The Word Is Alive -- Mark Hall and Steven Curtis Chapman

 

When the Creator-God speaks, there is no compromising. With that in mind, you either live what’s inside of you or you don’t. Perhaps that’s what Mark Hall and his song collaborator Steven Curtis Chapman were essentially saying as they provided a musical reminder for themselves and some young people that “The Word Is Alive”. Mark and his group, Casting Crowns, could have been in Daytona Beach (see its seal here) when they cut an album called The Altar and the Door, which was released in August 2007; its focus was inspired by some troubling information that Mark read about how people were trying to ‘ride the fence’, so to speak, and were not taking the right way of living beyond the traditional Sunday worship space. Did the focus of The Altar and the Door provide some echoes in what Mark and Casting Crowns sang about Him being the Word, about how He cannot be disregarded or diminished?     

 

Mark Hall was one of the youth pastors at the church when he found to his dismay some entries in MySpace (a social networking forum that began in August 2003) from some of the teens he knew that sharply contrasted with the Christian lifestyle. These young people were really trying to live in two separate worlds – a phenomenon that Mark pointed out was not unique to youths. It’s easy to feel guilty and share at the Sunday altar what’s going on and how God should motivate a person’s daily life, but what happens between the altar and the door is the crux of the matter. Some of the lyrics that Mark and Steven wrote sound as if they were recalling some scriptures that make God-in-the-flesh too real to overlook, even for a moment, so perhaps the theme of the album provided the subtext for ‘The Word is Alive’, though neither composer explicitly says this. Take for example the title words of the song they wrote – ‘the Word is alive’ sounds so very much like what John wrote on multiple occasions, that He really lived, and really was/is God (John 1:1, 14; and 1 John 1:1). Lest anyone forget how profound was this Word, try on what John saw on Patmos: He is dressed in a robe dipped in blood, and his name is the Word of God (Revelation 19:13). If that one verse isn’t enough, try reading the entire 19^th chapter – and especially verses 11-21 -- to capture more of just who He is, and how terrifying and breathtaking He can be, especially to those who oppose Him. Perhaps this and what the Hebrews writer said (Hebrews 4:12) was what drove home the point for Mark and Steven – that the Word’s living and active, and mortally dangerous for those who don’t accept who He is. Did Mark’s youth group hear that when he sang ‘And it cuts like a sword through the darkness’ (chorus). Did they understand also that the ‘world and its glories (including that stuff on MySpace) will fade’. Make very certain you are on God’s side, 24/7.  

 

Mark and Steven also included a spoken portion in the song – maybe it helps emphasize the word that God spoke? – that underscores the diversity of individuals and episodes that worked over centuries to produce the bible and its core message: that Jesus and how He points to the God of the universe is the focus. The bible…it’s hard to appreciate how rare it was once upon a time, in centuries past. But now, do you and I take it too much for granted? And, does that translate into some ho-hums about His presence now? Don’t look at the mere surfaces of what He’s done, but go a little deeper, and then go even deeper. This book that He’s preserved for me has unmined truths, ways to look at Jesus that can fascinate and inform me anew, if I’ll just spend time in it. That’s how one keeps renewing the vision of Him, by finding something new about Him every day. What Mark and Steven and Casting Crowns have done is but one more reminder that this Word is still watching and waiting for me to keep on coming. Get used to hearing His voice, and what He has to say to you.    

 

 

See information on the album on which the song appears here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Altar_and_the_Door

 

See information on the graphic-seal here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Seal_of_Daytona_Beach,_Florida.png …This work was created by a government unit (including state, county, and municipal government agencies) of the U.S. state of Florida. It is a public record that was not created by an agency which state law has allowed to claim copyright and is therefore in the public domain in the United States. The graphic-seal can be found inside this document: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Daytona_Beach,_Florida

The Family Prayer Song -- Morris Chapman and Joshua

 

Morris Chapman was thinking of his own family, and probably many other men’s families too when he uttered some words that echoed what an ancient leader of Hebrews said to admonish a people who were at a crossroads. It was in a place called Shechem (see the map-image of Shechem here), where Joshua told the people “As for Me and My House”, we will serve the Lord (Joshua 24:15). (The song’s title is alternately “The Family Prayer Song.) It had been a long struggle, and Joshua sensed that the people needed to be challenged – ‘Whom will you serve?’ Morris, some 3,400 years later, was a music leader of Promise Keepers in 1995, and could he have been having similar feelings as his ancient predecessor? It is a question that people of faith should be asking themselves many times along the journey, for there are many crossroads; who is my God, and am I really serving Him?

 

It's not explicitly indicated in the song’s details, nor among the 20^th Century composer’s information that is available in the open, to explain the circumstances of the evolution of ‘The Family Prayer Song’, but certain elements can be reasonably assumed. Morris obviously didn’t just arrive at the key phrase in the song on his own, so there was some situation among Morris’ contemporaries which called to mind what Joshua said to the Israelites so long ago, after they had arrived in the Promised Land and achieved in large measure the objectives that God had set before them. They still had much to do, however, and Joshua was therefore intent on getting their attention to not let up and become complacent; what happened later – as told throughout the book of Judges – was what Joshua must have feared. Much of what Promise Keepers has stood for, from its inception in the early 1990s, has been about men being who God intended them to be – committed to men-women marriage, including in monogamous relationships, strong fatherhood, and racial harmony. One can see why Morris might have written about God-serving with the words that Joshua first used, and then with some of his own too, to counter the drift in American culture that was ongoing in the early and mid-1990s. He must have thought that Joshua was thinking similarly, when Morris lyricized about God ‘filling…homes with your presence’, giving Him ‘reverence’. Being ‘holy’ before Him was also really recalling what Joshua admonished the people to do, by getting rid of the foreign idols among them. And then Morris turned his 20^th Century crowd’s attention on themselves just a bit, by reminding them that by ‘staying’ and ‘praying’ with each other was part of their therapy, because ‘storm(y) weather’ was threatening; family members needed to practice ‘harmony and love’, and especially commit to being in ‘God’s word’. People ‘need each other’, Morris said, and that’s something that has always been true, from Joshua’s days – and indeed from the very beginning, when God made Eve for Adam – until our own time. We don’t live alone here, and we cannot make it without Him either.

 

Morris certainly didn’t say anything new, did he? But, how often do we actually express the thoughts in what’s spelled out in his lyrics? We might go through the motions just a bit too easily – attending church, carrying a bible, singing songs, giving money to charity, clasping our hands and bowing heads, and even in eating a piece of cracker and swallowing a few drops of juice. If that sums up what I do, without more depth, I probably need to do a bit of self-examination. And, as Joshua and Morris would probably say also, I need to make myself accountable to some others in this. They might see something that I don’t, like am I wavering in some of the basics, and allowing God to be pushed aside on occasion. That matters, because that’s how other gods make their inroads, just a little bit at a time. Have I accomplished something that might put me in self-congratulatory mode, like what happened some 3,400 years ago? Is there a crossroads in sight for you, too? Is there a Joshua nearby?      

 

This site indicates the composer’s situation when he wrote the song (music leader of Promise Keepers in 1995):  https://s3.amazonaws.com/media.cloversites.com/19/196db2ea-297d-4503-9a12-49043489c907/documents/June_18_-_Family_Prayer_Song.pdf

 

See here some information about the organization in which the composer-author was involved: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Promise_Keepers

 

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.