As For Me -- Chris Tomlin, Jason Ingram, Pat Barrett, and Joshua

 

Control and Choice. That in a very succinct way describes what Pat Barrett, Jason Ingram, and Chris Tomlin were discussing one day in 2020. Their joint thinking process led one of them to recall something he’d read, and as they all talked about the episode when Joshua challenged the people (Joshua 24:14-15) (see the map-graphic here that shows Shechem, where Joshua issued what some might say was a dare), a song emerged that used this ancient leader’s own words “As For Me”. Pat especially thought a lot about what Joshua’s words meant, and what effects that should have for his family and himself. It is rather incongruous, seemingly, that the Almighty God, the Creator and Guide and Protector, the One who brought the people through the wilderness, would then prompt Joshua to say that the people had to right to choose, that they did possess some control. What would a people or an individual do with that? Why would God take a risk on people who could turn away? Take one more look at Him before you do.

 

Perhaps that was what Pat Barrett and his two musical collaborators did, and what they saw that Joshua also modeled some 3,300 years ago as he told the people to exercise their memories and then choose. He told them all about their ancestors’ days since the time of Abraham, right up until that moment, so they were thinking about all that God had meant to them jointly in their history. So how could they say anything else but ‘Yes, we will follow Him!’. Joshua told them ‘As for me…’, and the people essentially responded, ‘we too…we’re with you’. Pat said in an interview 33 centuries later what all the choice for God has meant for him, in a similar way that really echoes what those Israelites must have considered as well. Pat said it’s really stunning to understand that you and I have a say in how our lives proceed, but that this kind of control certainly doesn’t extend to everything we see and touch. No one can make you serve God, Pat remembered, and so lots of people do not, unfortunately. And, to underscore this point, the world turned and seemed very chaotic in 2020, and Pat recalled a feeling of helplessness was very present. And yet, we can all make a contribution, even if each of us thinks of himself as insignificant and really incapacitated when it comes to everything around us. But, when it comes to one’s own family and what goes on inside your home’s four walls, you can make choices about what values will prevail in that space. Pat (and his wife, Megan?) decided that that was a principle to guide their family, and he says that the song’s bridge helped remind him that choosing God should permeate ‘…every room, [and be on] every wall, and door’, so to speak. A Christian’s lifestyle doesn’t have to be ‘flashy’, he said, but one’s own family can decide how to be around others, including those who might enter their home; so, being ‘present’, and ‘gracious’, ‘generous’, ‘hospitable’, holding to the ‘truth’, and ‘forgiving’ others, and also capable of having the ‘hard conversations’…in short, being all of the things that are ‘Godly and good’, as Pat put it, is someone making the decision to exercise control and make a choice in one’s own life.

 

‘As for me’ means seeing who He is and has been for you, and making the choice to stay with Him. Pat ended the interview by saying that ‘as for me’ has been a daily selection, and a way that spurs him to reflect each day about whom he’s serving. Be honest with yourself, Pat said. Have there been other gods elbowing their way into my space, coaxing me to look in their direction? In Pat’s life, he’s had to watch out for popularity (as a performer), but also fear. Do those have control, and steer one’s course? You can be a pastor’s/minister’s/elder’s kid, and have Joshua’s words at Shechem on your lips, but does that itself become a risk, something that becomes too familiar? Pat hinted that that was something he’d thought about too (since he was a pastor’s kid). Does my Creator see me essentially as a part of my family’s lineage – as many of Joshua’s day, and later also, might have thought? I – me, myself, and I -- make my way with Him, or I don’t. No one else can do it for me. Jesus opened the door, certainly. Will you walk through it?  

 

See/hear the song story here (at 3:05 – 11:22) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWT5StJU2XU

 

See information on the map image here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shechem and https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shechem#/media/File:Nablus_and_Balata_in_the_Survey_of_Western_Palestine_1880.11_(cropped).jpg …This file is in the public domain because it is a mere mechanical scan or photocopy of a public domain original, or – from the available evidence – is so similar to such a scan or photocopy that no copyright protection can be expected to arise. The original itself is in the public domain for the following reason: This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 70 years or fewer. {{PD-1996}} – public domain in its source country on January 1, 1996 and in the United States.

Your Presence Is Heaven to Me -- Israel Houghton and Micah Massey

 

How many of us Earth-ers have wished that the Righteous Judge would make a physical appearance at one time or another? Could that have been what Israel Houghton and Micah Massey were also mulling over, as so many of us do on a particularly tough day? But rather than bemoaning the state of terrestrial affairs, Israel and Micah saw themselves in contact, in awe, and at least momentarily transported to an unblemished vision, when they exclaimed that “Your Presence Is Heaven to Me”. Perhaps that’s what three of His Apostles also experienced – that they were seeing a piece of Heaven when they saw Jesus transfigured with two other famous people (Moses and Elijah) of their heritage (see the 19^th Century artwork, The Transfiguration of Christ, by Carl Bloch here). Suspend the limits that your five senses coax you to accept, and imagine what it’s like to be with Him, as you and I hope and believe we will be in that never-ending place. It’s called heaven, and as Israel and Micah remind us, His presence is here now.

 

These two writers don’t share explicitly what spurred their song’s lyrics and music (which were published in 2012), but any number of scriptures might have contributed to the insights of Israel and Micah regarding His presence. ‘Thy kingdom come, thy will be done…on earth as it is in heaven’, as Jesus was once teaching a group of disciples to pray (Matthew 6:10). Or how about ^‘I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God so that you may know that you have eternal life’ (1 John 5:13). In both cases, believers seem to be told that His kingdom, and the eternity that comes with it, is available already. Try on these also, as they help convey something of the song lyrics’ meaning (as pointed out in one of the links below): Psalm 16:11; Exodus 33:14; Psalm 27:4; Psalm 42:1-2; Matthew 18:20. God’s presence is not some distant uncertainty, but a trustworthy promise. He answers and provides, even by giving people other mortals with whom they can share and count on His abiding presence. That’s a present-tense assurance that Isaiah and Micah realized when they wrote ‘Your Presence Is Heaven to Me’. Is…not will be, as they have us sing some 21 times in the song that they wrote. That is their main thought, that the believer should capture the moment one senses Him spiritually, and hold on to that. There is so much that comes with pondering Him and what He means. ‘Love’, ‘beauty’, and ‘worth’ (v.1) are what we can behold in Him, and He’s the bottomless ‘cup that won’t run dry’. The ‘treasure’ that He is overcomes my ‘weakness’ and ‘wrongs’, because he is ‘merciful’, the ‘Redeemer’ – the ‘Holder of my future’ (v.2). It’s not a wonder that Isaiah and Micah don’t try to enumerate more – the above are plenty for you and me to acknowledge with an Amen, as we sing repeatedly the song’s title words!

 

Put yourself in the shoes of Peter, James, and John as they saw Jesus in all of His glory. Look at that image up at the top of this entry for a few moments, or close your eyes if that’s more effective. When has He been real for you? When you were in dire straits, medically, financially, emotionally, or relationally? He doesn’t play favorites, but He does seem to want us to acknowledge our need and exercise some bit of faith in Him, even a mustard-seed size type of faith (Matthew 17:20, Luke 17:6). None of us measure up to His standard, and I expect to be terrified, at least initially, when I actually am before Him. Look at how his three closest disciples reacted to Him (in the picture), including in many other episodes in which He showed His power. They were petrified, and yet He embraced them, and wants us to draw near despite our insides telling us to withdraw and hide. He cannot help being divine, and thereby alarming us. But, He is also gentle (Matthew 11:29; 21:5). What I need is not to be hidden and safe from a power that I admittedly cannot comprehend, but to see my need for His cure. There’s no other way out of my problems. He made me, so I think I can trust that He knows what I need. Seek out His presence.      

 

Read about one of the composers here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Houghton

 

Read about one of the composers here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Micah_Massey

 

Watch/listen to a performance by one of the composers here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aff5lPzKQIo

 

Read some comments about the song’s meaning here: https://sifalyrics.com/israel-houghton-israel-new-breed-your-presence-is-heaven-lyrics

 

See information on the image here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Transfigurationbloch.jpg …This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or fewer. {{PD-US}} – US work that is in the public domain in the US for an unspecified reason, but presumably because it was published in the US before 1930. The image may be found inside the article at this link: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesus

You Were There -- Ben Glover

Ben Glover was still in the early years of his music-writing career in 2004, but he was a more seasoned human being (he was 26 years old), and so the things that challenge mortality most were certainly not foreign to him. Two biblical episodes in which lives were threatened evidently struck Ben especially, and so he tried to imagine what it would have been like if someone had said “You Were There”. From his home in Nashville (the author-composer had moved to Nashville in 2000, so he may have been in Tennessee when he wrote “You Were There” that was released in January 2004; see the seal of Nashville here), Ben transported himself thousands of miles away and centuries apart from his own world in order to visualize a couple of scenes when the Great Protector-God was present to give confidence to two of His servants. And then in a third scene, this same God became the one who’s life was in the balance. Ben concluded that he could trust this God, since He was there in all three scenes. He can not only appreciate and empathize with us in similar moments, but He absorbs those moments and ultimately overpowers them for us.   

 

Ben Glover was perhaps reading about or had been aware of stories in the Bible, probably for many years, when he decided to make them the focal point of “You Were There”. Though Ben hasn’t related what circumstance drew his attention in this song-writing episode, the lyrics he penned cannot be explained except in the context of some biblical story knowledge upon which Ben drew. That much we could say for certain. Was someone nearby in danger, also? Could Ben have been watching a rerun of the old television series You Are There, hosted by Walter Cronkite, imagining a different era in history and what it would have been like to be present? Certainly, Ben was doing something like that when he thought about David and Goliath, about Abraham and Isaac, and about Jesus in the throes of death at Calvary. Those three incidents grabbed Ben’s attention, no doubt because someone’s life was in danger in all three.  ‘David stood to face Goliath’ (v.1); ‘Abraham…poised to kill’ his own son, Isaac (v.2); and especially Jesus ‘on a cross’ all told Ben that God has control over life and death, even His own. Matthew 27:50, Luke 23:46, and John 19:30 all indicate that Jesus, even while on the cross of crucifixion, chose when to die; no one took His life or even had the ability to do so (John 10:17-18). Ben said in his poetry ‘I wonder’ or ‘imagine’, but didn’t spend a lot of words using the first person ‘I’; instead, he used ‘you/yours’ – 40 times in the song – most often as he addressed God directly. Ben’s attention was riveted upon God. God was/is/will be so many things to so many people, it just makes sense to talk to Him, and to see oneself in relation to who He is.   

 

If you check out the Cronkite-told stories of history, they allow one to see and hear a rendition of episodes that none of us living in the 21^st Century, except for the most-senior citizens who are still alive to tell of World War II or early Cold War incidents, have actually witnessed personally. You can be there, in a sense. And, we get the advantage of hearing Walter’s resonant baritone narrating the activity (see an image of Walter Cronkite here). Notably, none of the stories told in the five seasons of You Are There are from the Bible. Is it because they were too controversial when the show was produced, and so executives decided not to ‘push the envelope’ and risk   shrinking viewership? It doesn’t matter, really, since God was there. And, I don’t need to audibly hear someone mimic His voice and tell me what to believe. Can you and I believe without seeing and hearing, tasting and touching, or smelling? My five senses aren’t necessarily engaged when I trust God (although I do read my bible to know about Him), and it seems that neither were Ben Glover’s. How about yours?  

 

Read about the author-composer here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ben_Glover

 

The following site indicates the release/publication date of the song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmhiRX89FTM

 

See information on the old TV show here: You Are There (series) - Wikipedia

 

See information on the graphic here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Seal_of_Nashville,_Tennessee.png …This work is in the public domain in the United States because it was published in the United States between 1930 and 1977, inclusive, without a copyright notice. For further explanation, see Commons:Hirtle chart as well as a detailed definition of "publication" for public art. Note that it may still be copyrighted in jurisdictions that do not apply the rule of the shorter term for US works (depending on the date of the author's death), such as Canada (50 p.m.a.), Mainland China (50 p.m.a., not Hong Kong or Macao), Germany (70 p.m.a.), Mexico (100 p.m.a.), Switzerland (70 p.m.a.), and other countries with individual treaties. This graphic may be found inside the document here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nashville,_Tennessee

 

See information on the image of Walter Cronkite here: File:Walter Cronkite on television 1976.jpg - Wikimedia Commons …This work is from the U.S. News & World Report collection at the Library of Congress. According to the library, there are no known copyright restrictions on the use of this work. This photograph is a work for hire created between 1952 and 1986 by one of the following staff photographers at U.S. News & World Report:Warren K. Leffler (WKL); Thomas J. O'Halloran (TOH); Marion S. Trikosko (MST); John Bledsoe (JTB); Chick Harrity (CWH). It is part of a collection donated to the Library of Congress. Per the deed of gift, U.S. News & World Report dedicated to the public all rights it held for the photographs in this collection upon its donation to the Library. The image may be found inside this article: You Are There (series) - Wikipedia