People Need the Lord -- Phill McHugh and Greg Nelson

 

It happened in a very musical city -- Nashville, Tennessee; so, you have to wonder whether the venue where these two songwriters had an epiphany had a history with lyrics scrawled on napkins, or maybe conversations that moved from tables to exit doors and back to studios, as happened one day in the early 1980s. Phill McHugh and Greg Nelson had tried all morning, but they seemed to be pushing all the wrong buttons as they sat in Greg’s office trying to produce some new music. Was it only hunger that drove them to a local restaurant, a needed sustenance break to feed their physical selves? Phill and Greg found other hunger at the eatery they chose that day, but it wasn’t their own. It was a perception they could have picked up in probably almost any public gathering, but perhaps it was the fusion of something they were trying to find and their own otherwise ordinary purpose for going to this place that sparked what happened next.

 

She could have probably been almost any waitress, who served Phill and Greg that day in a restaurant where they went after a fruitless morning of song creation. The Nashville restaurant is also not named, but it would not be surprising if both the server and the location were actually familiar, at least in a distant kind of way. The two men both remembered seeing her face, and thinking that even with a smiling expression, this woman had a vacant look in her eyes. That’s when they spontaneously thought ‘she needs the Lord’, a not uncommon impression they gathered when observing the other lunchtime guests in the place. Was it just a bad day, when everyone was a bit overwhelmed by their schedules and tasks – maybe just a feeling of tedium that often pervades urban life? Phill and Greg imply that they recognized this place and these people, maybe not by names and details of their lives, but that this emptiness was sadly very normal for millions of people around the world. It was impossible for the two songwriters to actually look into all those countless faces, as they sat in one restaurant, but what they saw in that place in the space of one hour convinced them that a solution, a divine one, would resonate for people all over the globe. ‘Every day…filled with care…private pain’ (v.1) were the insights that Phill and Greg could see permeating these people, even if they never had had a conversation with them. Perhaps the two men had often felt as these restaurant workers’ and its customers’ faces suggested that day – that life lacked something, and furthermore, that the ‘… world where wrong seems right’ (v.2) was in control of events.  How do people escape a situation that seems to violate standards of right and wrong? It’s a ‘lost’ world, McHugh and Nelson concluded, but that’s not the end of the matter. Meet God, and He will be to all of these distressed people an ‘open door’ (song’s refrain) to a new reality, one where He redeems all of us and life itself.     

 

Phill McHugh and Greg Nelson were actually thinking of themselves a bit as they sat in that Nashville restaurant, too. After all, they went there to be served food. They were hungry. The morning’s efforts must have left them feeling somewhat frustrated, so perhaps the change of scenery was one thing they sought in order to approach their objective – song-making – from a new angle. As they looked about themselves at the other people, they arrived at kind of a self-judgement in the last line of their new song: ‘When will we realize…’, and joined that thought with the song’s title words. Greg and Phill were admitting their own responsibility – and, yours and mine too – in helping a lost civilization find its way back to the Creator. I’m made in His image. And, so are you. Walk toward Him and toward those who know Him best, and see if things don’t look brighter.  

 

 

The song story is found in the following books: I Could Sing of Your Love Forever, by Lindsay Terry, Thomas Nelson publishers, 2008; Stories Behind Popular Songs and Hymns, by Lindsay Terry, Baker Book House Company, 1992; and The Complete Book of Hymns – Inspiring Stories About 600 Hymns and Praise Songs by William J. Petersen and Ardythe Petersen, Tyndale House Publishers, 2006.

Holy God We Praise Your Name -- Ignaz Franz

 

Chant. Chances are, that you may have heard the original of this song only in some obscure monophonic form (without various harmonic parts mixed in), but nevertheless sung beautifully by some monks in a place with great acoustics, perhaps. If you had the original words, or something close to the original words (as in this Frankish Hymnal from the 8^th Century, shown here), it would have been in that same now-extinct language – Latin – that only pharmacists and others in the medical profession use today. All this did not matter to Ignaz Franz in 1771, however, when he took the original Latin and penned some German words, which in English say “Holy God, We Praise Your Name”. God listens in any language, so whether you’re saying ‘Te Deum’ (in Latin), ‘Grosser Gott, Wir Loben Dich’ (in German), or the words in English, He hears you.

 

That this ancient hymn has survived for over 1,600 years says something about the words that a believer from the 4^th Century used to express his faith. Indeed, they still mean something in the 21^st Century. Ignaz Franz probably speculated, to one degree or another, that ‘Te Deum’ emanated from one of the Christians, perhaps Ambrose or Augustine, who were bishops in the early church in Europe and North Africa during the last years of the crumbling Roman Empire. The original author, whose role would likely have been a formal one to guide worship in the church, would have crafted this and other hymns for various times that believers would assemble. Central to their faith expressions would have been the Apostles’ Creed, a statement that Ignaz and his contemporaries would have still acknowledged 1,400 years later. Basics of Christianity – that’s how someone might sum up this Creed. Ignaz’s eight verses, translated from the Latin into German (and then into English [seven verses by Clarence Walworth in 1858; and one verse by Hugh T. Henry several decades later]) intersperse these creedal axioms with praises to the Creator. Three verses that begin this hymn underscore the breadth of His ‘vast domain’ (v.1), and the creatures therein who lift praises to extol Him. Earth and heaven’s inhabitants – angels, seraphim and cherubim, apostles, prophets, and martyrs – are among the ‘all’ that offer Him this exaltation. The Trinity (v.4); Christ’s virgin birth by Mary, and His sacrifice (v.5); and His certain return to redeem all believers (vv.6 and 7) are foundations of the faith that Ignaz wanted to preserve, even as the Latin language expired. Only in the writer’s last two verses does the believer petition God for help – for eternal salvation and rest (v.7), and for protection until His rescue is secured (v.8).

 

‘Te Deum’ remains a model for 21^st Century prayers. None of the things that Ambrose or Augustine felt were essential have become ‘old-fashioned’. Though we may worry that our consumption is damaging what He’s created, the basics of our planet are unshaken. The sky, earth, and seas are still here, and though it’s true we pollute it, His fingerprints on this planet remain unobscured. None of my senses or the history I’ve heard or read tell me that He’s unreal, that He never came here, or that His promises are discredited. Ambrose, Augustine, and Franz were like me – what else is there to believe, when so many have seen Him, and so many have believed in Him throughout the centuries since He returned to heaven? How many millions of humans have leaned on the Truth of Him? Could God be that big of a hoax? I choose to think He’s still preparing a place for me there with Him (John 14:2). Have you got something more certain than Him?

 

 

See here for little biographic information on author: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/f/r/a/n/franz_i.htm

 

See here also: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ignaz_Franz

 

See here for all eight original verses: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/h/o/l/y/g/holygod.htm

 

See here for article detailing the original Latin hymn (from the 4^th Century) which the author used to construct the modern-day hymn in the 1770s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Te_Deum

Revive Us, O Lord -- Steve Camp and Carman Licciardello

 

Their paths crossed, perhaps just to make this one song. Was that true for two popular singers in the mid-1980s, by the names of Steve Camp and Carman Licciardello? They may have had something in common, as they thought about what to say in their collaborative project that they called “Revive Us, O Lord”.  As is evident by what they wrote, they felt an emergency was ongoing, which in a physical analogy oftentimes means an ambulance (perhaps like this one shown here) is necessary to prevent death. The two men had come to a shared faith in separate walks from different directions, so expressing the same message says something about not only the congruence, but also the universal truth of what they wanted to say.  What was it?

 

Steve Camp was 30 and Carman Licciardello was 29 in 1985, and can we infer from their words that these two, nearly the same age physically, also were closely aligned in their estimation of how Christendom was going here on planet Earth? Was it something in each of their personal journeys or rather something they sensed in the Christian world at large that caused them to cry out in their lyrics about betrayal, a need for repentance, and a divine renewal? Both Steve and Carman (his birth name was Carmelo) were musically talented from early ages, but their walks toward Christian faith were different. In childhood, Carman performed in his mother’s band and then moved on to his own shows as a teenager in Atlantic City casinos, before trying to take himself into the Las Vegas scene. So, at age 20, Carman was still searching for himself, and was in for a big change when a Christian music artist’s (Andrae Crouch) concert profoundly affected his outlook. He accepted the message he heard that night, though his musical career went on a five-year hiatus. In the same 20-year stretch of time, Steve Camp accepted Christ at age 5, and his early musical journey included mentorship by two men (Larry Norman and Keith Green) prior to beginning a professional music career by age 22. So, two different beginnings, but by their late 20s Steve and Carman were evidently on the same page. Where and how they met to collaborate is not known (at least, it’s not shared readily on websites, etc), but Camp and Licciardello agreed that something was amiss in their world. They admitted that they’d abandoned God, walked away from doing His work, and had strayed so far that they could no longer hear His voice nor feel energized by His resurrection (v.1). Were they dead? They must have thought so, because alive people don’t need revival! This was an urgent appeal, with Christians needing cardiopulmonary resuscitation, and with not just one jolt of divine electrical stimulation. Steve and Carman vocalize ‘revive us’ no less than 11 times in their collective exclamation.  Did God respond to their alarm bells?

 

From what they wrote Steve and Carman must have thought there was still some reason to hope, if only Christians would expose themselves to His prescription for healing. They expected God was still faithful and willing to call us His own (v.2). We could still be drawn by His own life’s revival, with His Spirit sparking our sense of fidelity (v.2). Finally, part of the healing process is humanity’s willingness to be cleansed, to admit we’re dirty (refrain). It may seem like a simple question, but Jesus once asked someone ‘Would you like to get well?’ (John 5:6) In our pandemic world today, some of us are asking others this same question, and wondering why the answer seems so elusive to them. To some with a spiritual disease, the same question might be asked. What better cure is there than Jesus?  

 

 

 

See here for biography of one of the authors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carman_%28singer%29

 

Here’s a link to an obituary of one of the authors: Died: Carman, Christian Showman Who Topped Charts with Tri...... | News & Reporting | Christianity Today

 

See here for biography of one of the authors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steve_Camp

 

See here for information on the album for the song by one of the authors: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/After_God%27s_Own_Heart