Tag Archives: Worship Wednesday

Culture & Religion, Film, God, Inspired, Jesus, Music, Thanksgiving, Thanksgiving or Gratefulness, Wednesday Worship

Worship Wednesday – All Good Gifts – Thanksgiving Memories

November 26, 2014 admindeb 6 Comments

Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, and comes down from the Father of lights, with whom there is no variation or shadow of turning. – James 1:17

For most of 20 years, we lived in North Africa where a Thanksgiving holiday was a foreign concept. “Eid el Shukr” (“Feast of Thanks” in Arabic) was understood but not a day set aside. We, along with other expat Americans, brought Thanksgiving with us and invited our local friends into the experience. On the surface, American Thanksgiving has pretty much three constant components – food, family, and football. In those days of living overseas, watching football on T.V. on Thanksgiving Day was a bit challenging, but these days, it seems, all things are possible.

Now, back in the States, the old traditions are changing. My Mom, who always laid out an incredible Southern-style feast on the kitchen counter back home in Georgia, is no longer with us. As with some of you, I’m sure, I miss her still every day and how she lavished love on us through these family times together. Our children are grown now and establishing their own traditions with more families and friends added into the mix. After so many years being away, we find ourselves needing to re-work our own traditions as well.

Last night, we participated in a community Thanksgiving dinner for international students. This is our fourth year, So I’m thinking it’s a new tradition for us. As we visited with new friends from Iran and Colombia, we marveled at how small the world has become. Enjoying Thanksgiving yummies together with them took us fondly back to our years in Egypt, Tunisia, and Morocco.

Thanksgiving is, for us, all about food, family, and football…but there’s also another element…faith… I am grateful every day for the kindnesses of God and those he’s placed in my life. Celebrating Thanksgiving allows us to put an exclamation point on being grateful. It’s not just about a tableful of food, although food is clearly a focal point. Thanksgiving, even as a national holiday and not a religious one, focuses our sight beyond ourselves. There is an object in Thanksgiving beyond ourselves.

Over 30 years ago, a funky little Broadway musical was turned into a film – Godspell. It was an adaptation of the life of Jesus according to the Gospel of Matthew. At that time, I was in that season of life young people pass through of searching out what I believed. It wasn’t going well at that time. Praise God, He did not forget me during those days when I had all but forgotten Him. Watching Godspell, of all things, was one of the occasions God used to wake me up. There’s a wonder and delight in the young followers of Jesus in the musical. It reminded me of what I had once with God…and what could be again.

All the songs in the musical Godspell are lovely. Composer and Lyricist, Stephen Schwartz, beautifully captured some of Jesus’ teaching and the depth of love and rightness between Him, His followers, and creation, in general. All Good Gifts, adapted from an old hymn, is one such song and is a pure and proper doxology of praise for Thanksgiving.

Worship with me. [Here’s the YouTube video from Godspell to give you the melody.]

All Good Gifts*
We plow the fields and scatter the good seed on the land..
But it is fed and watered by God’s almighty hand..
He sends us snow in winter, the warmth to swell the grain…
The breezes and the sunshine, and soft refreshing rain…

All good gifts around us
Are sent from Heaven above
Then thank the Lord, thank the Lord for all his love…

We thank thee then, O Father, for all things bright and good,
The seedtime and the harvest, our life our health our food,
No gifts have we to offer for all thy love imparts
But that which thou desirest, our humble thankful hearts!

All good gifts around us
Are sent from Heaven above..
Then thank the Lord, thank the Lord for all his love..

I really wanna thank you Lord!
All good gifts around us
Are sent from Heaven above..
Then thank the Lord, oh thank the Lord for all his love..

Food – Family Favorites in Mom’s Kitchen

Football – on T.V. or out on the street with cousins and friends

Family – Time together…savoring every minute.

Happy Thanksgiving…

Oh…just in case Thanksgiving is a struggle…and it isn’t all happy family fun…I pray you take courage and rein in your heart to remember that God sees and loves you. We can be a blessing…if you’ve read this far…you are a blessing to me. Wish you were at our table…maybe one day you will be. You are definitely welcome at God’s table.

*Lyrics and Story Behind the Song – All Good Gifts (Godspell)

YouTube Video – All Good Gifts (Godspell 1990)

YouTube Video Clip – All Good Gifts (Godspell original cast 1973)

Wikipedia article on original hymn/lyric – We Plough the Fields and Scatter (1862)

Babies & Children, Music, Thanksgiving or Gratefulness, Volunteering/Serving, Walk with God, Wednesday Worship

Worship Wednesday – Babysitting, Ballads, and the Beauty of God

November 5, 2014 admindeb Leave a comment

Don’t you love when the nearness of God penetrates an ordinary afternoon? I was babysitting for a little buddy of mine while her mom and dad went for a prenatal appointment for adorable baby #2. Her mom had left a Pandora radio station playing on her Apple computer for our listening enjoyment.

Side-Bar: I’m pretty narrow in my music preferences – both in genre and method of listening. The music on my computer was selected and installed by my family. Typically, I listen to my classical guitarist son, Nathan Mills, Christmas music (starting in October), and contemporary worship. If you’re like me, you may not know these songs (below; links are at the bottom of page). Hang in there with me on this. I think you will resonate with how God can turn any ordinary into something extraordinary.

As my little buddy finished her snack, and we retired to her living room to play, the music became more of a focal point. The Pandora channel was Jack Johnson (Children’s) which I’ve never heard before. As my little charge and I began playing together, one song after another (4 in a row) set my heart to praise.

Adele’s Make Me Feel Your Love – Cover of Bob Dylan’s song (1997).

“I could make you happy, make your dreams come true.
Nothing that I wouldn’t do.
Go to the ends of the Earth for you,
To make you feel my love.”*

Crazy romantic song and yet also full of images of my experience of a God who pursues and goes, not just to the ends of the Earth but, to the Cross for us. Not just so I can feel His love but to know it absolutely.

Jason Mraz’s I Won’t Give Up (also by Michael Natter) – It’s a ballad about fighting for relationship(s), about holding on to one’s life aspirations, and about remaining steadfast.

“I won’t give up on us
Even if the skies get rough
I’m giving you all my love
I’m still looking up.

I don’t wanna be someone who walks away so easily
I’m here to stay and make the difference that I can make.”**

Coming on the playlist after Make You Feel My Love, this song reminded me of the culture of today. Commitments aren’t forever. Too often, we walk away from each other…and sometimes we walk away from God. So much is at stake in life, and I don’t want to be “someone who walks away so easily”. I want to be a person who doesn’t give up on life, or God…or you.

As I was twirling around the living room with my little buddy, singing this song, it was like a proclamation of praise to God that He doesn’t give up on us, and I’m not going to give up on us either.

Ingrid Michaelson’s The Way I Am – This quirky little love song doesn’t really take me to the throne of God or anything. Yet, there are a couple of lines that speak volumes to me:

“I love you more than I could ever promise.
And you take me the way I am.”***

How grateful I am that God knows us, through and through, and loves us anyway. His love causes me to love Him. He is not surprised or put off by my brokenness, and I love Him for that… No need to say, “I promise”. He knows I love Him…as imperfect and messy as that is…and He still takes me the way I am…and by His grace, makes me something beautiful.

Then, last of the 4 in a row:

American Authors’ Best Day of My Life – Anybody who knows this song has to wonder how I could derive any thought of God from it. It could be a stretch…but not for me. The lead vocalist of American Authors tells how the song is about how we can all escape from whatever our reality is and enter into some sort of better world we make up, if need be.**** We can make any day “the best day of my life”.

The irony here is that this situation is totally flipped, thanks to God. Whatever our situation is, or seems to be, we can know that God is at work in it, whatever it is, for our good and His glory (Romans 8:28). Rather than letting whatever is “seen” devastate us or bring us down, we focus on what is “unseen” – the marvel of God at work in our lives and all around us. He makes “best days” possible…always.

The rest of the songs on the Pandora playlist yesterday are a blur to me. The afternoon wound down with books, babydolls, and bears…and my little charge. When her parents returned, I left for home…blessed. A bit of time serving a young family I love, and 4 pop ballads that filled my heart, all over again, with joy and gratefulness at knowing God.

This sort of thing happens to you, too, right? Finding sacred in the supposed secular? I’m sure of it.

YouTube Video – Adele – Make Me Feel Your Love Lyrics

*Lyrics to Make Me Feel Your Love

YouTube Video – Jason Mraz – I Won’t Give Up [Official Music Video]

**Lyrics to I Won’t Give Up

YouTube Video – Ingrid Michaelson – The Way I Am [Official Music Video]

Story Behind the Song – The Way I Am

***Lyrics to The Way I Am

YouTube Video – American Authors – Best Day of My Life

****Story Behind the Song Best Day of My Life

God, Inspired, Jesus, Lives Full of God, Music, Walk with God, Wednesday Worship

Worship Wednesday – Hallelujahs Multiplied by NeedToBreathe

October 29, 2014 admindeb Leave a comment

[The LORD speaking] “For I am about to do something new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.” – Isaiah 43:19

I was so mad. Details aren’t important for this. Let’s just say, all it takes for me sometimes to rocket from baseline to ballistic is to be ignored. Especially when I think what I’m saying is important. Sigh. Not that I would do anything with my anger except to go all silent and fuming. Yet, it still happens…after all these years, walking with the Lord. Getting angry because I didn’t get the consideration “deserved”.

Entitlement is such an indictment of our heart – our all-out absorption with self.

En·ti·tle·ment – the fact of having a right to something; the amount to which a person has a right; the belief that one is inherently deserving of privileges or special treatment.

Thanks be to GOD, that He doesn’t leave His children wallowing in their muddled thoughts. Within minutes, the Holy Spirit’s kind reasoning broke through my anger. I came to my senses thinking of how GOD must deal with our ignoring Him. Nothing in what I’ve experienced of His character shows Him stewing in anger toward us. He is not surprised at our behavior. He knows our frailty when we stomp our feet and kick at the dust in whatever frustration we’ve allowed ourselves to focus on.

He does not retaliate. Even when He is silent, it never seems like the kind I perpetrated against my husband, for instance, in those early years of marriage. It would take me three days to return to normal conversation with him when he “made me mad”. How thankful I am that God has grown me well past those days. How thankful that He does not get angry at His children in ways that punish.

Now, in minutes, instead of days, God gently reminds me how to release the anger toward another, frail as me. He brings Himself to mind in the life and example of Jesus, who suffered long with those He loved. My entitlement falls in pieces at the foot of the Cross, where He died for me.

Bear and Bo Rinehart, brothers out of Seneca, South Carolina, wrote Multiplied. They, along with Seth Bolt, make up the band NEEDTOBREATHE. The song Multiplied came to mind yesterday as I recovered from my fit, remembering Whose I am. His love, not judgment, helped me clear my head. How amazing that He (like the song says) comes to find us, wherever we are and whatever condition we put ourselves.

We have such a small life…such a short one here…God, please take all our “hallelujahs” and multiply them to Your magnificent glory.

Worship with me.

Multiplied

Your love is
Like radiant diamonds
Bursting inside us
We cannot contain
Your love will
Surely come find us
Like blazing wildfires
Singing your name

God of mercy
Sweet love of mine
I have surrendered to your design
may this offering stretch across the sky
And these hallelujahs be multiplied.

Lyrics of Multiplied from the album Rivers in the Wasteland; written by Bear Rinehart and Bo Rinehart

YouTube Official Video of Multiplied

YouTube Unofficial Lyric Video of Multiplied

Story Behind the Song and the Band

Images – NeedToBreathe Website

Culture & Religion, Inspired, Life Skills, Lives Full of God, Music, Walk with God, Wednesday Worship

Worship Wednesday – You Are My Vision – Rend Collective

August 20, 2014 admindeb 1 Comment

The strongest memories I have of the song Be Thou My Vision are connected with worship across North Africa. When our children were growing up, we “attended church” – expat families who gathered once or twice a week to worship in English. We sang great hymns, old and more modern, with guitar accompaniment, and worship leaders with more British and Irish accents than American. I remember our little family, strung out along a pew of these little churches. Our stair-step children, with shoulders squared, singing from hymnals in the early years and then words projected on the stuccoed front walls.

We sang Be Thou My Vision, this old Irish hymn, across three countries in Heliopolis Community Church (Cairo), St. George’s (Tunis), and St. John’s (Casablanca). Before our children all launched back into life in the US, we “attended” church less and became a part of house churches. There we still sang Be Thou My Vision, still with guitar…less with a British or Irish accent.

Now to Rend Collective. I heard this group for the first time on my radio about a year ago. The song was Second Chance*. I jotted down the group’s name and song (while driving…sigh) and would later buy the album** based on that one song. Have you ever done that?

When I heard You are My Vision, my first thought was how could anyone mess with such a great hymn that so truly magnifies God? As I listened, the personal nature of this version drew me in. This old Irish hymn written in the 8th century has been, not-so-much-updated but, celebrated by an Irish group of young worshippers. Not celebrating the song so much as celebrating the Saviour of the song.

Worship with me through the lyrics and music of You are My Vision.

You are my vision, oh King of mine heart. Nothing else satisfies, only You, Lord. You are my best thought, by day or by night. Waking or sleeping, Your presence, my light.

You are my wisdom; You are my true word – I ever with You and You with me, Lord. You’re my great Father and I’m Your true Son. You dwell inside me, together we’re one.

You are my battle shield, sword for the fight. You are my dignity; You’re my delight. You’re my soul’s shelter, and You’re my high tower. Come raise me heavenward, oh, Power of my power.

I don’t want riches or a man’s empty praise. You’re my inheritance, now and always. You and You only, the first in my heart – High king of heaven, my treasure You are.

High king of heaven, when victory’s won, may I reach heaven’s joy, oh, bright heaven’s Son. Heart of my own heart, whatever befall, still be my vision, oh, Ruler of all.

Heart of my own heart, whatever befall, still be my vision, oh, Ruler of all.

Lyrics for You are My Vision

You are My Vision – Rend Collective – Official Live – acapella part at 2:23 will seriously give you cold chills

YouTube video of You are My Vision with lyrics

**Rend Collective Albums with You are My Vision – Homemade Worship by Handmade People and Campfire

Rend Collective Art of Celebration – Album & Tour

Be Thou My Vision – Wikipedia – English Methodist Lyrics, 1964

Back Story of Be Thou My Vision

*YouTube video of Second Chance from album Homemade Worship by Handmade People

YouTube video of Build Your Kingdom Here from album Homemade Worship by Handmade People – another favorite for another day

Lives Full of God, Transitions, Walk with God, Workplace or Marketplace

Worship Wednesday – Blessings Disguised – Laura Story’s Discovery of the Mercies of God

July 30, 2014 admindeb 3 Comments

For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, is working for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory, while we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen. For the things which are seen are temporary, but the things which are not seen are eternal. – 2 Corinthians 4:17-18

“For My thoughts are not your thoughts,
Nor are your ways My ways,” says the Lord.
“For as the heavens are higher than the earth,
So are My ways higher than your ways,
And My thoughts than your thoughts.” – Isaiah 55:8-9

The first time I was aware of Laura Story’s song Blessings was last week on a perplexing workday. I was on an errand, and this song came on the radio. The sweet love of God washed over me, bringing perspective to my work situation and lightening my heart.

Later, I read online that the song Blessings came out of Laura Story’s journey with her husband, Martin, through the diagnosis of his brain tumor. After years in treatment, he is doing well today and they have a little daughter. He still has some issues related to his treatment, but they’re living in a new normal, with a deeper faith in God and joy in the life they have together and with Him.

Life brings all kinds of twists and turns. Sometimes a tough day at work but other times a painful, life-altering diagnosis. Sometimes a relationship betrayal; other times a devastating failure or disappointment. Things just don’t always go as we think they should. Yet, as we cling to God, we find His faithfulness.

We discover, as Laura and Martin did, that God’s mercies are revealed in these places of pain and confusion. He is there in that dark place with His children, and He will bring us into the light again.

Take a few minutes and worship our faithful God, meditating on His presence with us in these “mercies in disguise”.

Blessings by Laura Story

We pray for blessings
We pray for peace
Comfort for family, protection while we sleep
We pray for healing, for prosperity
We pray for Your mighty hand to ease our suffering
All the while, You hear each spoken need
Yet love is way too much to give us lesser things

(Chorus)
‘Cause what if your blessings come through raindrops
What if Your healing comes through tears
What if the thousand sleepless nights are what it takes to know You’re near
What if trials of this life are Your mercies in disguise

We pray for wisdom
Your voice to hear
We cry in anger when we cannot feel You near
We doubt your goodness, we doubt your love
As if every promise from Your Word is not enough
And all the while, You hear each desperate plea
And long that we’d have faith to believe

Chorus

When friends betray us
When darkness seems to win
We know the pain reminds this heart
That this is not, this is not our home

Chorus

What if my greatest disappointments
Or the aching of this life
Is the revealing of a greater thirst this world can’t satisfy
What if trials of this life
The rain, the storms, the hardest nights
Are your mercies in disguise

Blessings – Lyrics from KLove

Story of Song

More of Back Story

Photo Credit – Blessings Album Cover

Indescribable also written by Laura Story and performed by Chris Tomlin