Tuesday, May 10, 2011

This Is My Passion

Maybe it's the fact that I'm teaching a songwriting class at the moment, or maybe it's the fact that I've said yes to God's prodding to step out of my comfort zone yet again. Maybe it's because both of these things have me praying a lot, but whatever it is, I feel like I'm getting more song ideas than I have in a really long time. While I tend to get lots of little song "sprouts," in recent years I've have a hard time bringing a lot of them through to completion so that they are usable for our local church congregation. My "seed file," as my songwriting idea file is affectionately known, is full of partial songs, choruses, titles, melodies and harmonic ideas. Lately though, the ideas are turning into completed songs and it feels really great.

I pulled out a song idea from 2009 last week and have been playing with all sorts of lyrical ideas to flesh it out. It feels really close but with a few potential weak spots: It has two working titles at the moment: "Passion" and "Risen One." It also has a different chorus for each verse. This might mean it needs to be honed in a bit. There are some others, but we'll leave it at that for now. The lyrics as of Thursday night, May 10 read as follows:

Passion (Risen One)
This is my passion, to live this life for You
With one desire: to honor You
Jesus, my Portion, I live for Your pleasure
To serve You forever, to worship You

To sing of the wonderful work of Jesus
Saving the sinners to call us sons
Of blood that was poured out to make us holy
Perfectly dressed in the righteousness of the Risen One

This is our passion, to carry Your kingdom
In this generation, declaring Your truth
So fill us again, Lord, with power from heaven
Provoking the nations to worship You

The sons and the daughters of many nations
Praising the Father, we join as one
Freely adopted through great salvation
Now we are dressed in the righteousness of the Risen One
©2011 JonnyDavids Music


On Saturday night I have the opportunity to have this song evaluated by a veteran Christian musician and songwriter, Bob Kilpatrick. In the 1980's Bob penned the song "Be Glorified" which became one of the most widely sung worship songs in the world and it's still sung in countless churches today. One of his songs was sung at Mother Teresa's funeral, resulting in a public compliment from Hillary Clinton. Bob is going to be leading a clinic for worship musicians, leaders and songwriters Saturday at 7 pm. He'll be evaluating songs from two or three local songwriters as a part of the evening. What fun! We'll see what kind of changes the lyrics undergo as a result of Saturday and I'll be sure to post them here.

PS - If you'd like to hear Bob speak and lead worship he'll be doing both on Sunday night, May 15 at 7 pm at Clark Fork City Church. His band will be made up of local musicians! (Surprise!!)