A Gathering Voices post by Lynne M. Baab
Two of my college friends formed a musical group after they graduated. They spent a year travelling around, singing at churches and other venues, and they produced an LP record of their songs. I kept playing that record for many years after their little group disbanded.
Our turntable died, and the record got stored in a cabinet. Like most other people, we moved on to cassettes and CDs. A few years ago I asked a friend of my son, a sound engineer, to turn the songs on the record into digital files so I could play them again. He made me a disc, but I misplaced it until last week, when it reappeared while I was cleaning out a drawer. I’ve been playing it all week.
One of the songs speaks to me today even more than it spoke to me decades ago when I first heard it. And I loved the song even then.
I have chosen three words to be my theme words for 2012: listen, seek, follow. I want to strive to hear and follow God’s voice more closely in 2012. The song from my friends’ old album adds an additional dimension to this quest, rounding out a sense of purpose for why I might want to listen, seek and follow God. Listening, seeking and following contribute to making me know God better, and that’s actually what I want most of all. The song helps give language to that desire, using Trinitarian terms to describe our quest to know God. The song also links knowing God to belonging to God.
It’s amazing to me that my friend Denise Morey wrote the song when she was in her early 20s, and the song continues to speak today. Music has such power; music memories reside so deep inside us and music touches us so profoundly. I wish you could hear Denise sing the song, but I think the words speak even without the music. Denise has given permission for me to publish the words here.
Be Yours by Denise Morey
I want to know the Father
deeper than I’ve known before,
freedom from my selfish heartaches,
anxious thoughts, my heart so sore.
Peace like a river filling up my life now.
Open up the doors and show me how
to be me in you, be yours. Be Yours.
And I want to know the Son
deeper than I’ve ever known before.
I want to understand His dying for me
and then rising for me.
Joy like a river filling up my heart now.
Open up the doors and show me how
to die with you, then live. Be Yours.
And I want to know God’s Spirit
deeper than I’ve ever known before.
Understand the way He works in me
and feel his power grow.
Faith like a river welling up inside me now.
Open up the doors and show me how
He can change my ways
and He can guide my days. Be Yours.
