney had the approximate 25,000 Marcus Amphitheater audience enthralled, razzeled, dazzled, mesmerized, crying, twisting & shouting all night long.

My poor family knows my FANatic love of The Beatles, John, Paul, George & Ringo and especially my appreciation for Paul McCartney. Now that does not mean I don't love the drumming and talents of Ringo Starr, the underrated brilliant guitar playing and musical acumen of George Harrison and the genius of John Lennon's lyrics and musical vision that changed Rock N' Roll forever but it does put into perspective the amazing gifts God gave James Paul McCartney from Liverpool, England.

While it was John Lennon who started the Liverpudlian band in 1957, it was Paul's synergistic-musical chemistry that combined with John and George's talents to create "The Beatles" arguably THE BEST damn Rock N' Roll Band in history!

BTW one of my favorite songs of the night was ""Here Today" a song by Paul McCartney from his 1982 album Tug of War. McCartney wrote the song about his relationship with and LOVE for John Lennon." Paul says these words to John Lennon...we should say them to our loved ones everyday....

"But As For Me, I Still Remember How It Was Before.

And I Am Holding Back The Tears No More.

Ooh- Ooh- Ooh- I LOVE YOU, Ooh..."

I'll post the song below....

When The Beatles broke up in the Spring of 1970, Paul thought he was finished and went into a deep depression, until the love of his life Linda inspired him to pull out of his funk, recreate himself and to let his talents be shown to the world once again.

It worked.

From 1971 to 2016 Paul McCartney has written 527 songs, many, many of them memorable and love by millions. The Muses were smiling last night in Milwaukee as Paul's set-list was a magical blend of Quarrymen, The Beatles and post Beatles's creativity at is finest and the Baby-Boomer to teenage audience loved it singing and dancing to Paul's every-note.

I know some of you will wonder why I am so enamored by The Beatles and Paul's music. Perhaps it's something as simple as:

1. It was the music of my youth and we all know how the music of our younger years can have a lifelong impact on us.
   
   
2. Or perhaps it was the profound impact The Beatles had on music in the Sixties moving it in a direction that contributed significantly to a VERY special era in music history.
   
   
3. Or perhaps it was the integral role The Beatles played in the counterculture of their, my day.
   

I believe when all is said & done it is ALL the above stated perhaps.

I also know that some will wonder how I can love-appreciate so zealously a Band and person who were/are not Christian.

Yes, I know Paul's excitement at meeting the famous atheist Bertrand Russell who wrote the classic atheist book, "Why I Am Not A Christian" and yes I know John Lennon wrote the famous song, "Imagine" whose first line calls for the world to "imagine there's no heaven."

If John was alive and we could meet up with Paul in a Pub to discuss life and the reason for our existence I would unabashedly tell John and Paul that I can't imagine there's no heaven as I pray everyday to "Our Father who IS in Heaven" who is madly in love with us! So much so He gave His only begotten Son to graciously get us into His Heavenly home. John, Paul, George and Ringo where never shy when it came to sharing their worldview thus in a respectful way I would not shy away from sharing mine.

However, that does not mean I cannot love and appreciate them and the talents that our Heavenly Father has bestowed upon them and I would tell them so. (Ironically my # Two All-Time favorite band is Pink Floyd whose co-founder Roger Waters is a notorious atheist and I too would invite him to the Pub and tell him the same.)

I know that some of my Christian friends might disagree my viewpoint but that's OK, when we get to Heaven these differences will have sorted themselves out.

In closing, I was not only one of those singing "Hey Jude" loudly last last and probably off key, I was one of those crazy Baby Boomers whose old heart and body was twisting & shouting remembering my youth and the magic The Beatles brought to my young heart. Maybe my heart isn't so old after all.

As Paul sang I was missing my mother whom I saw The Beatles with on our B&W TV on February 9th, 1964. Before she died we were together at the nursing home watching CBS's 50th Anniversary Special of that classic-historic 1964 Ed Sullivan-Beatles event. Mom was in serous pain and while she could no longer dance, for the love of her son, she enthusiastically sang along with me "She Loves You Yeah-Yeah-Yeah."

Maybe more than anything Sir Paul McCartney and The Beatles remind us not only of our Baby Boomer "Wonder Years" but that our mothers, fathers, brothers, sisters and friends, ALL of us, just long to be LOVED and as we slowly fade away we ALL long for that Heavenly LOVE that NEVER fades away .....

Paul, I love ya man, you truly bless thousands with your kind heart and amazing God-given talents but I just have to end by saying, "Jesus LOVES Us Yeah-Yeah-Yeah!" I hope and pray to see you in His Kingdom someday there we will twist & shout for joy over God's Glory and His Son's amazing story for us.

© Jake Jacobs