Jeremy Riddle is seeing great success as a singer-songwriter-worship leader, and I don't see it as a commercial thing. His stuff seems to melt people and soften hearts to God stuff. So I'm digging a bit deeper with this one tonight.
[to listen, right click and choose "open link in new window/tab"]
Full Attention
May Your voice be louder
May Your voice be clearer
Than all the others
May Your face be dearer
May Your words be sweeter
Than all the others in my life
Yeah, we hear a lot of voices. Major understatement!!! My stomping grounds, central Canada and the American Midwest, we're right in the heart of the land of distraction. I love it here, but there's so much going on! Packers, Vikings, Blue Bombers, iPhones and Blackberry's, the economy, political dissension, school board controversy, road construction, job interviews, Wii and PS3...and I'm hardly getting warmed up! We can wake up in our forties and realize our hearts' affections are scattered to the four winds. But this song is about focus...
Please keep my eyes fixed on You
Please wound my heart so deep in You
Keep me abiding, keep me abiding
Keep me abiding that I may be a fruit
In John's Gospel, 15th chapter, first four verses, Jesus says:
"I am the true vine, and my Father is the gardener. 2He cuts off every branch in me that bears no fruit, while every branch that does bear fruit he prunes[a] so that it will be even more fruitful. 3You are already clean because of the word I have spoken to you. 4Remain in me, and I will remain in you. No branch can bear fruit by itself; it must remain in the vine. Neither can you bear fruit unless you remain in me.
A fruit doesn't seem all that glamorous, but it's healthy, sweet produce from the vine. Life of it's life.
May Your your presence be truer
May Your presence be nearer
Than all the others
And may Your light shine brighter
And may Your love move deeper
Than all the other my God
Than all the others in my life
Again, the distractions. And the prayer is for God to help us to not be so distracted, not in the way that hurts us so badly. I read a quote today about the secret of strength being in concentration, or focus. Like a martial arts performer focusing the energy of his entire body into the side of his right hand to break the concrete block.
Seems my life's been a mixture of focus and scattershot. I'm always wrestling with this idea of how broad to reach vs how deep to dig. But if I've lost God in the mix, I've lost.
Please keep my eyes fixed on You
Please wound my heart so deep in You
Keep me abiding, keep me abiding
Keep me abiding that I may be a fruit
"Wound my heart so deep in you" is such an intriguing line. I take it in the sense of sharing in the fellowship of Jesus' sufferings, like Philippians 3:10-11:
I want to know Christ and the power of his resurrection and the fellowship of sharing in his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, 11and so, somehow, to attain to the resurrection from the dead.
Resurrection from the dead. Wow! We walk around in this "now and not yet" where God is active and yet evil remains. Life and death are around us every day, and we have this hope of something better, of just life.
Please keep my eyes fixed on You
Please wound my heart so deep in You
Keep me asking, keep me near
Keep me abding that I may be a fruit
Keep me close to You
Oh, right next to Your heart
Close to You
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