"How to Save a Life" is the title track to the album. It was inspired by Slade's experience as a mentor to a crack addicted teen. "I was a sheltered suburban kid when I met this guy. He was a recovering addict, coming out of a really tough teenage life. Thankfully, he was on his way out of that life, so he was able to really look back with some objectivity. The song is more of a memoir about his slow motion descent and all the relationships he lost along the way."

Destined to be one of the band's greatest hits, Slade isn't worried about getting tired of performing the song: "It is the easiest one for me to sing every night. I constantly get emails from people who relate to it."

The song has not only proved a hit in terms of music sales but has resonated with fans in moving ways, which is humbling to Slade: "Some people actually formed a non-profit organization called Save A Life. They lost their son to a tragic car accident and apparently ‘How To Save A Life' was the last song he downloaded. Another girl lost her mother to suicide. She wrote me and said it helped her deal with her mom's death."

"How to Save a Life" is simply a fairly catchy piano-based ballad. However, as you begin to sing along with the words of the chorus it becomes obvious that there is much more to it:
"Where did I go wrong, I lost a friend
Somewhere along in the bitterness
And I would have stayed up with you all night
Had I known how to save a life"

It is a song about life and loss and how we deal with it and has provoked some amazing responses. It has hit upon an issue that is raw and an emotion which people feel ill equipped to deal with.

As you watch the video words appear and fade against the background of bereaved and pained people. Words such as faith, touch, forgiveness and phrases such as Don't be afraid of death. It is a great song and you find yourself singing along for hours after.

But it also exposes our fear of loss and that somehow death doesn't sit right with us. That somehow we know we were not meant to experience such pain and loss. Hope is one of the words that appears and hope is exactly what Jesus promises as Jesus visits a bereaved family mourning the loss of their brother and raises Lazarus back to life, as he enters the house of mourning parents and says to their dead daughter "Get up", as he hangs on the cross dying himself but says to the criminal on the cross "today you will be with me in paradise." There is hope, in Jesus who comes and overturns death, who is raised to life and brings the promise that the grave has no victory, death has no sting. Trust in him that's how to save a life, that's where hope is found.

Christianity & Culture