The Power of Your Name -- Lincoln Brewster and Mia Fieldes

 

What they wanted to see was a heartbeat. Lincoln Brewster tells in his remembrance of the development of “The Power of Your Name” that he and Mia Fieldes wanted there to be something of heart in the song in 2008. So, Lincoln actually recorded his son’s heartbeat before he was born, so that it could be inserted as a rhythmic reminder in the song’s recording. What he saw that day in the doctor’s office was probably what you’ve probably seen if you’ve ever had your heart monitored, or have seen a TV show about doctors and hospitals: what’s known as an electrocardiogram (ECG or EKG) (see the diagram here of one). Lincoln and Mia really wanted to inject Jesus’ ‘kingdom come’ prayer into their musical effort, to make plain from the lyrics’ first few lines that life as God values it is something we cannot ignore when we see how He approached people with compassion. He made us all to reflect Him, so how does it feel for us to see some people in desperate straits, those people to whom social injustice is a daily reality? Lincoln and Mia offer something that is a prayer that we could say every morning, as we contemplate how our days should unfold.   

 

The purpose of the Lincoln-Mia composition was to spur its hearers to deal with social injustice, to see people in the church ‘take a stand’ and make social injustice something that is resisted and reversed. The in-the-womb heartbeat was Lincoln’s way of inserting some special and intimate feeling from himself and his family into the song, and to say in an audible way that every person is a life that is unique and valuable, particularly to God, even before any of us were born. God has conceived what the life of each human will mean on this earth, so Christians who believe and live life at His direction will try to make certain others’ lives are not demeaned, but rather counted as precious and meaningful. To have the opportunity to live and experience life as God intended is what Lincoln and Mia felt was the message of the song they co-wrote. That means especially, as Lincoln shared in a video message, that God-followers should make sure they pursue life-affirming actions outside of the church buildings where they mouth belief in His way of life every Sunday. That means ‘comfort zone’ is excised from the people’s vocabulary, because so many people live in circumstances that are difficult, and which cannot be repaired easily. It’s hard work, and challenges will undoubtedly threaten the commitment of God’s people to endure in His work to make social justice a reality, and not just an aspiration. I should take the words and phrases that Lincoln and Mia have put to music – like ‘compassion’ that is expressed explicitly (in the chorus) and otherwise in many other words -- and internalize them. That would be the way to make ‘the power of (His) name’ consequential.

 

It really needs to be ‘in my heart’, as the words of Lincoln and Mia say at the end of verse two. If I really intellectually accept that Jesus’ Matthew 6/Luke 11 prayer is an action plan, then I will seek out ways to make His kingdom more real to the hurting. You don’t have to look very far to find opportunities to make social justice yours and my way of life, and there are literally hundreds of ways to do this. The first few words of the Lincoln-Mia song use the phrase ‘made for the streets’ to admit that some children are actually in that condition -- a place where far too many homeless find themselves, including in very prosperous nations and poorer ones too. I cannot help every child in the streets, but there is a group that does help give kids like this a brighter future in Nairobi, Kenya. It’s called Made in the Streets (see a link to it below), and is just one that you can join. Just listen, see, and have a heart.     

 

See the song story told here: the power of your name brewster fields lyrics - Search

 

Read about one way to change the lives of children in one social justice effort in Kenya here: MADE IN THE STREETS | Serving street-connected youth in Kenya

 

See information on the heartbeat image here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:SinusRhythmLabels.svg ... Re: the copyright the following statement is associated with the image: I, the copyright holder of this work, release this work into the public domain. This applies worldwide. In some countries this may not be legally possible; if so: I grant anyone the right to use this work for any purpose, without any conditions, unless such conditions are required by law.

Rescue the Perishing -- Fanny Crosby

“Rescue the Perishing” was a line that stuck in her head one summer night in 1869, and Fanny Crosby just couldn’t ignore it. How could this 49-year-old blind woman rescue anyone? Wasn’t she herself at risk, visiting a rundown neighborhood inhabited by desperate men? This Bowery area of the Manhattan borough (see a look at it in 1910 shown here) was not for the timid, who might encounter the “Bowery Boys” street gang or other reminders of urban blight. Not a wonder that its residents might turn to alcohol as a means of escape, and find themselves needing help as life slid into one of the many gutters there. Maybe this is where Fanny had an advantage. Since one of her senses, eyesight, did not function, she could not shrink from people with the same revulsion that sight might have compelled. Thankfully, she did not ignore her other senses, including her heart.

Crosby’s life and work especially among missions in New York City are well-known, but never grow old. This 1869 episode took place early in her hymn-writing career, which had only started a few years before, though she had been a notable writer of secular works for some time already. It could be said that the hymn’s poem had gestated in her spirit because of the work in which she was engaged that day, and also was spurred by a musical friend’s idea. Her friend Howard Doane had proposed the ‘Rescue the Perishing’ theme to her a few days beforehand, and it was still stirring within her as she spoke to a crowd that evening at the mission. Her urgent appeal struck a chord with one 18-year-old, whom she implored needed God if he ever expected to join his mother in eternity. This was a defining moment in these two lives, apparently, as he accepted her leading and God’s place in his life. The young man reportedly encountered Crosby decades later to tell of his faithful service for God. For her part, Crosby went home that evening following their initial encounter and wrote the lyrics for “Rescue…”, a hymn that still survives one hundred years after her own death in 1915. And, the Bowery Mission still goes on too, with this story – and probably many more – that relate how the blind woman helped others to see. How many people did Frances Jane Crosby show the way, and still does through her poetry?

Urban, suburban, rural, and especially the third-world…how would Fanny Crosby have regarded residents of these areas today? There’s still poor in every one of them, though an economist might claim the world has come a long way in the last 150 years since Fanny thought about rescue. She’d be somewhere helping, and teaching, and making music too, no doubt. There’s still lots of people in trouble, and plenty who try to help others in ways that remind us of her. Fanny was special because she merged her gift - her musical ear- with a mission for the destitute. She was genuine, with hymns flowing from a reality she experienced. Hers were not just ideas, but authentic life. Maybe that’s why her hymns still reach us. What might yours or my life have to say?            

See more information on the song story in these sources: The Complete Book of Hymns – Inspiring Stories About 600 Hymns and Praise Songs by William J. Petersen and Ardythe Petersen, Tyndale House Publishers, 2006; Amazing Grace: 366 Inspiring Hymn Stories for Daily Devotions by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications, 1990; 101 Hymn Stories, by Kenneth W. Osbeck, Kregel Publications, 1982; and Then Sings My Soul – 150 of the World’s Greatest Hymn Stories, Robert J. Morgan, Thomas Nelson Publishers, 2003.

See this site that describes the ministries of the mission where the composer had the experience that birthed this song: http://www.bowery.org/

Tell Me the Story of Jesus -- Fanny Crosby

What made this one special among the 8,000 that she wrote? ‘Hunt the needle in the haystack, while you’re at it’, someone says. Maybe even Fanny Crosby couldn’t identify what motivated her to write the words for “Tell Me the Story of Jesus” in 1880, otherwise we might know. So much is known about her, this woman who by the end of the 19^th Century was called a “household name” in the United States. But, could the song’s own words tell us something about what she thought of her notoriety, and thus what circumstances she wanted others to know when she penned these words?  

She had quite a life story already by the time she turned 60. Fanny’s amazing accomplishments were already magnified because of their source, a blind woman, who nevertheless learned to play multiple musical instruments, write poetry, speak publicly, and organize missionary works in poverty-stricken urban areas in the U.S. We know that even among all the positives, there were disappointments too, including in 1880 when Crosby had apparently separated from her husband, Alexander Van Alstyne.  Some people might say that her choice to live in a slum in Manhattan that same year was a disappointment, too, although Crosby apparently had chosen this path as part of a recommitment to better serve the poor in domestic missionary work.  This was the time from which she served at the Water Street Mission (Manhattan). Living in a slum (perhaps not unlike this one pictured here, known as Bandit’s Roost or Five Points in a notorious NYC slum, circa 1831), helping the poor, can one imagine a more challenging environment? It was in this atmosphere that she focused attention not on herself and what she could do, but instead on Him. Perhaps she’d concluded that the best way to help the poor, and to manage her personal marital regrets, was to think about God’s son. Perspective matters. He gave up more than we can imagine, suffered poverty, and died as a criminal. Yet, that wasn’t the end of it. That’s hope for the 19^th Century poor in the lowest of the low in New York.

Do Crosby’s words sound like someone speaking at a homeless shelter to a scruffy, cold, dismal group? There’s a good chance that some folks like that were among the first to appreciate her poem put to music. What’s a group that’s struggling to survive day-to-day looking for? A soul mate, someone who shares their pain, yet overcame, just might be a guy they could understand. Was Jesus’ treatment unfair? Of course. He knew this would happen, too – that’s the amazing part. Could that be why he did it, and why Crosby wanted this story to be in the ears of her neighbors? ‘I cannot help you escape your physical life’, Fanny might have said. ‘But, listen to how He came down from an incredible existence, lived among poor like us, and then gave Himself up to draw us toward Himself and a place beyond this slum’. She came to live among them, too. This accomplished, blind 60-year old woman, turned poor, knew a story – not hers. It must have captured the attention of these Manhattanites…why would she choose to live this way? Why did He? Come find the answer with the rest of us slum-dwellers!         

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fanny_Crosby

http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/t/e/l/tellmsoj.htm

There Is a Redeemer -- Melody Green

A redeemed hippie. That’s what someone might have said about Melody Green in the mid-1970’s. Along with much of the rest of her generation, Melody seemed to effervesce when she had found the truth, magnified by the polar opposite life she had been living. “There is a Redeemer” that she wrote by 1977, including the third verse by her husband Keith, was a pretty simple expression of the Greens’ discovery. That probably explains its wide popularity. Maybe the way the third verse and its writer’s destiny played out just a few years after its composition helps explain the song’s reach too. Some might say Keith Green was being apocalyptic, perhaps even seeing the four horsemen in the Apocalypse (see the picture).

Melody’s path to “There Is a Redeemer” was anything but direct, and even after its composition, there would be unexpected events that gave fresh meaning to its words. She’d grown up in the Jewish faith of her parents and grandparents, the latter of whom were survivors of the persecution in tsarist Russia. Despite her respect for their influence upon her early life, in her teens and early 20’s Melody tried Buddhism in Japan on the heels of experimentation with drugs in California, as she searched for fulfillment and something that could be termed genuine. She met Keith, her husband in 1972, and they mutually sought the faith they felt must be out there, finally grasping it in 1975 during a bible study. In the aftermath of the discovery, Melody and Keith started something that continues today, called Last Days Ministry (LDM), an outreach to the drug culture, to unwed teenage mothers, and to their neighborhood too. It was in the midst of this in 1977 that Melody penned the words to the song that has become so well-known. Its message was straightforward – Jesus is God’s present to the world, and He also left the Spirit to continue what the Son started. Keith wrote the third verse, unknowing that its words would have what some might call an eerie ring to them just a few years hence, a call to imagine the eternal future. In 1982, with their family life, LDM, and Keith’s music career blossoming, a tragic event—a plane crash—snuffed out the life of Keith and two of the Greens’ children.  …Last Days Ministry, ‘life is short, make it count’ the website of this organization the Greens started says. One wonders if that motto buoyed Melody during that heart-rending period in 1982.

LDM is still active today, carried along perhaps by the memory of the song’s truth contained in its final verse. You just never know when your eternity will become fact, perhaps something that Keith Green would tell us if he were here today. Oh, I guess he did say it today after all…it’s in the verse he wrote in 1977. Am I listening to what I’ve been singing…?   

The source for the song story is “The Complete Book of Hymns – Inspiring Stories About 600 Hymns and Praise Songs”, by William J. and Ardythe Petersen, Tyndale House Publishers, 2006.

Also see the following links for biographies of the composer: http://www.newreleasetuesday.com/authordetail.php?aut_id=431

http://www.lastdaysministries.org/Groups/1000008704/Last_Days_Ministries/Melody_Green/Bio/Bio.aspx

Also see the following site for background on a ministry the composer began: http://www.lastdaysministries.org/