God of Wrath

They say that necessity is the mother of invention. That was certainly true with the song “God of Wrath.” I was preparing to begin a sermon series on the book of Judge and was excited for our community to hear from God through this book and encounter the ever-relevant themes found within it. The most common themes in the book are the tendency of God’s people toward idolatry, God’s righteous judgment on such idolatry, and God’s faithfulness to mercifully provide deliverance from the ultimate judgment his people to deserve.

In preaching these themes it was important that our congregation recognize that this isn’t just the experience of the ancient Israelites but that it’s also our experience. Though few of us bow to idols made of wood and stone we do the same thing in a different way. We give our love, our obedience, and our sacrifice to created people and things instead of to the Creator of all things. For that we have earned God’s wrath and deserve his judgment. Thankfully, God has raised up the true and perfect judge in Jesus Christ to deliver us from the wrathful judgment that we deserve.

Just typing those words moves me to worship and I knew that the people of Emmaus would likewise be moved to worship after hearing these truths preached from God’s Word. For this reason I wanted to ensure that we had several worship songs that we could sing together in response to this preached word. It was important to me that we found songs that spoke of these same themes, so that our response in song would match the responses of our hearts after hearing these truths. Unfortunately, I couldn’t find anything. I found many songs about our worship of God, but few about our idolatry. I found many songs about God’s love, but few about his wrath. And I couldn’t find any songs that connected these truths together. I was frustrated by this and didn’t know what to do. Eventually I decided I would try to write one myself.

At this time I had never written a song for our church specifically or for congregational worship in general. I wasn’t sure if I could do it. But we didn’t really have any other options at the time. So I tried. I was surprised at how quickly the words and melody came. To this day it was the easiest and quickest song that I’ve ever written, and it is also the most personal. When I wrote this song I was not writing a song for our church as much as I was repenting to God. Through my study of Judges I became increasingly aware of my own idolatry. From this increasing awareness and conviction I simply wrote down what I saw in myself.

The first verse was my confession of my idolatry in general: “We have all gone astray/we have all lost our way/we have all given chase/after gods that don’t save/we have all bowed ourselves/at the altar of self/we have all served our pride/at the cost of what’s right.”

The second verse was my confession of specific ways I saw this idolatry manifesting itself in my own life: “We have all sung the songs/we have all prayed the prayers/we have all said the words when our heart wasn’t there/we have all lived our lives/as adulterous wives/we have all spilled the blood/of the ones we should love.”

I wrote these verses first. But I had no intention of letting the song end there. I had to tell the whole story. So I wrote the chorus and then the bridge, both of which relieve the tension by confessing that we will not taste the wrath our idolatry deserves because Jesus tasted it for us. After completing the bridge I was confident that we had a song that would work for corporate worship during our series on Judges. There was only one problem: it had no music. Thankfully, my friend Jelani Greenidge came to the rescue. I sang the words and melody to him and he built the right music around it within a matter of hours (how anyone can discern a melody from my singing I am still unsure). Emmaus was able to sing the song for the first time just a few days later.

That was three years ago. The version you hear on Church Songs is a darker, stripped-down version of what Jelani and I initially composed (if you’re crafty you may be able to find the original online). While the original will always hold a special place in my heart I love how this acoustic version (from Jonathan Wold and Brandon Woods) captures a quiet mood of repentance and desperation, as that’s what I felt when I wrote it.

Creator, Sustainer, Redeemer

I hesitate to say that I have a “favorite” Bible passage. But if you forced me to pick one I would pick Colossians 1:15-20. In this passage we find what has been called a “Christ hymn” wherein the Apostle Paul rehearses essential truths about Jesus in a rhythmic fashion that would be easy for his audience to memorize and repeat as those around them were trying to diminish Jesus’ glory. I don’t know how anyone could read this passage and not be mesmerized by the Jesus revealed in it. It reads like this,

“The Son is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For in him all things were created: things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and in him all things hold together. And he is the head of the body, the church; he is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything he might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all his fullness dwell in him, and through him to reconcile to himself all things, whether things on earth or things in heaven, by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross” (Colossians 1:15-20).

In this text we see Jesus revealed as our creator, our sustainer, and our redeemer. He is our creator in that he is “the image of the invisible God” in whom “all things were created.” He is our sustainer in that “He is before all things, and in him all things hold together.” And he is our redeemer in that “God was pleased…through him to reconcile to himself all things…by making peace through his blood, shed on the cross.” As I prepared to preach through the book of Colossians I was most excited about preaching this passage and proclaiming the excellencies of Jesus who made us, holds us together even as we turn from him, and redeems us by bringing us back to him. Yet I wanted to do more than just preach it. As I considered that Paul intentionally wrote this in what F.F. Bruce called “rhythmic prose” so that it could be easily learned and easily repeated, I wanted to put these same truths into a musical form that would be easy for the people of Emmaus to learn and repeat. So I wrote this song to an instrumental I received from my friend HR Crump.

In writing the song I followed the outline of the Colossian Christ hymn as best as I could. You’ll notice that the first verse focuses on who Jesus is as our creator, the second verse focuses on who Jesus is as our sustainer, and the bridge and vamp focus on who Jesus is as our redeemer. It is my prayer that this song could serve both as a tool for teaching and as motivation to worship. As we rehearse the doctrine of Christ through songs like this may we be more in awe of who he is and more opposed to any teachings that minimize his greatness.

No One Else

Psalm 73 is one of my favorite psalms. It’s one that we as a church have turned to time and time again. In this psalm the author, Asaph, begins by expressing his frustration over the state of the world. He is troubled that God’s people seem to suffer terribly while wicked people seem to prosper endlessly. In view of this apparent injustice Asaph initially thinks that perhaps he has lived righteously in vain. After all, if righteous people suffer and wicked people prosper what’s the point of living righteously? But before he can utter the words he stops himself and reminds himself who God is, what God will ultimately do to the wicked, and how God is present with his people in their suffering. As he reflects on these things he remembers that while the wicked may have money in this life he has God now and forever, and nothing could be more wonderful than that. He puts it this way, “Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you” (Psalm 73:25).

After preaching a sermon on this passage I knew that those words would be perfect for a congregational song. They capture a truth we need to be reminded of and rejoice over: that God is the greatest treasure we could ever obtain and that this greatest treasure is ours in Jesus Christ. That’s where the chorus to this song came from. The verses and pre-chorus came that same week. While on a plane flying to St. Louis I took out my computer and began to make a list of some of the ways God fulfills and surpasses our every desire: “Satisfaction for the hopeless/and forgiveness for the flawed/you are peace for the stressed and anxious/you are God.” The lyrics for the entire song were completed by the time I landed in St. Louis in October of 2008. But we didn’t sing the song in church until 2011. I simply couldn’t find the right melody.

After trying to shape the melody several times I had basically given up and placed the song in my mental file for “things I wish I could make work but will probably never finish.” Then one of our worship music leaders, Michael Dean, asked if I had any songs. I emailed him the lyrics to what would become “No One Else.” In less than an hour he replied with the song as it is now heard on our album. To get it there he had to make a lot of adjustments. In addition to creating the entire melody around the existing lyrics, he also transformed what was originally the second verse of the song into what is now the pre-chorus (“You are justice for the victim/you are riches for the poor/you are Father for the orphan/you are Lord…”). This turned out to be very wise as the pre-chorus is the most memorable part of the song, both melodically and lyrically.

“No One Else” is one of my favorite songs to sing with Emmaus. There’s something special about watching our entire family singing out who God is and reminding one another that God himself is enough for us regardless of life’s circumstances.