My Worship Revolution

Alright friends, so here’s the deal.

Several weeks ago, for the last day of Re:create, I got to participate in a bonus session at EMI records with some songwriters and publishers.  As part of that workshop, we were all invited to bring an original song of our own that the group, us and one of their producers, would critique.

I have felt a desire to write for years now, but I have had a lot of trouble getting past the whole artist insecurity thing.  The idea of actually sharing something I wrote freaks me out.  A while back I collaborated with a few others to write a song while on a retreat.  Outside of that, nothing much…until recently.  I mentioned it in a Worship Confessional here.

So here’s the deal.  I got some good feedback to improve the song at that workshop.  But I also wanted to go ahead, open myself up, and share it with you, my blogging community,  as well.  Several of you are worship leaders and songwriters and the rest of you are just flat out opinionated.  So I want your critique now.  before I work on the stuff they mentioned, what do you think of it?  How could it be improved?  And don’t worry about hurting my feelings.  Trust me…I’m my own worst critic.  So bring it!  Here’s the story of how the song came about, and embedded below that is the audio file with the lyrics.  Check it out:

We used this past Christmas to do a series on worship as we shared the Christmas story.  We spoke one week about Luke chapter 1 and Mary’s magnificat, her song that she offers up to God in response to his message to her.  We talked about the importance in worship of bringing ourselves and our own talents to God.  As response after the message, during the worship, we invited people to write their own "songs" to God.  To write out their own words and thoughts from their lives.  After a few songs, we brought it down and invited people to share with our community what they had written to God.  It was amazing!

Well I figured that if we were asking people to step out of their comfort zone and share their responses to God, I needed to do the same and write a song for our body (although, I of course didn’t mention I had written it).  So this is the song we sang immediately after sharing with each other what we had written to God.  The verse was kind of inspired by that passage in Luke 1 from The Message.  It’s real simple: a verse and a chorus, with a quick recording in my office.  Here ya go:

HEAR OUR SONGS

Verse
Our souls are bursting with the news of Your good works
Our feet they dance the song of our savior
Your mercy flows in waves and washes over us
The things that you have done, they will not be forgotten

Pre-Chorus
And so we respond to You
We offer You these songs

Chorus
Hear our songs to You God
Receive these offerings from our hearts
We worship You
Hear our songs to You Jesus
This is our offering, oh God

Alright people…
fire away!!