Psalm 23 (I Am Not Alone) -- Joshua Sherman, Laurel Taylor, Steven Musso, The Emerging Sound

 

It most likely happened at a summer camp. The year was 2018, and Joshua Sherman and two other musical collaborators, Laurel Taylor and Steven Musso, reached back for a song that was very old, in order to drawn something that remained potent from its object of worship. “Psalm 23 (I Am Not Alone)”, which drew upon what one shepherd once wrote about another greater shepherd, spoke to these three 21^st Century songwriters. David’s version, and so many other renderings since his day 3,000 years ago, engender peace and contentment; Joshua, Laurel, and Steven, while in the camp atmosphere of The Emerging Sound, took David’s thoughts to a place of elation and pure excitement as they considered what the Great Shepherd provides. He gives the people of His pasture so much right now, and if what’s to come because of His provision could possibly be fathomed, that would really blow the top off of all we can imagine. That’s what Joshua, Laurel, and Steven seem to want us to drink in.  

 

Joshua, Laurel, and Steven come from different places in the eastern part of the United States, so one can guess that they came together somehow to mull over, share, and create something that their ancient songwriting brother would have recognized. These three heard and read what David said, and just to rearrange his lyrics some would have been profitable, and yet they evidently had some other objective in mind when they thought about Psalm 23. Joshua ministered in Boynton Beach in southern Florida, Laurel was Nashville in Middle Tennessee, and Steven was in Albany in east-central New York, so did the three talk by phones or via some other remote devices to craft the song? Part of it may have emerged from such an interaction, but since they cite The Emerging Sound as a part of their collective composing team, we can be pretty certain that they were together at one of the summer camps that this organization hosts to foster songwriting and ultimately the spread of the Good News. They thought David’s words about the Great Shepherd and what He provides were worth repeating – protection, anointing, guidance through valleys, refreshment and restoration, the mercy and grace He offers, and the comfort and confidence that makes our souls overflow. That’s a lot. Wrap up all of that in a single package, and how does one feel? That is what is expressed in this Psalm 23 version, and you and I are invited to feel as Joshua, Laurel, and Steven unmistakably felt as they sat with each other at a campsite. They used words that David must have also felt, but left unspoken. Hallelujah and Victory (vocalized six and fifteen times, respectively, throughout the song) raise the lyrics to a new height, testifying to a thrilling awareness for what He’s laid up for us to have in His presence, in His home. We can anticipate and be confident that He will, and is already providing for us, as these three remind us that ‘my Comfort, always holds me close’, an antidote to this life of frequent challenge that He alone bestows. David surely knew all about this too, and that ‘Your Spirit lives within me’, though he did not explicitly pen these phrases. Joshua, Laurel, and Steven thought David’s heartstrings beat pretty strong in these unspoken phrases through what he did write, so why not include them three millennia later? Good idea!   

 

Not much more needs to be said to expose what three contemporary Christian songwriters discovered eight years ago. Others probably have felt similarly as they have read and thought about David’s ode to the Great Shepherd. Too often, though, it is consigned to rather sad occasions, at funerals. Its comforting tone is appropriate for soothing the wounded hearts at those times, certainly. But our great Redeemer and Protector is more than a soother, as this new version of the 23^rd Psalm communicates so powerfully. Sing the hallelujahs and victories now that we implicitly know David had in his own soul, and which Joshua, Laurel, and Steven have seen fit to shout aloud. Say them again, and again, and again. Keep doing it. Live like it, and see who else will join in. (Click on one of the links below to get yourself in the correct frame of mind!)    

 

Hear a very stirring rendition of the song here from one of the artists: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpTXb_-sir8

 

Read some about the primary composer here: https://www.jasministries.com/

 

Read about another of the co-writers here: https://www.themussos.com/about

 

Read about another of the co-writers here: https://www.thechristianbeat.org/artists/laurel-taylor/

 

Read about the songwriting group that helped spawn the song here: https://www.theemergingsound.com/

 

See information about the image here: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Bernhard_Plockhorst_-_Good_Shephard.jpg... This work is in the public domain in its country of origin and other countries and areas where the copyright term is the author's life plus 100 years or fewer. {{PD-1996}} – public domain in its source country on January 1, 1996 and in the United States….the image may be found in this document -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sheep  

O The Precious Love of Jesus -- Eliza Morgan Sherman

 

She lived in small-town late 19^th Century America, and evidently had felt, seen, and heard something proclaimed and lived out in a church and a home that reinforced a simple, loving trust in Him. Could it be that Eliza Morgan Sherman had been taught to love Jesus Christ for so long, that by 1880 it was quite natural for her to sing “O, the Precious Love of Jesus” (also known as “Christ Is Precious”)? The very words she penned around her 30^th year most likely were those her parents had on their lips, too. Brodhead, Wisconsin (See the Seal of Wisconsin here; Brodhead sits astride the border of Green and Rock counties on the southern Wisconsin-northern Illinois border) and probably the Congregational Church where this family worshipped were small, but the Christian faith values she encountered there were evidently deeply embedded within Eliza. The basic message about God – that He is love (1 John 4:8), and that that character trait of Him is so very valuable – was not lost on this young woman.    

 

Eliza had sensed the love of God in boundless ways, perhaps even with the other two senses not yet mentioned (tasting and smelling), for it is evident in what she wrote that this divine nature was something that encompassed her life. ‘Taste and see that the Lord is good’ (Psalm 34:8), and ‘taste the love of Jesus’ (v.3 of the song), Eliza coaxed, evidently as she drew on what her ancient ancestor-songwriter David had said about having God’s sweetness on the tongue. Had Eliza also read Psalm 141:2, wherein David loved God – indeed, perhaps enjoyed a mutual sensation with Him – through the aroma of incense that was present as he lifted up a prayer of devotion to Him? Was that analogous to her last three lines in verse 3, where Eliza indicates there’s a prayer offered to the One above, upon whom ‘burdens’ are laid, because He is ‘trust(ed) with…grief and sorrow’, and someone toward whom a ‘joyful song’ (is borne) ‘away’, like incense? She vocalizes the word love three times, once for each of her three stanzas, but the poetic offshoots of love include many other words to describe its breadth – like precious, sweeter, joyous, and melody (v.1); and fullness, wondrous, glory, heavenly home (v.2). All of these are traced to Christ – employed 12 times in her poetry -- the name for the Anointed One of God to whom she points. Eliza managed to say quite a lot about this God of love with just a handful of words.

 

What do you suppose Eliza did with all of that love that she experienced in Brodhead? Without specific evidence to confirm how Eliza Sherman’s life played out day-to-day, including what particular episode might have spurred her poetry about this love of Jesus, we could surmise that what took place there stuck with her – and that she stuck with Brodhead in reply. The little available information about her, in addition to the verses of some 80 songs that she wrote, indicate her father (James) was a deacon in a Congregational Church for half-a-century, and that her mother was Abigail Morgan. These parents gave Eliza her mother’s maiden name and her father’s family’s name, so could they have wanted her to always know about her roots? Eliza Morgan Sherman remembered, and must have gleaned something else from her upbringing in Brodhead that she found very attractive, for she apparently lived almost all of her life – some 78.5 years – in Brodhead, or near there. Fifty years as a deacon’s daughter is a pretty long stretch. A small church and community are where Eliza evidently experienced love firsthand. Have you got a magnet with that kind of staying power?          

 

 

See few scant details of the authoress here: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/bio/s/h/e/r/sherman_em.htm

 

Find all three verses and the song’s refrain here: http://www.hymntime.com/tch/htm/o/p/r/e/oprelove.htm

 

Also see here for the song’s lyrics: O, the Precious Love of Jesus | Hymnary.org

 

See here for information about the authoress’s birthplace: Brodhead, Wisconsin - Wikipedia

 

See information on the seal of Wisconsin here: File:Coat of arms of Wisconsin.svg - Wikimedia Commons …  This media file is in the public domain in the United States. This applies to U.S. works where the copyright has expired, often because its first publication occurred prior to January 1, 1929, and if not then due to lack of notice or renewal.