I Will Call Upon the Lord - Michael O'Shields

I call to the LORD, who is worthy of praise, and I am saved from my enemies. The LORD lives! Praise be to my Rock! Exalted be God my Savior! (Psalm 18:3,46) I call out to God for all kinds of things. How about you? What tops your list…health, relationships, job difficulties, financial woes? There’s also, no doubt, the deeper spiritual dilemmas that I cannot answer myself, but as I ponder my own question, I have to admit it’s most often the physical needs that create the worry lines on my face. Question two: how do you pray about it to God…with privately clasped hands, or a public plea before the church? How about a prayer song? A song?! Aren’t those supposed to be reserved for happy, joyful, praiseworthy feelings? Read most of the Psalms, and you’ll hear a resounding ‘NO’. It’s encouraging that God still listens and inspires contemporary Psalmists in the same way He did King David and the others. Meet Michael O’Shields*.

Michael O’Shields was a young minister travelling in Oklahoma and Texas in the 1970s. He was struggling to make ends meet, and it was especially tough when the contribution was pretty meager, so he was calling upon the Lord for very tangible, felt needs when he wrote “I Will Call Upon the Lord”. The song’s pace might make you think he was in a joyful, upbeat mood, but he was likely feeling the opposite deep down. Yet, O’Shields knew what to do – he used the words David wrote in Psalm 18 centuries earlier as praise to God when he had been saved from enemies. It’s illuminating that Michael O’Shields adapted this psalm as his own petition to God, especially since David was already experiencing God’s saving hand. O’Shields must have trusted that God would save him too, even though he had not yet seen God’s rescue when he composed this tune.

O’Shields also shares a couple of other interesting details about the song’s development. He wrote this song, even though he didn’t think of himself as musically inclined….”I have only two problems, musically: I can’t sing on key and I can’t keep time. Otherwise, I do okay. “ Fortunately, O’Shields had friends to help make his words into music, but his experience tells us something about music and God, and us. You see, even someone without lots of gifts can be used by the Lord, in beautifully unexpected ways. O’Shields also shares that the song’s arrangement had a practical application for his time and place: it was intended to make men lead the worship in the farming communities he observed, where the composer recalls that usually the women would draw close to God first, followed by men. This song’s structure, a leader/follower echo, was novel in the 1970s and was intended to inspire the male spiritual leadership in those families who sang it.

O’Shields song, when I sing it now, makes me think twice about my prayer life. If I worry about things, maybe I should be writing poetry and giving my friends something to put to music. And, watch out! If I’m brave enough to create something, to make myself vulnerable, it just might resonate with others. God may make it something uniquely qualified to serve those nearby, or far away. And, who knows, it just might endure 30-40 years after its inception. Michael O’Shields’ example tells me that God’s providence lives on, and that He’s able to turn my struggle into inspiration. “I Will Call Upon the Lord” is a fresh reminder that God is most obvious when I’m in trouble …and that I need not fret, for He is near.

*Source for Michael O’Shields story is the book “Celebrate Jesus: The Stories behind Your Favorite Praise and Worship Songs”, by Phil Christensen and Shari MacDonald, Kregel Publications, 2003.