Story behind "Blessed Be Your Name"

Blessed Be Your Name was written by songwriter and worship leader Matt Redman and his wife, Beth. We sing this song together quite often, but I only recently learned the story behind the song. Matt Redman shares more about the story behind the song in his book "Blessed Be Your Name." Here is an excerpt from chapter two, The Road Marked with Suffering.

"On September 15, 2001, we flew into L.A. for the start of a sabbatical break in California. Four days earlier we'd watched with the rest of the world, gripped by those terrible, nation-shaking events of 9/11. Over the new few days and weeks in the U.S, as we watched the news, talked with neighbors and visited many different churches, the full effect of the terrorist attacks began to unfold before us. Brokenness was everywhere, and many people sought some kind of comfort in the church. Our landlady, which just weeks before had relocated to Manhattan, set foot inside a church building for the first time since her childhood. For the few weeks following those attacks, church attendance all over America went up dramatically.

During this time we had the privilege of visiting many different congregations. We were so inspired and impressed by the preachers. Virtually everywhere we went, pastors delievered biblical and powerful sermons, speaking into the pain of the nation. They eloquently and powerfully expressed the heart of God over a shocked and vulnerable people- and reminded them of His strength and soverignity. But nearly everywhere we visited, a worrying question began to arise: Where were the songwriters at such a time as this? Where were the musical poets and prophets to help the people of God find a voice in worship at this tragic time? The truth was, in most places we visited (or led worship in), there was a distinct lack of songs appropriate for this time. As songwriters and lead worshipers, we had a few expressions of hope at our dismal; but when it came to expressions of pain and lament, we had very little vocabulary to give voice to our heart cries... The truth is, the Church of God needs her songs of lament just as much as she needs her songs of victory.

A few weeks after 9/11, we wrote the worship song "Blessed Be Your Name." It wasn't written consciously in response to those dark events- but no doubt, being immersed in the spiritual and emotional climate of those days was an important factor in birthing it. Many people ask if there was a particular life event that triggered off the writing of this song, and in all truth, the answer is no. It's really a song born out of the whole of life- a realization that we will all face seasons of pain or unease. And in these seasons we will need to find our voice before God. The Church (and indeed the world) needs it songs of lament."

Listen to this acoustic version of Matt Redman singing the song here:
Blessed Be Your Name (Acoustic)

Stories Behind the Song - February 15, 2009

"Forever"

The song "Forever" was written by Chris Tomlin and is based out of Psalm 136. This song is a song of thanksgiving and praise. Notice the structure of the first verse:

"Give thanks to the Lord, our God and King.
His love endures forever.
For He is good, He is above all things.
His love endures forever.
Sing praise, sing praise."

The verses of this song lists the different things that God does for us, as well as His different attributes, and then call on us, as the singers, to sing praise to God in thanksgiving for what He has done for us. You will find that the Psalmist follows a similar structure in Psalm 136: "Give thanks to the Lord, for He is good! His love endures forever. Give thanks to the God of gods! His love endures forever. Give thanks to the Lord of lords. His love endures forever." (Psalm 136:1-3)The writer of this Psalm was Hezekiah. He wrote this Psalm as a response to the Lord thanking him for delivering Him from a deadly illness. Certainly God has delivered us from something in our own lives. As we sing this song this week, think about what God has delivered you from, and praise Him for His faithfulness!

"Everlasting God"

This song is based out of Isaiah 40:28-31, and is written by a songwriter named Brenton Brown. The frequent use of words such as strength, weary, and weak is intentional. In many ways, this song is Brown's personal testimony. Brenton was diagnosed in 2003 with a condition called Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, a rare ailment that leaves its victims constantly tired and weary, and not even able to find comfort by extra sleep. As Brenton writes the words, "Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord," he is putting to paper what is a reality in His life. He daily waits upon the Lord to give Him the strength to fulfill the tasks he needs to do. As we sing this song this week, think about where you are drawing your strength from each day. Is it from the Lord and His Word, or are you living in your own power?

"The Solid Rock"

The words to this song were written in 1834 by Edward Mote. Mote had this to say about the story behind the song: "One morn­ing it came into my mind as I went to la­bour, to write an hymn on the ‘Gra­cious Ex­per­i­ence of a Christ­ian.’ As I went up Hol­born I had the chor­us, ‘On Christ the solid Rock I stand,All other ground is sinking sand.’In the day I had four first vers­es com­plete, and wrote them off. On the Sab­bath fol­low­ing I met bro­ther King as I came out of Lisle Street Meet­ing…who in­formed me that his wife was ve­ry ill, and asked me to call and see her. I had an ear­ly tea, and called af­ter­wards. He said that it was his usu­al custom to sing a hymn, read a por­tion, and en­gage in pray­er, be­fore he went to meet­ing. He looked for his hymn-book but could find it no­where. I said, ‘I have some vers­es in my pock­et; if he liked, we would sing them.’ We did, and his wife en­joyed them so much, that af­ter ser­vice he asked me, as a fa­vour, to leave a co­py of them for his wife. I went home, and by the fire­side com­posed the last two vers­es, wrote the whole off, and took them to sis­ter King…As these vers­es so met the dy­ing wo­man’s case, my at­ten­tion to them was the more ar­rest­ed, and I had a thou­sand print­ed for dis­tr­ibu­tion."

This song was originally used to bring comfort to a dying woman, and has comforted many since its writing with the knowledge that our hope is not in ourselves, but in the Rock of Ages and Chief Cornerstone, Jesus Christ! As we sing this song this week, thank the Lord for being your Rock.

"I Need Thee Every Hour"

The words to this song were written by Annie Hawks, and the tune was composed by her pastor, Dr. Robert Lowry. As the story goes, Mrs. Hawks had dabbled in poetry writing in her younger years, and had quite a way with words. Dr. Lowry encouraged her to use her talent to begin writing songs for children's Sunday School. This song came one June morning in 1872 as Mrs. Hawks was going about her tasks of being a mother to 3, and became immediately overwhelmed with the thought of the constant presence of Jesus Christ in her life. She sat down to write the words, and wrote 6 beautiful verses of poetry. Dr. Lowry wrote the tune the following Sunday, and this hymn has become Hawks' most well known hymn out of the 600 plus songs she has written. It also came to mean a great deal to her when her husband passed away 17 years after the writing of this song. She realized her great need for Jesus not only in the good times, but in the valleys of life as well. As we sing this song this week, examine your own heart. Are you relying on your own abilities and powers? If so, make this hymn your heartfelt plea to the Lord.

"The Heart of Worship"

This song was written by one of today's most foremost songwriters, Matt Redman. Matt is originally from the United Kingdom, but has recently moved to Atlanta to plant a church with Louie Giglio, founder of Passion Ministries, and Chris Tomlin. This song came out of a difficult time in the church Matt was serving in Britain. In the fall of 1996, Matt's pastor felt that their church was just going through the motions when it came to their times of congregational worship. Yes, songs were being sung, but the hearts of those singing them were far from God. Those worshiping had become spectators of corporate worship, and not participators. The leadership made the difficult decision to remove all of the musicians, and to do without music for a while. The following period was very difficult and certainly awkward at first, but the learning and growing process that took place among the church's members was well worth the effort.

The first Sunday the band returned back to worship, Matt Redman sang this song. Think about what great meaning the first verse must have had: "When the music fades, all is stripped away and I simply come. Longing just to bring something that's of worth that will bless Your heart. I'll bring you more than a song for a song in itself is not what You have required. You search much deeper within, through the way things appear. You're looking into my heart." This song is a song of deep conviction, and I pray it will cause each of us to see our deep need for Jesus, as the song preceding has called us to do, and make each of us desire to make Jesus Christ alone the center and object of our worship each and every day!

Stories Behind the Songs - January 25, 2009

"Sing to the King"

This song was written by Billy James Foote. The song is based upon the hymn by Charles S. Horne. Here are the original words penned in 1910. Notice the similarity between Horne's words and Billy's adaptation of the song.

Sing we the King Who is coming to reign,
Glory to Jesus, the Lamb that was slain.
Life and salvation His empire shall bring,
Joy to the nations when Jesus is King.
Refrain: Come let us sing, praise to our King,
Jesus our King, Jesus our King,
This is our song, who to Jesus belong:
Glory to Jesus, to Jesus our King.

Billy and his wife Cindy live in San Antonio. Billy started leading worship in 1990, right out of college. Back then Christiandom didn't demand bands. They were satisfied with simplicity. Billy played his guitar and led worship by himself until several years later. He added a drummer (Joe McArthur) first and then a bass player (Shawn Skeen) and then Cindy joined in with vocals in 2001. Sometime around the year 2000 Billy began having vocal trouble which turned out to be a neurological condition called hyper-disphonia. There's really no cure for this condition. So Cindy began singing more of the lead vocals over time. Though Cindy sings most of the songs, Billy is still the person giving direction to the worship time and, of course, he writes most of the songs the band plays. Billy began song writing in the late 1990's. He's written several well known songs including:"Break Our Hearts", "Goodness and Mercy", "You Are My King (Amazing Love)", "Sing to the King", "I Have a River", "Die the Death", "You Are God Alone (not a god)", "You Are Welcome Here" and "Welcome to the Cross".

Learn more about Billy's ministry on his myspace website & ministry website:
www.myspace.com/billyfooteband

Learn more about Billy's ministry here:
www.billyfoote.com/

Here is a version of the song led by Kristian Stanfill, a worship leader out of Atlanta:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3zX2nWXGYeA&fmt=18

"Everlasting God"
This story behind the song "Everlasting God" is excerpted from an interview that Brenton Brown (one of the writers of this song) did with Worship Leader magazine:

The worship teams needed prayer. Fearless, and forward thinking, Brenton Brown led them out of Oxford on a cold and rainy afternoon. It was about six years ago when he was the worship pastor at his church in England. And like any good leader, he planned a worship weekend getaway. In Whales. Brenton, however, isn’t from England. Looking at the distance on the map and allowing for what he felt was a reasonable estimation of the time/distance ratio, the South African native overshot his allotted travel time by about five hours. It rained. They were hungry. They were disparaged by some Welsh locals who weren’t too excited to share their pub with a bunch of musicians from their neighboring country. Pulling into the campsite, well past midnight, having to let go of the plans he had for the first evening, Brown decided to do the safe thing.

“I said to my team, ‘Why don’t we just pray before bedtime and we can all go to sleep.’ I was hoping everyone would wake up in a better mood in the morning,” says Brown. “I brought along a lot of percussion instruments because I have a very short attention span. Most of the people I work with are the same way. So I handed out the instruments and asked everyone to pray for the weekend, and while we were praying we played the drums. “Pretty soon we really got into it-we felt the presence of the Lord. Some of the people started playing the guitar, just one chord with the rhythm. Because we were all tired and it was the end of a long week, the words ‘Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord’ just came out of my mouth. That’s where it started. We sang it for like 20 minutes, there was nothing else to the song.”

Phase Two
Most of us came into contact with Brenton Brown through the Vineyard releases in England that took a big role in the worship movement in that country. His songs include “Lord Reign in Me,” “All Who Are Thirsty,” “Hallelujah (Your Love Is Amazing).” And it was during that time in the UK that he led the weekend retreat where the chorus to “Everlasting God” was birthed. But the song came to full fruition through the experiences of daily living. A couple of years after writing the chorus, both Brenton and his wife were diagnosed with a Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS). Among the many features of CFS, one of them is severe mental and physical exhaustion from even small amounts of exertion, and sleep does little to alleviate it.

“Some songs for me come out of tears and strong emotion and those songs come out very quick,” says Brown. “And some songs come through study and, I guess the Pentecostal in me would say, the revelation of the character of God. It’s the truth about God, knowing and studying who He is and what He reveals to us through Scripture. ‘Everlasting God’ was a bit of both. It wasn’t like I got a word in the night and woke up and I heard God say, ‘Strength will rise as we wait upon the Lord.’ It wasn’t one of those special moments. I mean I do remember people praying that over me. Of course, the danger with suffering from a chronic illness without being healed is you grow cold to some words. But I was pretty intentional about it. This is God’s promise to us. However it works out, however he chooses to bring His strength. He hasn’t chosen the way I would have chosen, so to sing those words, for me, it’s almost a redeeming action. This is where I am at, this is the truth of God, and this is His promise. He will look after my wife and me, and he will carry us through this time.”

Life Lessons
The chorus of the song comes from Isaiah 40:28, “Do you not know? Have you not heard? The Lord is the everlasting God, the Creator of the ends of the earth. He will not grow tired or weary, and His understanding no one can fathom” (NIV). As a chapter in the Bible that is significant in Brown’s life, it makes sense that it would come out in his lyrics. He worked on the song with a friend who led the Youth For Christ band in England, and they basically filled the guitar parts with the verse and pre-chorus. After that it got shelfed again until Brown started working on his first solo record.

“I wanted to have that song on there,” he says. “It was a prayer that I was praying daily: ‘God you’ve got to help us. You may not be tired, but we really are tired, we need your help.’”

In a bit of a cryptic way, God’s answer to Brown’s plea for strength was, “I am the everlasting God.” “Most of my songs are basically an exploration of our two basic prayers: thank you and please,” explains Brown. “So my please in this song is give me strength, and God’s response is I’m the everlasting God. So before we got the final melody I kind worked up lyrically where I wanted it go. The second half of the pre-chorus we had the sense that God can help us. And then the chorus is ‘You are the everlasting God.’ That’s the punch line to the chapter in Isaiah; it explains God’s qualities as a deliverer. And then, ‘You’re the defender of the weak, you comfort those in need’ are thoughts taken from the Psalms and from the same chapter in Isaiah: ‘speak comfort to my people.’ ‘He lifts us up on wings like eagles,’ again from Isaiah 40.”

Writing Chops
The process that powered the writing of “Everlasting God” was an intentional fusion of head and heart. The rhythm and feel draws you in, but to get the true punch of the song, you have to be tracking with it. Learning valuable lessons as a Rhodes scholar at Oxford University, that simply became a way for Brown to approach his songs. “When I’m writing a song I kind of need to know what the point is,” he says. “In my second year of university one of my professors would give us one or two paragraphs and he’d ask us to work up the arguments. He wanted us to identify the steps in the argument and there’s a language and vocabulary used for this. Basically in an argument there are pre-clauses or clauses-a statement that backs up the argument-and at a certain point in the argument there is a completion. So it’s A and B, maybe C and D, therefore E. Those are the points of the argument. So when I write a song a like this, I need to know the point of it. What do we want to sing about? What truths of our God do we need to affirm? What truths of our life do we need to affirm? And then why is that true?

“I mean it’s not a complicated song. Lyrically it’s quite short. But in the end, I felt like we made this one strong point, why don’t we just stick to that? And hopefully it’s enough. That’s the cool thing about congregational songs. The temptation is so go, well I can’t find a really good, simple melody or lyric, so I’m just going to make a very complicated one. At least I’ve got my complexity if it doesn’t work out. The challenge is to risk going as simple as you can for the sake of the song.”

No Need
This simple, single-verse song is profound in its proclamation of God’s attributes and it is a promise that strength will come. Possibly even more so knowing that it comes from the pen of an artist who will always struggle with feeling a lack of strength. It’s a proclamation that requires our faith and also renews our hope. “Our hope is that He is near, and that not only is He strong, but He cares,” says Brown. “The Scripture says our God is powerful and compassionate. This is God that we serve. This is what He’s like. For me that’s where the joy comes from.”

Here is a video of Brenton Brown leading the song:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PGPTK24hQxc

"What A Friend We Have in Jesus"

Joseph Scriven was born in 1819 of prosperous parents in Dublin, Ireland. He was a graduate of Trinity College, Dublin. At the age of twenty-five he decided to leave his native country and migrate to Canada. His reasons for leaving his family and country seem to be two-fold: the religious influence of the Plymouth Brethren upon his life estranging him from his family and the accidental drowning of his fiancee the night before their scheduled wedding.

From that time Scriven developed a totally different pattern of life. He took the Sermon on the Mount literally. It is said that he gave freely of his limited possessions, even sharing the clothing from his own body, if necessary, and never once refused to help anyone who needed it. Ira Sankey tells in his writings of the man who, seeing Scriven in the streets of Port Hope, Ontario, with his sawbuck and saw, asked, "Who is that man? I want him to work for me." The answer was, "You cannot get that man; he saws wood only for poor widows and sick people who cannot pay." Because of this manner of life Scriven was respected but was considered to be eccentric by those who knew him.

"What a Friend We Have in Jesus" was never intended by Scriven for publication. Upon learning of his mother's serious illness and unable to be with her in far-off Dublin, he wrote a letter of comfort enclosing the words of this text. Some time later when he himself was ill, a friend who came to call on him chanced to see the poem scribbled on scratch paper near the bed. The friend read it with keen interest and asked Scriven if he had written the words. Scriven, with typical modesty, replied, "The Lord and I did it between us." In 1869 a small collection of his poems was published. It was simply entitled Hymns and Other Verses.

After the death of Joseph Scriven, also by accidental drowning, the citizens of Port Hope, Ontario, erected a monument on the Port Hope-Peterborough Highway, which runs from Lake Ontario, with the text and these words inscribed: Four miles north, in Pengally's Cemetery, lies the philanthropist and author of this great masterpiece, written at Port Hope, 1857. The composer of the music, Charles C. Converse, was a well-educated versatile and successful Christian, whose talents ranged from law to professional music. Under the pen name of Karl Reden, he wrote numerous scholarly articles on many subjects. Though he was an excellent musician and composer with many of his works performed by the leading American orchestras and choirs of his day, his life is best remembered for this simple music so well suited to Scriven's text.

Ira D. Sankey discovered the hymn in 1875, just in time to include it in his well-known collection, Sankey's Gospel Hymns Number One. Later Sankey wrote, "The last hymn which went into the book became one of the first in favor."

Quoted from "101 Hymn Stories" by Kenneth Osbeck.

Enjoy this version by Bart Millard, the lead singer of MercyMe, from his hymns album, "Hymned Again."
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w55gVIT7s0w

Here In My Life

You have said that all the heavens
sing for joy at one who finds
the way to freedom
truth of Jesus
Bought from death into His life

And I remember how You saw me
through the eyes of Your grace
And though the cost was Your beloved for me
still You made a way

You are my freedom
Jesus You're the reason
I'm kneeling again at Your throne
Where would I be without You here in my life
- Mia Fieldes, “Here in My Life”

The beginning of a New Year is here. This is a time of year when companies and individuals make goals for the year of 2009 and start to think towards the future. When we start making these goals and thinking towards what we want to accomplish, often we reminiscence on the previous year and what worked for us and what didn’t work. Goal-making can be an important process of the Christian life and can help us in envisioning where it is we want to go in the next year in our walk with the Lord. As we start this process in our Christian walks this year, allow me to remind us what it is the Lord brought us out of when we came into relationship with Him.

Paul reminds the church at Ephesus in Ephesians 2 the state in which they were in prior to knowing God: “you were dead in the trespasses and sins in which you once walked, following the course of this world… (living) in the passions of our flesh, carrying out the desires of the body and mind.” – Ephesians 2:1, 3, ESV (emphasis mine). When God found us, each one of us was in a similar state to the Ephesians. We were spiritually dead, destined for an eternity without Him and a life on this earth that would be without meaning or any lasting significance. Praise God that He did not leave us in this state, however!

The next verse lays out His saving plan for our lives: “But God, being rich in mercy, because of the great love with which He has loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, made us alive together with Christ - by grace you have been saved – and raised us up with him and seated us with him in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus.” – Ephesians 2:4-6, ESV (emphasis mine). How great is the love and mercy that God has showered down upon us that love Him! We were without purpose and dying in our sin, and yet He loved us enough to send His only son, Jesus Christ, to this earth to make a way for us to know Him. How great is our God! As the lyrics to the song above say, where would be without Him here in our lives? God is good!

May we never lose the wonder,

Brian