God of Wonders -- Steve Hindalong and Marc Byrd

 

What he created was a psalm-child, one of the authors might say. What Marc Byrd began to write might further be compared to the creativity of the character in this depiction of songwriting -- the most well-known psalmist named David, the poet-shepherd-king, when he used his harp. (This anonymous artist’s work is from the 10^th Century, and is known as the Paris Psalter, showing David creating something beautiful while others listen.) Similarly, Marc launched the song “God of Wonders” using his own stringed instrument (a guitar) and the ancient Psalms during one weekend in 1999. And, the development continued when he shared his embryonic effort with his friend Steve Hindalong, which resulted in a fusion of their ideas into a song that would literally be heard in the heavens just a few years later. When you hear what Marc and Steve have to say, you might say ‘thank God that Marc was feeling a bit uneasy with himself one Friday, and was willing to share this mood with Steve.’ How many other songwriters have created because they had similar episodes? It’s rather reminiscent of how David went about his life and his music.

 

Marc Byrd was trying to make a choice at a fork in his spiritual road one day, and that’s when he had an encounter with one or more of the Psalms he was reading. The way ahead in his journey wasn’t clear, so Marc decided it was time to return to the beginning in an effort to recapture the vision he’d had for his life when he’d become a Christ-believer years before. Which psalm or psalms had he read? Psalm 8 and 19, from David’s hand, both give God praise for the heavens, among other things, while Psalm 86 is David’s cry to Him in distress. Marc might answer when asked that any number of other psalms also contained some key thoughts that helped move his spirit that day. It was enough to give Marc a foothold on a song, bringing to the fore much of the music and some words like ‘You are holy’. What he already had convinced Marc that Steve could contribute more to what Marc was as yet unable to verbalize. Marc’s music spoke to Steve in a potent way, evoking something that Steve felt was larger than any one person looking inside himself could find. It was like looking at infinity, something cosmic in fact, as he remembered the moment when he first heard Marc’s chords. And so, over the next several days the two of them pushed and prodded to find the right combination of music and words, a collaborative exercise that Marc and Steve found was pretty familiar and productive, just as it had been many times in the past for these two comrades. Could Marc and Steve have predicted that their song would be heard high above the skies, by astronauts in the space shuttle only three years hence (in 2003)? And, poignantly, could those same astronauts have known that their views of God’s wonders would shortly usher in eternity for themselves, when their spacecraft was destroyed upon entering earth’s atmosphere just days later? This sequence of events might give one pause, if you propose singing Marc and Steve’s song.

 

Are you ready? If you’ve ever sat in a crowd at the end of a worship assembly, you might have heard those exact words. ‘When I consider the heavens…’, David wrote so long ago, as he coaxed God’s people to live seriously, with eyes opened to His boundless might. Do you think astronauts and cosmonauts considered the heavens and the danger of their professions, when they were preparing to launch on their journeys in the last 50 years? It would certainly seem wise if they did so, because some 30 people have died trying to touch earth’s lower heavens in that period (see link below to an article). Someone says ‘that just proves it’s really hard to get to God, to meet Him.’ But just maybe, could God have seen events 20 centuries before they happened? Wanna meet God, He says? Here I am, in Jesus. Now, can we still say He’s too hard to reach?   

 

The song story is found in the following book: I Could Sing of Your Love Forever, by Lindsay Terry, Thomas Nelson publishers, 2008.

See here for a discussion of space travelers who have died: https://astronomy.com/news/2019/10/how-many-astronauts-have-died-in-space

 

A Mighty Fortress – Nathan and Christy Nockels

 

They were 30-somethings and parents, three-times-over. Nathan and Christy Nockels might say that was a chief motivator for them as they thought about how best to maximize their example as God-believers before their children, and before the Atlanta area where they had recently arrived in 2008. And so, “A Mighty Fortress” and its original pedigree acquired some five centuries earlier seemed to fit the attitude that Nathan and Christy sought – that a believer, Martin Luther, whose very life was in mortal danger or who witnessed other episodes of danger or death for people close to himself, did not shrink when faced with these things. (See this blogger’s entry for Martin Luther’s great classic hymn in the August 29, 2009 post.) Courage is a trust in God that doesn’t give up, these two parents might have said to their three kids. And so, they must have reasoned that since they were musicians at heart, a song to underscore this confidence in God would be the best way to emphasize this.

 

This is not the Martin Luther song that we all know, though the Nockels did borrow one line from Luther’s hand – his original song title. The Nockels’ version of ‘A Mighty Fortress’ has lots of awesome metaphors for God…He’s not only the ‘mighty fortress’, aka ‘bulwark’ that Luther wrote about, but also a ‘consuming fire’ (Ex. 24:17, Deuteronomy 4:24, Hebrews 12:29), a ‘burning holy flame’, the ‘righteous judge’, a ‘sacred refuge’. These are all great ways to address Him, especially in music, and you can sense, when you turn the pages of scripture for yourself, that Nathan and Christy must have found a lot of these names for Him also in the Psalms. Christy spells out for worshippers that she feared for her children when she looked at her surrounding world. She needed reminders from Him, especially about His promises, all believers’ future reign with Him, and the certain strength of His kingdom’s foundations. Those are things she thought she and Nathan could lead their kids to hold close to themselves, in unshakeable trust. ‘…Keep (ing) our eyes on You’ must have been a personal declaration they wanted their offspring to adopt into their beings. Perhaps they thought of it as similar to other habits or skills parents might best teach their kids when they’re young, like learning to swim, playing an instrument, or reading and writing (perhaps even in a language other than one’s native tongue). Want to be really fluent and treat as implicit to one’s character some things? Then, begin practicing them as a child. Then, as adults, not only are eyes fixed on God, but ‘hearts are…’ too.

 

Nathan and Christy evidently wanted their children to know other things about this ‘Mighty Fortress’, other characteristics of Him that would in turn shape their own characters. ‘Glory and freedom’, along with ‘kindness and wisdom’ (v.1) are part of His multifaceted nature, as is His ‘jealous(y) for His own’ (v.2). Yes, He’s many things that are to be praised, especially ‘love and mercy’ (v.2), without which all of us mortals would be extinguished if they were not present in our Creator. He’s ‘exalted on His throne’ ‘above the heavens’ (v.2).  An everlasting worthiness (v.2) is therefore intrinsic to this unique Being. He alone has all of these powers and attributes. It’s a fearsome, even uneasy sensation of God that the Nockels’ song inspires, with some minor chords and an ending that does not bring the worshipper ‘home’ (to the root chord). Those might seem like kinda obscure, music-nerdy, inconsequential details, but Nathan and Christy seemed to know what they were doing, and how to introduce their kids to the real God. He’s breathtaking and beautiful all at once…and so much more.  

 

 

See here for information about one author: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christy_Nockels

 

See here for some comments on song by authoress: https://www.last.fm/music/Christy+Nockels/+wiki