Shine On Us -- Michael W. and Debbie Smith

Mid-career, and this composer/author and his wife were probably in Nashville, Tennessee when they crafted this song – Shine On Us – as a personal appeal to their Creator. If it sounds like a prayer when Michael W. Smith and his wife Debbie play it in concert, your insides aren’t misleading you, as Michael seems to confirm with his own recollection of what happened the first time he tried out the music and a few of the words. The way it came out, with just a few simple but powerful thoughts, is probably the way the One above would prefer that we talk to Him when we pray. He wants it to be personal, and He wants us to rely on Him for the deepest need every one of us has – for Himself and the light He brings to blot out darkness in someone’s life.    

Mid-life in 1996 was just about upon him, which is about as much detail as one can gather from available printed information to ascertain what prompted Michael’s thoughts in ‘Shine On Us’. That is, until you watch what Michael W. Smith says on a live stage when he introduces this song. In a 2016 concert (watch the youtube video ref’d below) he says it happened this way. During a prayer meeting, ‘Shine On Us’ was written spontaneously and with just a few people present  -- an intimate setting, as he says – that allowed the Spirt to move. He says he just ad-libbed on the spot, and at the end of the evening could not stop playing the tune, and thought to himself that it was really something special. Later, his wife Debbie helped him finish off the lyrics. Michael indicates the song’s lyrics were really something he felt was so profound, given the way events in the world arise. Michael shakes his head, and puts his face in his hands, as if to say, ‘Lord, we need you here below so much…would You be with us in our moment of desperation?’ And, so Michael and Debbie prayed for not only His face’s light to shine (v.1), but also for the very building blocks of God’s character to bless them – for grace (v.2), and for love (v.3). Are there any other elements of God that are more necessary? His light shone in the very beginning, exposing what He was doing – creating (Gen. 1:1). And, grace is what I need the most when I stand before Him (Rom. 5:2). His love for me is at the root of His being – He IS love (1 John 4:8). This kind of prayer never grows old, does it?

Michael and Debbie had already been creating music for many years when ‘Shine On Us’ was born, and it had been 20 years since they’d first performed it, when they sang it again in the 2016 concert. That means that what they expressed in 1996 was more or less centrally fixated along their timeline, as well as along their spirit-line. That says something about the believer’s journey, that I must keep the basics with Him always fresh and pivotal in my walk. Michael says they were beginning a new church relationship when ‘Shine On Us’ emerged, so the Smiths were evidently seeking spiritual guidance as they contemplated this event. Apprehension or excitement, it really doesn’t matter which feeling is present; I need His light, grace, and love. He’s my anchor, and apparently the Smiths still believe this, too. Keep singing and sharing how He shines, Michael and Debbie!  

The author/composer shares the genesis of the song here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjuKfaCosmI

See the following link for biography of author: https://hymnary.org/person/Smith_MW

Also see here: http://michaelwsmith.com/

And, here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_W._Smith

Covenant of Love -- Keith Lancaster

Anybody who calls himself a “musicianary” is really serious about his role in music in the Creator’s world. That much can be said about Keith Lancaster, a guy who’s in touch with the “Covenant of Love” that he feels compelled to proclaim through the gift of music he teaches to others. It was around 1996, and whether Keith was in Cullman, Alabama (see the map-picture here) – where he lives currently – or somewhere else is not clear. Did he actually conceive the song while there, or was it during one of his many ventures on the road to teach acapella music? Cullman is just a point of contact for Keith and what he does, really, as his biography makes clear. He has what he calls ‘…the greatest instrument of music ever created’. He’s not boasting, but instead recognizing Him who gave and still guides Keith in what he does. He – God -- is the keeper of the covenant.

Keith Lancaster’s life has multiple facets that all lead back to the music and the God who has given him this role as a ‘musicianary’.  @Musicianary is how you can reach him, the culmination of what began even before 1982 when 25-year old Keith established the Acapella Ministries. It was an outgrowth of the singing group ACAPELLA that Keith and three friends started in Tennessee, and which has spawned several other groups – Acapella Vocal Band (AVB), Vocal Union, The Lancasters, and Durant. So, in 1996 during the midst of this burgeoning music ministry, Keith wrote about the covenant embedded inside a Divine love that he was experiencing and communicating in all his travels. What had become crystal clear to the middle-aged Keith, some 14 years after he began to form his vision for his life’s work, was that God was still at work to ‘keep His covenant of love’, a refrain he has us sing to remind us that God’s still active in each of us. What precise circumstances motivated Keith to write ‘Covenant…’ is not clear from any of his online information. Yet, just read a bit, and you surmise that he must feel his cup overflowing, and that when he and his wife Sharon (his co-musicianary) travel to conduct Praise and Harmony workshops, Worship Leader Institute gatherings, or “Singing at Sea” cruise vacations, they are conduits of a special bond with God. It’s not surprising that they’ve been to all 50 states of the U. S., as well as provided training for worship leaders from other nations through the worship institute they facilitate.

Do you suppose that the Lancasters feel just an obligation to travel and do what they do to make better singers among those they meet? It’s much more than that, wouldn’t you say? They must feel that God’s mission in their lives is something in which they’ve become emotionally and spiritually invested – God’s purpose is theirs too. A life spent joining voices together in a common adoration is a pretty special thing. In fact, it’s probably pretty hard or nearly impossible to adequately describe it; it has to be experienced. And, once you have that sense of exhilaration wash over you, you keep coming back for more. That would certainly explain what has been going on with Acapella and its offspring since 1982. The Lancasters didn’t invent this, but they’re doing their part to underscore the phenomenon…and its real origin. It’s all Him.

See this site for author/composer’s story: http://www.keithlancaster.com/

Also see here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Keith_Lancaster

Oft We Come Together -- Tillit S. Teddlie

No real mysteries here, based upon the words that this preacher/teacher/publisher used in three verses. Tillit Sydney Teddlie made it pretty clear in “Oft We Come Together” what his motivation was when he penned the words and wrote the accompanying music in 1944, most likely while living in Texas. Some people say this part of the worship service, which Tillit seemed to be addressing, is the centerpiece of Christendom and a proper Sunday morning worship. Trays pass in front of people, and the main point is to remember and appreciate His gift, and reciprocate. This kind of commemoration, as Tillit saw it, was not intended for one-timers, but for believers who habitually and faithfully took time on a first day of the week for such a ceremony. That’s the reason for the first word he wrote – oft. It was a short little word that might have summed up Tillet Teddlie, a man who did a lot of good things regularly.

He had been a Christian for a pretty long time in 1944, and would continue on for several more decades, continuing to do the things that defined his life. Tillit Teddlie was close to 60 years old when he penned “Oft We Come Together”, a statement he probably had thought about and paraphrased from the pulpit he so often occupied. Though many in his family were musicians, Tillit reportedly did not take up writing most of the approximately 100 songs accredited to him and seriously teaching music until he was in his early 30s, continuing in this for some 60 years. Besides writing, Teddlie published over a dozen hymnals and served as a preacher and an evangelist in multiple places. So, for how many Sunday worship services or other events the other six days of the week had Tillit been present by 1944? Thousands, no doubt, perhaps something he’d contemplated as he considered what to say in three verses about something variously called ‘Communion’, the ‘Lord’s Supper’, or Eucharist. That time is special, even central to the Christian’s faith, so Tillit evidently wanted to vocalize and be certain he and his fellow believers did not take for granted what they did routinely. As one looks at the order of the verses Tillit wrote, you might ask ‘aren’t the thoughts a bit backwards in priority?’ ‘..we bring our offering’, Tillit says in verse 1, but we all know that normally comes third, after we’ve honored the Lord’s command to eat and drink of his body and blood. Right? So, what was Teddlie thinking?! Was it in fact the monetary offering? Or, maybe Tillit was thinking of the offering of worship in our hearts and minds, something that, after all, is necessary before one takes a bite out of that cracker and drinks a bit of juice (vv.2-3). We might imagine that Tillit addressed this issue with his hearers; when your offering of worship is right-minded, then you really don’t need to urge worshippers to give a physical offering – it comes naturally, as we contact the Divine spirit and sense His love. The refrain tells us that Tillit was in fact reminding his brethren that to worship ‘in truth and spirit’ was accomplished when we ask Him to ‘Help us…’.     

So, Tillit had some very simple advice for the worship service in which he had participated thousands of times. He undoubtedly had felt moved many times during that point in worship, and knew what – or, in fact, Who – made that moment special. He didn’t put God in the third person in his poetry, but spoke directly to Him. ‘Help us Lord’, he urges all of us to say. God is personal, so speak like you believe He’s present to hear your love song sung back to Him. Edify one another with that devotional message to Him who has saved you. Try thinking of it that way the next time you’re sitting there with the trays coming by and the sounds of people’s voices wafting through the room. Then, see how you feel. Do it again, and again -- 'oft', as Tillit said. Then, perhaps you and I will appreciate what he had discovered.       

See brief biography of the author here: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/t/e/d/teddlie_ts.htm

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tillit_Sidney_Teddlie

https://hymnary.org/person/Teddlie_Tillit