Called Me Higher -- Leslie Jordan

 

This one was really something that matched the name of the singing group and its purpose, and so it was probably a ‘no-brainer’ for Leslie Jordan to pen the words for “Called Me Higher”.  All of her spiritual brothers and sisters – All Sons & Daughters (the name of her singing duo, and the name of the album, too, on which the song appears) – in the Franklin, Tennessee (part of the Nashville metro area) church were on Leslie’s mind. Though she eventually saw the song as for this large group, it didn’t start out that way; it was, instead, pretty personal in its conception. ‘Pray this, just between you and Him’, she thought to herself. It was no more complicated than that. It’s just one more landmark, further evidence, of what can emerge from a musical person when she contacts the Spirit. So, don’t keep some of those prayers private and confidential, if it will motivate others around you – that’s a secondary message that comes out of this story.

 

Leslie Jordan was helping guide the worship at the church were she and David Leonard (her singing partner in All Sons and Daughters, and co-worship leader at the church) were active sometime in 2012. She was thinking about her own walk with God, and really wanted to be authentic and expansive in her faith. And so, she admitted to herself and to her Lord that she didn’t want to ‘just sit’ (v.1) or ‘hold on’ (v.2), remaining in a ‘safe’ zone.  She asked Him in this prayer to move her off center, to come and ‘lead her ‘deeper’ and ‘higher’ (chorus). Later, when the song had fully arrived and was being produced for the album, Leslie says she was thinking also about everyone in the church, and how they might be coaxed to launch outside of themselves. It would be about all of them letting go of fears, about letting God take control of circumstances. This all came to her mind as she was driving along one day. She pictured different people being challenged to do things they’d not had the courage to do before…to be called into His strength. As verses one and two indicate, Leslie thought it would be easy to not do anything different, but just ‘wait’ for God to move, and yet there was the inclination toward ‘never’, which she repeats three times (v.2). It shows she recognized her internal drives, and the impetus versus inertia conflict that was ongoing. Perhaps she could likewise see it in the facial expressions of her church’s members, or hear it in their voices as they talked about various visions and circumstances to manage. These visions, perhaps in their collective immediate futures, were not the only ones to consider. Leslie thought about being His vessel and force ‘for all my life’. That’s a pretty big commitment, if we really mean it when we sing it, isn’t it?

 

Who can imagine all that one might do in all of his life? I don’t have that kind of crystal ball, and some of what I might see would scare me, probably. Leslie Jordan didn’t let thoughts like that stop her from challenging herself, and us, with those forward-leaning kind of words. She, and all of us, need one elemental thing in order to make a pledge like she sings in the words ‘for all my life’. Trust. He’s the only one who knows the future, and knows each of us better than we know ourselves. If He’s ‘called me higher’, then logically I should realize that anything is possible if I’m truly in tune with the place and the Creator that I am aimed at. Leslie just seems to be saying ‘let the Spirit loose on yourself’, to let that ‘higher’ and ‘deeper’ grow that space in which I live. Just see how big it can get!

 

 

See the author-composer description of the song’s origin and meaning: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbCXOI3QIcA

 

Read here for description of the musical group in which the author-writer sings: All Sons & Daughters - Wikipedia

Build Your Kingdom Here -- Rend Collective Experiment

 

Northern Ireland…historically not really a place of peace, especially for those who’ve been around more than two or three decades (see one flag here, sometimes called the Ulster Banner, that is often used to publicly represent Northern Ireland). And could that have helped spur a group of young people at a church in the Bangor area (a part of the larger Belfast metropolitan area) to form and call themselves the Rend Collective Experiment (now known as the Rend Collective)? The band’s members tell of trying to ‘figure out life’ amid a palpable hostility from their surroundings toward the Christian hope they espoused when they formed in 2002-03, about ten years before “Build Your Kingdom Here” was written – something that you could interpret is rather like the band’s anthem response to their world. You might also guess that these ‘experimenters’ were reading of a powerful promise from one ancient writer, when you watch one of their music videos of the song. This underscores how they feel about their God, and what they yearn for Him to do where they live.

 

There is a story that the Rend Collective tells about what sparked ‘Build Your Kingdom”, and it apparently is available to those granted access to it (see the link below to a facebook page.) Without that, a researcher could alternately surmise what they were thinking via this 2012 song’s lyrics and by reading about their formation as a group. They quite candidly admit that they sought to counter their culture’s antipathy about Christianity with their music, hoping its message would act like a magnet for unbelievers. One of their videos contains the words of Isaiah (9:7), a prediction that one often hears around Christmastime – that He will bring a government committed to everlasting ‘peace’, implemented through ‘justice and righteousness’. So, what this group of over 15 people (it tours and records its songs with just six musicians) was aiming to do in 2002-03 was still on their minds ten years later. The poetry they crafted is rich in its passionate desire for his power to impact their world. And, it’s not just the words that demonstrate this appeal, but also the videos that reveal an energy among the group’s members that you can imagine is infectious. Words like ‘ablaze’ and ‘wildfire’ (v.1); and ‘hunger’, and ‘thirst’ (v.2); and ‘fire’ (chorus) inhabit their verses to attest to their fervent objective. This Isaiah message also must have helped stir the words about God’s character – that He has ‘power’ (vv.1,3), is ‘mighty’ (chorus), and has ‘strength’ (v.3). And yet, He is also One who defines ‘beauty’ and ‘love’ (v.3). The Rend people don’t call for God to intervene on His own, however, but with their active participation. They ask for ‘unveil(ing)’ and ‘invad(ing)’ by the Spirit, so that humanity will know its purpose (v.1); and they seem to expect that they will play the earthly role in helping the ‘hurt’, ‘sick’, and ‘poor’ (v.2). ‘We are your church’, they declare repeatedly. There’s more in their poetry, and when it’s fused with the vibrant energy they bring to the performance stage, you can imagine that onlookers would want more of a God they represent. This God is not here to spectate, and neither are the Rend Collective.

 

From where does the ‘Rend’ originate in the band’s name? Joel (2:13) and Isaiah (64:1) are two Old Testament prophets on whom they lean for their identity…they seek to be authentic, not showy, in ‘rending their hearts and not just their garments in worship’ (Joel); and they appeal to God to ‘rend the heavens’ and show His potency as the ultimate force in the universe (Isaiah). Thus, the Rend Collective wants to connect their own rending with His. They felt they were an experiment at first, as they tried to ‘figure out life’, which also seems to further bespeak of a genuine quality in the band’s nature – that they admit they haven’t got it all figured out. But, they seem to know where to look for the One who does. Do you?

 

See information about the source of the song here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Build_Your_Kingdom_Here

 

Read here about the band that wrote the song: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rend_Collective

 

Read some more about the band here: https://www.crossrhythms.co.uk/articles/music/Rend_Collective_Experiment_Bringing_a_fresh_approach_to_worship_music/38854/p1/

 

Facebook page that shares the story to those granted access: https://www.facebook.com/rendcollective/posts/the-story-behind-build-your-kingdom-here-httptcoscozl2i1g0/10151547692831832/

 

See this video for song’s performance and for scripture that band shared at end of song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcSWpVKKMcs

 

See a really spirited rendition of the song by the band here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sbdJXKqVgtg

 

Information about the album on which the song appears: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homemade_Worship_by_Handmade_People

 

Read an interesting review of the song here: https://www.thebereantest.com/rend-collective-build-your-kingdom-here

You Have Been Good -- Twila Paris

 

“Why do you call me good?” Jesus answered. “No one is good—except God alone.” Then the very One who dismissed the compliment from a rich man told him that, besides keeping the commandments, he needed to part with his money (Mark 10:18-22; Luke 18:19-23). Oh, that one smarts, Jesus! Perhaps Twila Paris would have been caught off guard as much as the rest of us, when Jesus said these words. First, He says something puzzling, and then He issues a really challenging footnote for us followers. Nevertheless, you could imagine that Twila understood what Jesus was saying, when she declared that “You Have Been Good”, and that probably she would be as confident as the rest of us in picking out the Good versus the Evil in this 19^th Century work of art (The Temptation of Christ, by Ary Scheffer). In this artwork, Jesus is just beginning His earthly ministry when He confronted Satan (Matthew 4); Twila reminds us that all He accomplished after this wilderness clash with the enemy is why we now can say ‘Good’ when we call out to Him.

 

Twila Paris had been singing and worshipping the Good One for over 20 years when she penned ‘You Have Been Good’ around 1988. She was truly ‘Little Twila Paris’ when she’d first started singing as a youngster, all of seven years old, and so by the time she was 30, the faith with which she’d been raised was deep within her. You could guess that she thought this faith was worth spreading, for this song she wrote is part of the 1988 album named For Every Heart. What was motivating Twila in 1988, after she had already cut six albums, including five as an adult in the early to mid-1980s? Today, she’s written so many songs and produced so many albums, that maybe even Twila might not be able, with pinpoint accuracy, to remember what brought about her personal address to this Good God. But, the crucial part of this episode in the late 1980s was that she enumerated a number of good things in His relationship to us. Indeed ‘all generations’ can applaud His faithful goodness. His ’steadfast love and tender mercy’ are at the root of the ‘salvation’ He has purchased for each of us. Being ‘fed’ by Him and led by His ‘Spirit’ are the ways He continues to care for those He has called. And finally, Twila zeroes in on this God’s character, that this ‘Almighty’ is ‘unchanging’, ‘upright’, and ‘holy’. What could be better and more reassuring than following someone you’ve identified as perfect, and knowing that He’s not going to become anything else but the good that you’ve already learned to appreciate and trust? And so, Twila wasn’t really trying to offer a lot of deep theological rationale for sticking with Him. She just wanted to tell of her own feelings for Him after two-plus decades within His shadow.

 

It’s like a love song that Twila was singing to Him, when she offered up ‘You Have Been Good’.  A couple in love, when they make their vows at a wedding, really are saying that they want to grow old together when they promise to forsake others, and ‘till death do us part’. Have you ever wondered what would either party say during those nuptials if they could actually see each other’s visage 40-50 years hence? Wrinkles, extra weight, receding hairlines, bodies potentially weakened by disease – not a pretty physical picture, is it? Consider that our groom (spiritually speaking – Revelation 18 – 22) will not change, and that He’s looking at us (His bride) with a different set of glasses than you and I might use. Kinda seems like Twila was still, in her mind, standing at the altar with Him in 1988. Actually, let’s never leave that place and time!       

 

 

See here for information on the composer/author: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twila_Paris

 

Read about the author here: Welcome To TwilaParis.com (archive.org)

 

You can find the reproduction of The Temptation of Christ here (source of picture -- Good and evil - Wikipedia)