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Worship Wednesday – Beneath the Waters (I Will Rise) Revisited – Hillsong

October 10, 2019 admindeb Leave a comment

[Original blog on this song – after my emergency experience in 2016 – Worship Wednesday – Beneath the Waters (I Will Rise) – Hillsong]

Our son Nathan is named for an Old Testament prophet – the prophet who courageously stood before David, the King of Israel, and confronted him with his sin. 2 Samuel 11 gives the staggering account of David forsaking his place in battle and falling into the temptation of wanting something that wasn’t his. A king who had everything he could possibly want…but not Bathsheba, the wife of Uriah, one of his own mighty men, where his king should have also been.

We all know the story. David lusted for Bathsheba and had his way with her. When she became pregnant, he called Uriah home, hoping to hide his sin. Loyal Uriah didn’t go into his wife’s bed while his fellow warriors were still at war. Finally, King David, in sinful desperation, had Uriah sent back to battle, to the front lines, to die. Making way for David and Bathsheba to marry and have that child together…as if nothing terribly wrong had happened.

The barrier to all this is the perfect justice of God. God would intervene in this ill-fated situation. Uriah’s death would not go unpunished. David’s adultery would have a terrible cost…

Enter Prophet Nathan (2 Samuel 12) who tells the king a story that mirrors David’s own sin against Uriah. He was incensed by the story not seeing himself in it at first. “You are the man,” Nathan boldly confronted him. “You are the man.”

The baby conceived by Bathsheba with David would be born and then become deathly ill. King David prayed, fasted, and laid on the floor in anguish…until the baby died.

David was down for the count. Fully faced his sin and its consequences. Nowhere to go…but to rise for a fresh encounter with his God.

When David saw his servants whispering, he knew that the baby was dead. So he asked them, “Is the baby dead?”

They answered, “Yes, he is dead.”

Then David got up from the floor, washed himself, put lotions on, and changed his clothes. Then he went into the Lord’s house to worship. After that, he went home and asked for something to eat. His servants gave him some food, and he ate.

David’s servants said to him, “Why are you doing this? When the baby was still alive, you fasted and you cried. Now that the baby is dead, you get up and eat food.”

David said, “While the baby was still alive, I fasted, and I cried. I thought, ‘Who knows? Maybe the Lord will feel sorry for me and let the baby live.’ But now that the baby is dead, why should I fast? I can’t bring him back to life. Someday I will go to him, but he cannot come back to me.” – 2 Samuel 12:19-23

The account of King David’s sin against Bathsheba and her husband, Uriah, is sobering. David’s sin was deeply personal, against Uriah and Bathsheba, and against God, whom David loved.

Our circumstances and our choices can bring us to dark places sometimes…to low places. Far from God…and yet He never leaves His own. Even when we leave our own senses. David lost Uriah, he lost his baby son, but he didn’t lose God.

How do we get our minds around such a God? A God who is not surprised by our sin and not put off by us at our worst. In fact, “God proves His own love for us in that while we were still sinners Christ died for us!” (Romans 5:8) Our sin is costly. Devastating. Yet not without a way forward, because of Jesus.

When we come to the end of ourselves, as David did, we find God.

Hillsong‘s song Beneath the Waters (I Will Rise) was written about believer’s baptism, in particular, but it has a larger message.

“In its essence, this song is about rising to the new life Romans 6:4 speaks of as well as acknowledging the submission to Christ’s Lordship that baptism represents. In a broader sense, however, it has become a powerful confession of faith and salvation that has found a place across the life of our church.” – Scott Ligertwood

King David submitted again to the lordship of our sovereign God. When we find ourselves in a desperately hard place, whether we made it for ourselves or not, we can rise out of it as we turn our hearts toward God…because of what Jesus did for us.

Worship with me to this beautiful song:

This is my revelation
Christ Jesus crucified
Salvation through repentance
At the cross on which He died

Now hear my absolution
Forgiveness for my sin
And I sink beneath the waters
That Christ was buried in

I will rise
I will rise
As Christ was raised to life
Now in Him
Now in Him I live

I stand a new creation
Baptized in blood and fire
No fear of condemnation
By faith I’m justified

I will rise
I will rise
As Christ was raised to life
Now in Him
Now in Him I live
(x2)

I rise as You are risen
Declare Your rule and reign
My life confess Your lordship
And glorify Your name

Your word it stands eternal
Your Kingdom knows no end
Your praise goes on forever
And on and on again

No power can stand against You
No curse assault Your throne
No one can steal Your glory
For it is Yours alone

I stand to sing Your praises
I stand to testify
For I was dead in my sin

But now i rise
I will rise
As Christ was raised to life
Now in Him
Now in Him I live

No power can stand against You
No curse assault Your throne
No one can steal Your glory
For it is Yours alone

I stand to sing Your praises
I stand to testify
For I was dead in my sin

But now I rise
I will rise
As Christ was raised to life
Now in Him
Now in Him I live

I will rise
I will rise
As Christ was raised to life
Now in Him
Now in Him I live
(x2)*

“There will come a day for all of us that we won’t rise any more on this side of eternity…but because of Him, we will rise to be with Him, in Heaven…if we believe. Hallelujah!” – Deb Mills Writer

*Lyrics to Beneath the Waters (I Will Rise) – Songwriters: Brooke Ligertwood, Scott Ligertwood

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Worship Wednesday – Beneath the Waters (I Will Rise) – Hillsong

September 14, 2016 admindeb 11 Comments

Photo Credit: BakersfieldBSide, Shutterstock

“…I have set before you life and death, blessing and curse. Therefore choose life, that you and your offspring may live, loving the LORD your God, obeying his voice and holding fast to him, for he is your life and length of days…” – Deuteronomy 30:19-20a

I’ve ridden inside an ambulance as a caregiver and family member, but never as a patient…until this week.

Take one perfectly normal evening. Getting ready for bed. Last items of the day…and then…I can’t get my breath. Literally… Coughing and breathing hard and feeling like I just can’t get air.

For any of you with asthma or other lung issues, you may have experienced this. I now know how terrifying that can be.

Then you add a husband, already in bed and half asleep, who, in an emergency, can turn on a dime (i.e., move and think quickly and well)…and I was getting help.

Could I make it to an urgent care center? Yes…no! Feeling like I might lose consciousness, I had to sit down just as we were going out the door. Then he called 911. How many times have any of us ever even done that?

For me, I was just trying to breathe. The “what if’s” fly. What if this is it?…actually came to my mind in those moments. Sitting, sucking in air, I told him I loved him, and he said, “Let me pray for you.” …and God was near through it all. Did I feel Him near?…not every moment, but I knew it just the same.

Somewhere in those seeming seconds before the rescue squad arrived, some of the panic started subsiding. God. When they arrived, they took action, and my hope rallied. Surprisingly, it actually took quite a few minutes before we drove off.

I could see Dave through the back window of the ambulance, in his car ready to follow us. Seriously, between him and them, it was like being attended by a host of angels. All I had to do was keep breathing.

The EMT’s were busy, too. Assessing, assessing, assessing. They fed me oxygen and encouragement, and finally off we went. Yet, the longer I lived, in those moments, with these professionals doing their job, the less it seemed I would die from whatever this was.

Photo Credit: Medscape

By the time, we were settled in the emergency room, the terror of not getting enough air had passed. It seemed everything the nurses, techs, and doctors did was magical. They were still searching for a cause all through the night, but the labwork, x-rays, and such were narrowing the field of possibles. They continued to assess and apply their knowledge to whatever was wrong with me – breathing treatments, more tests, antibiotics, more tests.

Finally, the scariest stuff was ruled out. It wasn’t a collapsed lung from cancer, or pulmonary edema from congestive heart failure, or bleeding from an aneurysm .

It was pneumonia…as best they could tell.

Admitted to the hospital, in the care of another set of angels…er, nurses, I began the process of getting better.

The better came quickly and I am so grateful. We all have had and will have dark days. What takes my breath away (in totally a good way) is that we never have to be alone in it. Either God sends angels…or God sends people. I have experienced that this week, and know it has happened in lives of others near me. Including my older brother’s situation…the day he too swiftly went to be with the Lord (that story is for another day).

Across our lifetimes, we have experiences of the severe mercies and tender graces of God. Sometimes, they come through the kindnesses of both strangers and loved ones. Sometimes, it’s in the quiet of a heart, through breathing hard in the back of an ambulance. We know we can count on Him from His Word…and from all these brushes with real and serious.

Just the day before I couldn’t breathe, we sang the following worship song during when gathered on Sunday at Movement Church. Over the last two days, the words and truth of God in the words have settled in my heart and mind.

Hillsong‘s Beneath the Waters (I Will Rise) is a strong declaration of life knowing God through Jesus Christ. The songwriters took some of their ideas from the verse in Romans: “We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.” (Romans6:4)

“I will rise” is my song today because what felt like a near-death experience two nights ago has just added my awareness of that “newness of life” we have in Christ. There will come a day for all of us that we won’t rise any more on this side of eternity…but because of Him, we will rise to be with Him, in Heaven…if we believe. Hallelujah!

Worship with me.