California rapper Mickey Cho is joined by Sam Cho and Diane Lee for an unplugged rendition of his songs “Arms of Love” from his 2010 album, PTL. This is a pretty dope acoustic performance video though the video is fairly uneventful. Perhaps a wider shot would have helped but it all left me feeling a bit claustrophobic. But the strength of the material is definitely the song itself – “a song portraying the cries of real-life inner city children from Daejeon, Korea”.
Verse 1:
Dear God, my life isn’t normal. In fact, it’s rather tough/
Sometimes I feel like I’m finished, like I’ve just had enough/
While other children get presents and chew on licorice/
I feel and smell the abusiveness and pain of what liquor is/
My father says he loves me, but hits me and leaves these bruises/
On my body, that make me question why does he have to do this/
Why is he so abusive/ What did I do wrong/
Why is my life so tragic/ I need a new song/
My mother’s scared to defend me, she gets it even worse/
Hospitalized so many times, making excuses to the nurse/
The outer pain isn’t anything/ Compared to the many things/
Scarred so deep/ It’s hard to sleep/
It’s hard to keep/ A positive hope, but then at camp/
I saw a drama that depicted You suffering as a man/
You took the suffering’s struggles and drove the rain away/
And made me wonder, God, if You could truly take my pain away/Chorus:
How could a love like this exist
In a world so cold and damaged?
Only pain and misery is what I sing
Oh God, don’t leave me abandoned!
I never felt the love and care of a father
I never felt the warm embrace of a mother
But through the love of the people You have sent, Lord
I have been embraced by You in Your Arms of LoveVerse 2:
Dear God, my life is deserted, it’s like You bombed it bad/
I’m talking about my mom and dad/
At three, they both were gone, I’m sad/
I’m just an orphan with no place I belong to/
But I wish I had a home, oh God, so desperate, I long to/
A mom to hold on to/ A dad to provide/
A family that i could laugh with, but there’s no one in sight/
Why did they leave me? Why didn’t they want me?
Lord, what is wrong with me/
Why don’t these foster parents ever get along with me/
I’d given up, until at camp, what I felt there/
Maybe you were calling to me, did You send me help there/
Cause all the teachers embraced me and loved me/
Like I was their own child, they would face me and hug me/
And tell me I have a Father who is You, up above/
Who sees me with only love/ It’s hard for me to trust/
But through their love, I know that i could dwell alone in You/
And though this world rejects me, I could always find my Home in You/Chorus
Verse 3:
Dear God, I’m looking at my legs, there isn’t anything i feel there/
Why’d You have to make it so my life is in this wheelchair/
Sometimes I think about my life and I get real scared/
If faith is all I need, then Lord, I’m willing to be healed here/
I see the other kids play, I wish that I could too/
Run and jump and not be so stranded right here in front of You/
My days are lonely, it’s been this way and I’m sick of it/
But yesterday was a little different now that I think of it/
There was a teacher, while others played with the other kids/
Who stood by me throughout the whole day just like my brother did/
He kept on talking and playing with me/ And saying to me/
I’m precious in God’s eyes, Why is he staying with me/
When no one at this camp would even pass a stare at me/
Why does he still care for me/ Why’d he cry a prayer for me/
I’ve never felt a love like this and it’s uplifted me/
Is this the way Your heart is when You think of me? God?
a-Tunes 