The Wind of GOD (Songwriting)

I was listening to the “Coffee House” station on XM Radio tonight when they had a guitar playing, singer-song writer give a brief on one of his number one songs. He said he was traveling thru Northern California in his old, tired out van when it died along the road. He got it to the local mechanic who proceeded to tell him that his fuel pump was shot, and that it would be about $150 to repair it. Well, he didn’t have that much money and left the van at the shop. He wandered around, went into the local Safeway Store---one of those have almost everything stores that are scattered about Rural America. He was lost and wandering around wondering what the heck to do. He did have a credit card, but no income, no steady job or gig, no way to pay the bill on the card when it came in a month. Suddenly he heard a familiar song over the speaker system in the Safeway Store---he realized it was his own song, and relished in the fact that the record publisher finally released it. I’m sorry, I don’t remember the song or the artist, but he’s still around and is very good and very famous and now very rich. Thus, he went back to the mechanic and laid down his credit card and said “go ahead and fix it now”.

There it is, out of the blue fortuitous nature of random blessings, that man’s life changed in just a few moments. Things were “fixed”. He went from going up and down California in an old tired out van, playing in clubs for just enough money to get to his next gig, not being able to afford repairs on his van---to being a famous, wealthy song-writer. I too am thankful for the songs that occasionally go thru my head. These songs “fix” things for me nightly. Friends have told me I am a gifted song-writer. I have seen toughened Marines cry over a song I wrote about my daughters called “You’ll Always Be My Little Girl.” However, I still haven’t heard one of my songs over the Safeway Sound System. Until a lot of years ago, I still entertained the notion that one of my songs might make it out there on the airways, might touch someone, might make me rich and famous. Alas, that has not transpired and I realize that my opportunity to be a “young: singer, song-writer has come and gone. Here is a “snippet” on that one….

“What has happened to my princess?
You’ve become a woman of the world,
And you will do things, that I never will,
But to me you’ll always be, you’ll always be,
My little girl.

However, unlike many “one-hit-wonders” or angry musicians I have not opted to relish in the sadness and depression of what could have been and “waste my life away.” Instead, I have continued to lift my song-writer’s nose to the wind and search for the breath of the Creator and find a melody or a few words. You know, Beehtoven said that his music was simply a reflection of capturing the wind, the breath, the voice of GOD that’s always out there on the wind---you simply have to open your spiritual ears and you will hear HIM talking to you. How true is that?

A few short years ago we were asked to write a song for a couple’s wedding. I scribbled notes about song ideas and played a million chords over 3 months-- getting nowhere, in fact, I was downright frustrated and scared because now it was just a day before the wedding and I had NOTHING. I was trying, yes, ME, I, was trying to write a song. I forgot about the wind….I forgot about the breath of GOD….and then in my basement song-writers lair I prayed a simple prayer and asked my GOD for help with this song…I told HIM I was getting nowhere and was lost without HIM….and, as I picked up my pen it came as thus….

“There’s something really special about you,
it’s in your eyes….
There’s something really special about you,
It’s the Kingdom in your eyes…
I’m yours, you’re mine and we are one in Jesus’ eyes…


Well, there’s a lot more to the song, but that’s the gist of it, there is a marvelous Kingdom inside you, I can see it in your eyes---and that song has been played in a lot in coffee houses, etc. to pretty good reviews, but can’t you see that in your true love’s eyes? Something magical, something so special even beyond earthly love? Yes, it’s heaven, a little taste of heaven that you get when you look into those shimmering eyes and see someone loving you beyond belief, beyond what you know you deserve or could ever hope for. There is a Kingdom of God in there.

And that is the gift of songwriting---something beyond anything I could ever do alone. Something that carries me on the wind of GOD to this day. Something that no matter what, I always have something special to rely on, something that not everybody gets. You have something I don’t, and I admire you for it---but I tell you, I am so blessed and thankful to share the next song with you. May you walk outside and take a little sniff of fresh air and find a song in your heart today too. May you sail on the Wind of GOD and soar beyond your earthly woes and troubles and pain and find the freshness of a new song on the WIND OF GOD.