Joe Choi

This is my song with attitude.  Ha ha.  It's in the chords, it's in the music, and it's in the overall feel of the song.  

I was changing strings on my guitar, got sidetracked, and then came back to play it and found it to be delightfully out of tune.  I usually would say I found it to be horribly out of tune but this time the non-standard tuning was somewhat pleasant.  I fine-tweaked some things and ended up chord-ing out some music and out came this song.

I wanted to be respectful to all camps of people and to what all people believe but this song kind of dropped the hammer down on the whining and complaining that I was getting sick and tired of hearing.  What was this whining and complaining you ask?  It was the nails-on-chalkboard-to-my-ears statements that sounded like the following: "O this world is doomed", "The earth is so full or darkness", "Things are getting so bad", "God save us and take us to Heaven before you destroy this world", and so on and so forth in the likes of these statements.  

It was like hearing the spies that came back to Moses saying, "It's a land flowing with milk and honey but there are giants in the land and we are like grasshoppers.  There is no way that we can overtake them!  We are doomed!" (Number 13).  It was in light of these statements and in their attitude that the opening lines of the song were written: "Looks like darkness covers the whole earth. Deep darkness covers the people.  But who cares?... I don't care." It wasn't meant to sound insensitive to those who really are terrified but it was meant to address and challenge the attitude of fear by saying, "Okay, so there are giants, and okay, so there is darkness... So what?  God is bigger.  He really is!  Let me show you how."

The next lines go(from Isaiah 60): "A light, it shines, it shines all around, it's piercing the darkness.  Nations will come to your light.  Kings to the brightness of your rising.  The LORD rises upon you, His glory appears on you."  

I wanted to say that this is why we don't care. It's because it's all been prophesied a long time ago and we've already been told about this (Isaiah 60).  It shouldn't come as a surprise that our lives are meant to shine like lights in this world.  It's not our light but God's but He has chosen to bring His light through us. And that when we rise up, "nations will come to our light"(they will come to the light of God shining upon us) and "kings to the brightness of our rising" (to the brightness they see of God's glory on us when we actually show up in their land and display His love and power).    

The next part of the song was what Psalmists would call a "selah" part of a psalm where there's just some pondering of what's been said in a musical interlude.  Anyhow, after this I shout, "The LORD is here!"  I just wanted to snap the spirit of fear into pieces with this simple statement that God is here and that "His perfect love drives out all fear"(1 John 4:18).  

This song is a tricky one to pull off live because I'd need a guitar on stage specifically tuned to this weird tuning.  It'd take WAY too long to detune and then re-tune a guitar before and after I played this song.  I tried it once and it made for some really great awkward silence.  Good times.  Ha ha.  :)  

Thanks for reading!

This song is bittersweet.  It started out spontaneously in a personal time of worship and it got finished in a car ride on a way to my friend, Cody Spahr's, funeral.

The whole journey of the song and the meaning behind it all is about the challenge set before us in Psalms to "sing a new song" and how "many will come to know and fear the LORD"(Psalm 33:3, 40:3, ...).  

I wrote this song but never could finish it until I got inspired by someone who really lived the lyrics of it.  Cody, even as he battled cancer back and forth before it eventually took his life, kept on in his pursuit and hunger for God.  I got to be with him in the prayer lines for healing at Bethel Church and I got to be with him when he got prayed for over and over again by many other people.  He kept on hoping and kept on believing for his healing. The same goes for his wife, Amy.  She kept on too and even after Cody's passing, she went on to India by herself to share God's love with the people there.   

I looked at their lives and how they held on and felt convicted that no one was meant to live a life hidden like a light under a basket but that we were all meant to live lives that shine openly and publicly like lamps in a dark room giving light to everyone around it(Matthew 5:14-16).

In my music and in my Christian subculture that I grew up with, I became timid to share about Christ because of the association with things that I had no control over.  These were things that weren't associated with God but with Christians.  I grew cynical of Christians (and I guess myself then) and found myself in a hole of nothingness if nothingness is even a word.  I came to and realized that the main thing is God and regardless of any other misunderstandings, you don't want it to be misunderstood that you are unashamedly God's child and that He is your Dad and that you love Him more than life.  All other misunderstandings that may happen as a result are worth it just to make that one clear.

The song started out as a chorus that I used to sing on the piano during my alone-times with God.  I would be belting this out at the top of my lungs and I just felt like my spiritual eyes were being opened to see a reality of many people coming to know and fear the LORD through my singing and through my song.  I don't ever want to lose that child-like belief or feeling.  It may read or sound like arrogance but I think it's innocence.  Being in God's Presence is matchless to anything else in the universe.  It's something to be feared, cherished, and guarded closely and not so much because of religious duty but because of love-sickness.  Those two clauses are connected (notice no paragraph break).  Anyhow, here I go preaching.  

I hope you can enjoy this song even more!  This might even be your first time listening to it.  I hope you can pick all of these things I've written here when you hear it and even better, pick up things I didn't write.  :)  God bless you all and thanks for reading!  

I wrote "Lost and Found"(from "Daylight Comes") the night before I drove to southern California to live there.  I had never lived down there before and there was just so much that was unknown.  I had no crutches to lean on even if I wanted to besides my trust in God.  I was nervous, scared, and excited all at the same time.    

When I got to southern California, I only lasted about a month.  I soon eagerly and desperately drove back to Redding(northern California).  I lost all my money and barely had anything left to drive back with.  The radiator in my car also blew out on the way back.  I also injured my neck and my back somehow on the same drive and my shoulder and neck continued to stay in pain off and on for about 5 years afterwards.  

I did this all because I felt like God had told me to move there.  Looking back, I still don't know what the purpose was but I do know that it was totally worth it.  Money can't buy the worth of knowing that I put all my chips in and obeyed what I felt was God.  Moreover that I chose this rather than being skeptical, doubtful, and never trying.  I didn't see any good come out of it material-wise or earthly-wise but I do know that something good happened inside of me and also probably in places that I couldn't see at the time.  

This song is about all of this.  It's about what Jesus said when He told us to trust Him with our lives.  Jesus said that those who tried to save their lives would lose them and those who lost their lives for Him would find them.  It's the opposite of what our natural minds and instincts would say to us yet it's the challenge and invitation that Jesus gives to us to enter into His rest by having a loving and trust-filled relationship with Him again just like God intended to have with us from the beginning.  

There is no greater adventure nor any greater reward than to follow God and to trust Him with our whole heart.  I call God "Darling" in the song because He is the darling and the desire of our souls.  We don't just follow God because He is God but because He is good and because He loves us perfectly and fulfills us like no one or nothing else can. Those words might just seem cute but much like anything else in the Bible, when you put God's words to the test so to speak, they come alive.  

Thanks for reading!  

"Awaken the Dawn" from the album, "Son", started off as an arpeggio or in other words, a melodic series of notes that I started playing on the guitar.  The song and it's lyrics got written around this.  

I wanted this song to be about taking ownership of the atmosphere and changing it rather than coming under it and complaining about it. Also, I wanted for people to get out of the gloom and to step into the happiness and the brightness of God.  God is the light but we are to approach it in other words.  He has already comes to us.  I think you get what I'm saying.  :)  

People used to call this the "honey song" because of how I call God, "honey", in some of the verses.  For instance: "Still I wait for You, honey.  Still I wait for You. Still I wait for You, honey, more than watchmen wait for the morning."  God and I are just tight like that so we felt comfortable with these lyrics.  :)  I was inspired by Song of Songs and the Psalms and how affectionately the writers called out to God in their writings.  

Living in Seattle this is a fun song to play but I actually wrote it in California.  The lyrics talk about the sun not coming out of the clouds and darkness covering the earth but I wrote it in the most sunniest and brightest of places.  So funny.  Anyhow, I hope you guys enjoy this one even more and thanks for checking out these SongBlog entries. I hope you are enjoying them.  

We had some guests at Mountain Chapel in Weaverville, CA, who were leading us in a time of worship and prayer.  They were from Lou Engle's Justice House of Prayer.  As they were praying, I just kept hearing a spontaneous chorus being played in my heart and my head.  The chorus was "Glo glo glor ria, I sing Your praises..."  I scribbled it down and re-visited it later and this song idea became the final chorus to the song "Gloria" from the album "Son".

This song actually took the most re-takes than any other song we did when we recorded "Son".  We recorded "Son" all-at-once meaning if anyone messed up we'd have hit to stop and do it all over again. Sometimes we'd just stop it if we weren't "feeling it" even if all the right notes were played.  This was mostly the case with this song.  We just weren't "feeling it".  Trying to record this particular song almost became "the straw that broke the camel's back."  Our drummer was about to call it quits until we sat down together, prayed, and figured out a plan for this one.  It actually was our drummer (Stewart) who came up with the idea for the song's dynamics.  His idea ended up saving the song, maybe even the album, and helping this song be better than it could have been without him.  I was so thankful and we all realized how each of us contributed something significant and special to this project.

It's been great to hear this song re-mixed and re-envisioned recently by Brock Human from United Pursuit.  He really made the song more whimsical and fun.  You can hear this on the new United Pursuit and Iris Ministries album, "Let Hope Rise".   

This is the story of how I wrote the song "Love" from the album "Son".  

I was at Bethel Church one night when Danny Silk (http://www.lovingonpurpose.com/) was speaking.  Danny said something that grabbed my attention.  He said something like, "The more we taste of God, the more we need to taste."  He was talking about how God satisfies us like no other and like nothing else but that when we experience and realize this we just can't get enough of Him- we always want more.  It's a beautiful paradox.

I started scribbling down the words "the more we taste of God, we more we need to taste" onto a piece of paper. The rest of the song was written around these words and out came this upbeat, happy, and joyful song about needing and valuing God's love and His Presence.

I wanted this song to capture the desperation, the joy, and the hunger of finding God, cherishing Him, and wanting more of Him. Even right now as you're reading this I hope you are stirred just as I am to go and spend some time with Him.  :) 

I wrote "This Day" while we were living in San Antonio, TX.  Life was slow, our apartment was comfy, and we were so tempted and motivated to do absolutely nothing every single day.  It was so easy to hit snooze.  I wrote this song which ended up being recorded on "Daylight Comes" as a way to motivate ourselves out of procrastination.  It's themed around the latin phrase "carpe diem" or in other words "seize the day!"  This appears in the bridge at the end of the song before the whistling and cymbal-crashes come in.  :) 

I think it's important to realize and cherish the gift of life each and every day.  This is what the song is about- thanking God and remembering that each moment we have is sacred.  I ended up making a video of me washing some late night dishes as a backdrop to this song for fun.  If you want to some great dish washing, click here: http://youtu.be/dlfukqfEZmo.  :)

I told my wife and fiance at the time, Christina, that I was not going to be playing a song for her at our wedding.  I just thought that was what everyone else does and I didn't want to do just because everyone else does it.  So that was our plan and she didn't mind.  

The night before our wedding, I couldn't sleep.  I picked up my guitar and just started playing and yep, this song got written in like 5 minutes.  I decided to play it for her at our wedding not because it's what everyone else does but because I had a song and the right song for the right one.  Isn't that just ooey gooey gushy mushy?  

So there's a lot of play on words in this song.  One of them being that Christina and I have called each other pennies since we met and how "together we make sense."  You can hear this song on the album "Daylight Comes."

Hope you enjoy.  Thanks for reading! 

I first heard of the term "open heaven" from an evangelist named Reinhard Bonnke when I was at one of his meetings in Washington state.  I didn't really know what it meant at the time and still am learning.  What happened to me though was that I began to think differently about Heaven and about the Kingdom of God.  Rather than thinking that Heaven was a destination awaiting all believers of Jesus Christ at the end of their lives, I began to think of Heaven more as another world invading our world in our present day and age.  I began to think more about the prayer Jesus taught us pray, "Your Kingdom come, Your will be done, on earth as it is in Heaven..."

The way that I got saved was through a supernatural encounter I had with Jesus Christ.  You can read more about this in my first SongBlog entry from a while ago:

http://www.joechoimusic.com/songblog/song_blog_intro__mystery

Outside of this experience, I hadn't experienced many events of the supernatural as frequently as I did during the time that I lived in Redding, CA.  I used to hear people say that there was an "open heaven" over Redding.  I can testify now that after living there that I agree.  

There are, of course, with every supernatural experience, Scriptural references for these terms that can become familiar phrases like "open heaven".  In Genesis 28:10-18, Jacob had a supernatural experience where he had a prophetic vision of Heaven being opened in the place where he was as he saw angels ascending and descending.  Jacob was so moved and convinced by this that he named the place "Bethel" and he said in verse 17(NIV): “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house of God; this is the gate of heaven.”  He actually changed the name of the city to remember what he had seen and also to declare the supernatural identity of that place.  I think that is amazing.  

So with all that said, this week's SongBlog entry is for the song I wrote and recorded on "Daylight Comes" called "We Sing With an Open Heaven."  This is exactly what this song is about.  It's about the worship of Earth joining with the worship of Heaven.  It's about the idea that we can worship God with a mindset that Heaven is closer than we can imagine and that our worship is joining together with the worship happening in Heaven.  That angels are descending and ascending and in other words interacting with our worship to God.  We are worshiping God with a mindset that is bigger than the room we're in, the music that we're playing, the songs that we are singing, and the event that we are at.  It's all about the Kingdom of God and not about any of our own kingdoms that we can sometimes esteem in higher ways than we should.  Yet God's heart is not to condescendingly speak that we are small and that He is big.  It's just that when our eyes are open to the Kingdom of God and we have a revelation of who God is, we cannot help but feel small and know that He is God.  Just like in Genesis 28 where it says that Jacob was afraid after what he had seen and in that moment of fear he began to praise and worship God.  

All of these thoughts and other ideas went into writing this song and I believe they also go into every moment I pick up a guitar or an instrument to play, sing, and to worship.  I hope to challenge myself along with you to always worship bigger than the room, bigger than your circumstances, and bigger than anything else that might be holding your attention or affection more firmly than the LORD.  

"Taste and see that the LORD is good.  Blessed is the man who takes refuge in Him."  Psalm 34:8

Thanks for reading!

I used to help out a friend, Eric Johnson, with something called the 48 HOP.  It was a house of prayer that was set up for 48 hours in any given place and at any given time for 48 consecutive hours.  It was an eye and mind-opener for myself and anyone else who were involved because it revolutionized the definition of prayer.  Musicians would take shifts throughout the 48 hours and there were art stations set up all around where people could pray through journaling, poetry, painting, sitting, dancing, etc.  I miss being a part of those.  It was a great time and Eric's a great person to hang out with.  He is now the Senior Pastor at Bethel Church in Redding, CA.  

Well, it was during one of these 48 HOP when I was leading a music set when this song, "Precious", just kind of sneaked up on me.  It started out as a bass progression and then the lyrics followed.  Stewart and Leo who played on the recording (on the album "Son") really helped take the song to a place I never even knew it could go.  They really helped put dynamics into it.  

The second part of the song sneaked up on me too b/c it happened spontaneously during a time of worship while I was leading at Mountain Chapel in Weaverville, CA.  It was also a time that a speaker named Dick Joyce was there as a guest speaker.  I began singing this spontaneous song and Dick Joyce took notice and called me out on it later in a good kind of way.  This ended up pairing with "Precious" and just like that I had a finished song I was happy with.  

This song is all about the gospel- the good news that Jesus Christ's body was broken for us so that our bodies wouldn't have to be broken and that His blood was poured out for us becoming the sacrifice that we or anyone or anything couldn't be for the atonement for all our sin.  Like the song says, "By Your suffering we are saved, we are healed..." "I will dance about in freedom for You have broken my chains. The curse and the law of sin and death has been broken, forever broken..."  We have been forgiven, set free, reconciled, and made alive in God's son, Jesus Christ.  We got a lot to sing and dance about!  :)

I used to be and I guess still am a huge fan of the Doves.  I love their music.  I would still say that I think I'm still maybe stuck in the 00s with post-rock, alternative, and old-emo (sunny day real estate, old jimmy eat world) floating around in my songwriting. 

I love all the new stuff too but like I once heard from someone I really respect, it's so important to stay "true to your heart" no matter what's fashionable at the present moment.  With that said, I really like Caveman and all the other new music that sounds like old music (Fleet Foxes, etc.).  :)

I remember hearing the theremin in the song "The Man Who Told Everything" from the Doves' earlier album "Lost Souls".  I didn't realize how much I was influenced by these guys and this song in particular until I heard the song again after writing the song "Son".  It pretty much followed the same chord progression and I humbly realized even more how un-original I was.  Ha ha.  It's good to never take ourselves seriously.  

This song was a song that I got to lead a lot in worship settings in Churches.  It seemed to connect really well with people and moreover between people and God in their time of reflecting and expressing their hearts to Him.  

I really like what this song is about and most of it comes from chapter 8 in the book of Romans (from the Bible).  Paul, the apostle, writes about how God has given those who are in His Son a spirit of adoption and that they are no longer orphans anymore.  In case you're not familiar with the term "in His Son", it means those who believe that Jesus Christ came to the earth, died for our sins, and rose again from the dead and through this satisfied the judgement and justice of God for our sins, broke the curse of the law of sin and death, and gave us eternal life through the power of His resurrection.  Those who confess, believe, and receive that Jesus Christ is their Savior and their LORD are those who are "in Him".  I hope that makes sense.  :)  You can read more about this in Romans, Ephesians, and throughout the Bible.

So to paraphrase, in Romans 8, it says that we all who were far away have been brought near to God and have been brought into God's family as His sons and daughters.  God is our Father and not just as a Name but as the real Person and reality of an ever-present and ever-loving Dad.   It says that out of our spirits we now cry out "Abba, Daddy, Father!"  Later on in Romans 8 it also talks about how "creation waits in eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed."  The last part of this song reflects on this and is a moment of intercession between the earth and God, praying for the sons and daughters of God to be revealed.  It's a prayer for the whole earth to realize that God is their Maker, their Father, and that they are all His beloved sons and daughters.  I guess to put it into an even smaller nutshell, it's a prayer for all (everyone, all the earth) to be saved and reconciled to God.  

This song became the album title primarily because of what it's all about.  It's pretty much what everything I do is all about.  I wanted the whole album to capture the "spirit" or attitude of this song and what is was about.  I wanted people to pick this album up and to get free from their insecurities, fears, and strife to impress.  I purposely left in mistakes, kept off-tempo/time moments, saved crazy moments (crazy emu), did one-take vocals, recorded everyone all-at-once and all-in, and did whatever else I could to get these songs across but get them across real, raw, and true.  I wanted the album to be free of polished studio pretentiousness, cool trendy images, and whatever else that can get in the way of our connection with God as listeners and as artists in music/worship settings.  The truth is that we are all insecure and scrambling to cover our nakedness with leaves that just won't ever cut it.  When we realize this, we can be free because we can realize that we all find our everything in God and in nothing else.  No one is exempt or is an exception to this no matter how cool you or they think they are.  :)  

So if you're still hanging on and reading this, God has the most amazing plan, gift, and promise for you and it's not about what you do but about what or Who you do everything from.  You'll be the most fulfilled when you find your life in Him.  When we lose our lives, we find them and vice versa.  I hope that God can somehow use this song, this album, and whatever other fridge art that I come out with to encourage others to go after our identity and son-ship in God.  :)

I had a dream where I was sitting in a college classroom and the professor was talking about abortion and the value of life.  He was very persuasive with his words and he had the whole class in laughter over the issue and over the efforts of those who are "pro-life."  As I sat there, something stirred up inside my heart.  I stood up and walked to the front of the classroom where the professor was standing.  I began to pound his desk with my fist saying, "Life.  Life.  Life."  I saw sneers as well as shocked faces as I stood up for what I believed in.  I was counting myself as one of those "for life" and in doing so made myself to be a target for their jokes and cynicism.  I immediately woke up after this.

I grabbed a piece of paper and began to write this song.  It was one of those songs that felt like it was caught more than it was written.  I had written the whole song in maybe 5-10 minutes.  

Later on that day or the next day my friends asked me if I could play a set of music for an event called Relay for Life.  Relay for Life was an event to raise awareness and funds for the research and prevention of cancer.  I knew it was no coincidence that I had just written this song titled "Life".  I agreed to play and shared the song with them.  They told me enthusiastically, "You have to play this!"  And so we did.  "Life" was played for the first time that week on the stage for Relay for Life.  

This song is about prophesying life as the lyrics suggest.  It's about speaking life into places of darkness and even places of death.  It's a song about resurrection and the gospel.  I also reference Ezekiel 37 where it talks about the valley of dry bones and how Ezekiel prophesied life into the bones and they became an "exceedingly great army."  I believed that as we spoke life over the lives being fought for and lost due to sickness, death, abortion, and whatever else, we could see a great army being raised from the rubble and ashes.  I still believe it and enjoy playing this song live because I believe in it so much.  

"I prophesy 'life'.  I speak to the four winds of the earth.  You may see bones but I see an army..." 

I fell in love with Redding, CA at first sight.  When I was a kid I used to always draw the same picture whenever I doodled around.  It was always a picture of a landscape filled with green grassy hills and gray mountains behind them.  That was exactly the landscape in northern California where I ended up living for quite some time (after love's first sight).  

I used to hang out at the Alabaster House at Bethel Church in Redding like it was my second home.  The Alabaster House was a prayer chapel but I would love to hang outside of it.  It's there I strummed my heart away in a secret spot I found where I knew no one else besides God could hear me play.  It still makes me smile thinking about it. :)  

I remember looking out at the landscape and just starting to pray.  This song, "Son of Man", just came out naturally and it was my prayer for the land of northern California.  I just imagined all the blood that was shed from wars, injustice, and crime over time (Native American blood specifically) and it moved me to pray/write/sing this song.  

"Son of Man" appears on the album, "Son", and was recorded live right when the Bethel Church elementary school had just gone on recess/break.  If you listen closely you can hear the sound of children laughing and playing.  The engineer at first was frustrated about this but we realized later on that we had a special moment here.  

Thanks for reading!

This song was written way back when and then was scrapped away as an unfinished song and was one of those songs in the back of my mind never to be remembered again.

Years later, my family and I went over to our friend Jeff Duncan's house to pray for him and his family.  Jeff had been diagnosed with a terminal illness and was told he only had a few weeks to live.  Jeff had been my friend and it was unreal to see him like this.  I didn't know what to say, pray, or to do really.  I pulled out my guitar and I know it was probably only maybe a minute but it felt like hours that I waited before I had decided what song I would play.  The Holy Spirit just brought this song that I had forgotten about into my heart and I began to play it.  We felt God in that room.  The song is pretty straightforward.  It's kind of like "even if you only have a little amount of time to spend or share together with God, in that moment, it can change your life, your soul."  

I recorded this song later on and again, I just felt God all over it.  Most of the end were just spontaneous parts all scrapped together somehow.  This song expressively became about holding onto hope and holding onto having an encounter with God even until the grave.  One part of the lyrics goes, "And my hope will not become like the dust.  Thought nothing else lives, I know that will."  

It hurts me to think about Jeff even to this day.  I don't know why even though I know he's in Heaven.  I guess I still miss him.  Please remember the Duncan family in your prayers.  

Thanks for reading! 

This song came from an idea I had about joy being a choice rather than just a feeling.  

This might have been obvious to everyone else but to me, it was an epiphany.  

This song took a while because I always tried to write it when I was upset and frustrated and in those agonizing moments of emo-ness.  I figured if it didn't work for me than I wasn't going to finish writing it.

Finally one day after countless re-writes, I finally wrote some verses that grabbed my heart despite how much I fought them.  It was then that I knew that those verses would be the "keepers".    

Since recording it and playing it in places, it has been a song that has really connected with a lot of people and have helped them to get over it and move on.  that has been amazing to hear and experience.  

Thanks for reading!!

I used to play a lot of electric guitar at Bethel Church in Redding, CA for a season in my life.  During one of the services we were playing a song that we always play but for some reason, a certain chord progression stood out to me.  I archived it into the back of my mind to revisit it later.

The next day while waiting for the Comcast cable guy to show up, I pulled this chord progression out of the archives and in that time of waiting for our cable to get set up, I wrote this song.  It used to be called "The Comcast Cable Song" for a little bit b/c of its story.  I changed it later b/c that title made no sense with the lyrics of the song.  Ha ha.

The song is about awakening to our identity in God and how it comes through realizing His love and heart-affections for us.

The last part of the song goes, "I lift my eyes and find my soul."  That's pretty much the whole song in a nutshell.

Thanks for reading and hope you enjoy this one even more now especially when you're waiting for your cable guy, fridge repairman, and whoever else too.  Ha ha.

I wrote the song Daylight during maybe one of the hardest times of my life.  This is from the album "Daylight Comes".

We had lost our son, Jeremiah, as a premature birth.  I was still unemployed and I was very sick.  I think I had walking pneumonia.  It lasted for maybe 2 months and I had to sleep with a cough drop in my month just to be able to fall asleep through the coughing (it was in my lungs). 

It was hard to have hope during this time.  We couldn't see a brighter future.  We felt so disillusioned with life, God, and what we were supposed to be doing - "why were we here?".  

As I laid in bed, I began to imagine what hope would look like if it were present.  I began to call it in through my imagination hoping that by doing so, it'd actually come.  It did.  

This song is about hope and about holding on to God.  Without faith, we can't live.  If we live by faith, we truly live.  It shouldn't take horrible circumstances to face this reality but in our experience we really were at a crossroads to either choose to doubt, get bitter, and just be "blah" about life or to believe, trust, and move on in faith knowing that God is good and so are His plans for our lives.  

This song has really made a mark with critics and the press more than other ones that I have written.  It's been amazing to see how a pearl of a song has come out of life's frictions.  Had I have chosen not to hope anymore, this song wouldn't have been written. 

The song "Saved" from the album "Son" was a song I wrote after I had almost gotten into a car accident.  I literally was inches away from seeing my life pass before my eyes.  I ended up not having a scratch on me or on my car but I was definitely shaken up.

As I rode the rest of the way back home (about 30 minutes), I began to write a song about what had just happened so that I'd never forget.  as I wrote it, I began to realize the parallel meaning that this song had with our souls.  That we all need a Savior, Jesus Christ, to save us.  

The opening lyrics are "I was going too fast and I deserved to crash but You saved me..."  

I was broke, single, and living in a cramped apartment with two roommates.  I woke up one morning and couldn't sing a note.  i thought this was the end of my singing career/life/hobby/whatever you'd call it.  :)

I decided to write a thank-you note to God in the form of a song and it went something like this: 

"Thanks God for all the fun we've had singing together.  I guess it's over now but  I had so much fun and I'm so glad that I still and always have You.  Without that (Your Presence), I don't know what I'd do."

I ended up being able to sing again but liked this song so much that it ended up being recorded on "Daylight Comes".  

It's also a great reminder for me to remember the most important things in life.

Thanks for reading.

Thank you so much for visiting and for reading this.  It feels like it's been a long journey but it's really only been maybe 12 years since I started writing, recording, and playing music.

Thanks for helping me to keep this going by all your support.  

I thought it'd be great to share some insight on my songs- how they were written, what they are about, the stories behind them.

Here goes the first:

"MYSTERY"

First of all, the music and chord progressions I think were inspired by Corrine Bailey Rae's "Like a Star"(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gvH9Ccqk5qc&ob=av2e) and Radiohead's "Optimistic"(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=COUaNmm53VA).

Corrine Bailey's song struck a chord with me b/c of how personal it was.  I believe it was a song about her mother. Radiohead's song somehow invaded the bridge section as I began to write it as well.

"Mystery" to me became maybe the most personal song I've ever written.  

"Mystery" is about how I met God in the real, the raw, and for the first time.  

I was an angry and skeptical kid that scoffed at the idea of God.  I was afraid of the dark, of monsters, and the night.   My parents thought I was just dealing with childhood bedtime fears but I knew there was something real about darkness and about evil.  

The day I met God was in the night and in a dream.  I saw Jesus and I just knew it was Him even though I never saw Him before.  I didn't know how to act around Him but just felt myself running toward Him naturally as He embraced me.  I began to weep uncontrollably.  It was the first time I ever felt so safe.  There was more that happened after this but to keep this brief, after this experience I never doubted God's existence again.  Also, the night terrors stopped and never returned.

If you listen to the lyrics of "Mystery", it's about how I felt when I first laid eyes on the eyes of Jesus.  That I felt like His eyes pierced through me and knew me more than I could understand.  I felt loved, safe, and greatly terrified all at the same time.  It wasn't the same kind of terror that I had of monsters and of evil.  It was a deeper terror that came from feeling like I was in the presence of something or Someone greater than i could fathom or contain.  

Thanks for reading.