so...a song i wrote...sort of

yesterday we traveled down to grand prairie family church to do their service. levi preached and i lead the singing with meagan and heather, and a few from their band. the worship went great and levi's message, based on matthew 22 (love God...love your neighbor as yourself) was awesome. as part of the service order i had put in "response song" after the message. i didn't know what i was going to do, even that morning. this is not my normal planning practice but for some reason i couldn't think of a song that would say what we wanted to say at the end. we decided before the service that we would just do "amazing grace (my chains are gone)" again, a song we did in the worship set.

all through the message i was just thinking and thinking, what do we need to say in response to this message? levi was talking about how we in american churches get so wrapped up in doing church stuff with church people that we don't impact those in the world that are really in need. he said this is totally not the way Christ lived. He hung out with those that were the outcasts. He hung out with tax collectors, prostitutes, samaritans, etc. He loved them and talked with them about the kingdom of God. He did not spend all His time in the temple or with religious people. He spent most of His time with sinners. then a question formed in my head (whether it was from levi directly i don't know), could it be that we don't interact with those that are outcasts because we aren't looking for them? and a phrase popped in my head: "who do you see? i want to see." so i was working on that thought for the response song. at the end of the sermon levi was closing and said "i want you to close your eyes and think about your life. think about who you can impact with the love of Christ." and then he said, "jonathan is going to come up and sing a song about grace"... so now i have to put grace in the song, i thought, and immediately came the phrase i wanna be Your grace.

so i get up on stage and just start singing what comes to mind and this is what happened:

who, who did you see
i, i wanna see
who, who did you touch
i, i wanna touch
who, who did you love
i, i wanna love
who, who did you show grace
i, i wanna be Your grace

i wanna be Your grace
i wanna be Your grace

show me
those around me
who are living
like i used to be


i don't necessarily like the "like i used to be" line for the finished version of the song. i guess i wanted to get across the idea that once we join the cause of Christ we are not the same, so the prayer is "God show me those around me that are not living life with You." i'll definitely keep
working with it but was pretty pumped that it came together. i asked levi afterward what he thought and he said, "i hope he remembers it next time." he was worried that when i got around to repeating it i wouldn't remember what i sang. lol

i don't recommend doing this. it is very nerve racking for that very reason. however, this is the second time i've written a song like this. next time, i'll post the other song.