Bucket Full of Grace

As the Deer [Amazon Music Link] The Bible passage that this song comes from is Psalm 42 : "1 As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, my God.  2 My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.  When can I go and meet with God?"  This psalm and this song shows the emotional and passionate side of faith, longing to worship God.  If you are an analytical type like me and find this hard to wrap your head around then here's something you can think about in this song to help you deepen your connection.  This Psalm is attributed to the Sons of Korah and understanding who they were can give you a lot to think about within this song. The Sons of Korah In 2 Chronicles 20:19 we find that the sons of Korah were Levites, from the family of Kohath.  When David was writing the Psalms, they served as musicians in the temple.  So, being named as the sons of Korah, means that their lineage was very important to understanding them.  In Numbers 16 , their father Korah

Amazing Grace [Amazon Music Link] Can You Have Amazing Grace? Two weeks before his seventh birthday, young John lost his mother.  His father was a rough and tough sea captain and John took up the sailor's life at that impressionable age.  He was led into a life of drinking, anger and unimaginable cruelty.  His father left him in Africa at one point where he was enslaved by a princess and treated horribly.  Upon returning to a navy ship he tried to desert but ended up becoming a captain in the slave-trade.  He transported slaves on his ship for multiple years treating them abhorrently. Imagine meeting this tragic figure on the street.  Would you have grace for him?  It's easy to think that you would initially, but really imagine the meeting…  a racist, cruel, murdering, drunken sailor with apparently no redeeming qualities. This man had an experience that changed his life.  During a storm at sea, with a gaping hole in his ship, about to die, he prayed to God to save them.  Mirac

Sweet Hour of Prayer [Amazon Music Link] Christians nowadays tend to use words like "devotions" or "quiet-time" to describe their daily time spent in prayer and bible study.  It doesn't matter what you call it but I prefer the phrase "sweet hour of prayer."  I don't mean that it is necessarily 60 minutes long, maybe you schedule 30 minutes or 10 minutes to dedicate the day to your Lord.  However, at that early morning hour, it is certainly sweet to start off your day with the right perspective and to start off with prayer.  When I write these little thoughts, I know that most people skim over the words.  I understand.  But, the words of this song are really worth giving a think.  Jump down to the lyrics and meditate on what your "sweet hour of prayer" really is. Psalms 6:9 The Lord has heard my supplication; The Lord will receive my prayer. Historical Background William Walford, a blind lay preacher in the small hamlet of Coleshill, Warwi

Would You Rather Self-Help or Take Courage? Take Courage by Kristene DiMarco is not about self-help.  We live in a culture of "self-help" with all sorts of mantras like "pull yourself up by your bootstraps," "you need to have grit" and "success is falling down 7 times and getting up 8."  There is some truth to these things and hard work is important but it's not everything.  If your confidence comes from your drive and perseverance to overcome then you will eventually be exhausted and disappointed.  There is rest in the Lord.  But, it's not what rest looks like to this world.  It looks like taking courage that you didn't have.   Take Courage in the New Testament In the New Testament there are many places where Jesus tells people to "take courage" which is an interesting phrase.  It means there is a well of courage available to you for overcoming life and it is available.  All you have to do is take it.  If you think you can

Center by Charlie Hall [on Amazon Music] Since the beginning, people have lifted their eyes to the heavens and thought that they were at the center of the Universe.  It turns out that only God can be at the center.  Above is a picture of the microwave background radiation left after the Big Bang.  Although the phrase, "Big Bang" sounds like an explosion that takes place at a single point, what it really describes is an everywhere expansion much like inflating a balloon.  Imagine that the entire Universe was a small deflated bag of rubber and breath was breathed in.  This Universe would expand and the rubber molecules would pull apart from each other everywhere at the same time.  This is similar to the expansion of what we see in the Universe as we look out at the night sky with powerful telescopes.  Measurements show that the galaxies are pulling away from each other like they are all on the surface of a balloon.  So, each person's view of things pulling away from them ma

  Background Elvina Hall [link to Amazon Music] was in the choir loft in church one Sunday morning in 1865 feeling the pastor's prayer was going a bit too long.  She began to have the words of the first verse and refrain of this song form in her mind and heart for the first time and searched, during the prayer, for paper to write them down.  There was no paper nearby so she wrote the words in her hymnbook, not realizing that this would become a classic printed in almost every hymbook in every denomination for the next century.  After the service, she showed her pastor what she had done and he realized that the organist had also written a new song that day and they fit together perfectly.  He worked with them to finish the hymn and the rest is history.  One of the most beloved hymns in history. A Typo: Leopard not Leper A well-known typo in the lyrics happens in verse 4.  The original manuscripts and many early hymnals would read "Can change the leper's spots" but thi

  Breathing has been stressful over the past few years.  Ever notice that once you start thinking about your breathing, it's hard to stop?  I bet you are noticing your own breathing right now.  The world has been thinking about breathing for the last two and a half years and it's been stressful and exhausting.  I remember the first time that I went to get groceries when everything was locked down.  "Only essential workers" and "no unnecessary travel" come to mind in this memory.  When shopping, I found myself concentrating on my breath (partly because I was wearing a mask and wasn't used to it).  I had joined a herd of full shopping carts sweating and distracted by picturing particles from every person flying through the air.  As people around me became more and more afraid, my faith got me through this.  I said, "It's Your Breath in our lungs so we pour out our praise to you only, God.  Great are You Lord."  This song became an anthem for

A great storm comes in.  Jesus walks on the water.  Peter walks on the water.  Peter starts to sink.  Jesus rescues Peter.  Following Jesus isn't meant to be easy, it's meant to challenge you to the point where you continually realize how much you need Him.  Pastor Dan wrote this song years ago and it always blesses me to hear it.  We are all on a journey, stepping out in faith, failing, and being rescued by Jesus.   Background Prov 3:5 Trust in the Lord with all your heart, And lean not on your own understanding; 6 In all your ways acknowledge Him, And He shall direct your paths. NKJV Eph 1:15 Therefore I also, after I heard of your faith in the Lord Jesus and your love for all the saints, 16 do not cease to give thanks for you, making mention of you in my prayers: 17 that the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give to you the spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, 18 the eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that you may know

  Matthew 19:26  Jesus looked at them and said,  “With man this is impossible, but with God all things are possible.” Background The song Every Giant Will Fall by Rend Collective references Jericho.  Many scholars believe that Jericho is one of the oldest cities in the world.  As with most properties, the significance of Jericho was "location, location, location."  The Promised Land was promised to the Israelites by God... and Jericho... the formidable walled border city stood in the way of this.  Jericho was the first city that needed to be overcome to really enter into the promises of God.  For the full story read Joshua 5:13-6:23 . This is a picture for us of God doing the impossible when we rely on Him and not on our own strength.  Reading the biblical account and meditating on how this applies to your life, the giants (like Goliath 1 Samuel 17 ) that need to be overcome and the promises of God for your future, brings deep meaning to the words of the song as you worship

A Different Kind of Background When we first sang Graves into Gardens at my church (Abundant Life Fellowship in Boonville, NY) there was some opposition to it.  At the time, there were elements in Conservative Christian media that were trying to "cancel" Steven Furtick , mega-church pastor and co-author of this song.  It seemed at the time that there was a very critical community that scoured the internet for something to be against and they latched onto being against Furtick and anything he was connected to.  You can tell pretty easily that I disagree with that approach.  However, it is alway possible that a mega-church pastor is a wolf in sheep's clothing so I do understand the urge to be skeptical and to " test all things and hold onto that which is true."    I think the deeper problem for me is that I used to be extremely critical in the same way.  When I was in college, before cancelling was the cultural go-to phenomenon that is today, I would basically ca

  Years ago I attended a mennonite wedding held in a rural church with no electricity.  There was a large crowd packed into the tiny building with no organ, piano, guitar, or any other instrument.  An elderly man stood up at the front of the gathering and blew a pitch pipe finding the first note and suddenly the entire congregation burst into what seemed like seven part harmony!  Each note rang out as tears formed in many eyes.  I don't actually recall whether the song that day was How Great Thou Art or another great old hymn.  But, I do know that every time I hear this hymn I am transported back to that moment. Historical Background Mr. Carl Gustav Boberg was a Swedish pastor, editor and member of parliament in the late 1800s.  Boberg was caught in a thunderstorm outside with severe winds and almost died.  When the storm calmed, he looked out over a clear bay and the words of How Great Thou Art began to come to him in his heart... "O Lord, My God, When I in awesome wonder, c

I saw Matt Redman in concert when I was in college during a festival called Passion OneDay in Tennessee.  It was a wonderful experience in that open field, rain pouring down, with tens of thousands of other college students singing "Let it rain... Open the floodgates of Heaven."  He is a truly great worship leader with a gift for bringing people into a real worship experience.  He does this with 10,000 Reasons [which he has won Dove Awards and Grammy Awards for].  This is one of the reasons that this is one of the first songs our worship team recorded to put online during church shutdowns.  "Sing like never before.  I'll worship Your Holy Name." Background This song quotes Psalms 103:1-5 which lays out five reasons to bless the Lord [His Name, His benefits, His Healing, His Lovingkindness and Compassion, and how He renews our youth like the eagle]: 1 Bless the Lord, O my soul,      And all that is within me, bless His holy name. 2 Bless the Lord, O my soul,