Peace-Young & Free

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZNDD2qxJYo]

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLSWtamikJk]

You will stay true
Even when the lies come
Your word remains truth
Even when my thoughts don’t line up
I will stand tall
On each promise You made
Let the rest fade away
There’s a peace far beyond all understanding

May it ever set my heart at ease
Dare anxiety come, I’ll remember that peace is a promise You keep
Peace is a promise You keep
You will stay true
Even in the chaos
Your word remains truth
Even when my mind wreaks havoc
I will be still
For I’ve known all along

My Jehovah Shalom
There’s a peace far beyond all understanding
May it ever set my heart at ease
What anxiety fails to remember is peace is a promise You keep
Peace is a promise You keep

You are peace to a restless soul
Peace when my thoughts wage war
Peace to the anxious heart
That’s who You are, that’s who You are
You are peace when my fear takes hold
Peace when I feel enclosed
Peace when I loose control

That’s who You are, that’s who You are
I’ve found peace far beyond all understanding
Let it flow when my mind’s under siege
All anxiety bows in the presence of Jesus the Keeper of Peace
And peace is a promise He keeps

Songwriters: Benjamin Hastings / Melodie Wagner / Michael Fatkin
P E A C E lyrics © Capitol Christian Music Group

The Story Behind “How He Loves Us”

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5L4FbKbyIeA?rel=0]

“How He Loves” is a song by independent artist John Mark McMillan for his second studio album, The Song Inside the Sounds of Breaking Down.

McMillan wrote “How He Loves” following the death of his best friend, Stephen Coffey. Coffey was a youth minister for MorningStar Ministries.

On November 1, 2002, during a church prayer meeting, Coffey prayed out loud:

I’d give my life today if it would shake the youth of the nation.

That very night, he was in a multi-car accident and died of serious injuries.

Meanwhile, McMillan was recording in a studio in Jacksonville, Florida when he received a call that two of his friends had been critically injured in a car accident. Later that evening, he received another call from his father who informed McMillan that Coffey had died.

The next day, McMillan wrote “How He Loves” as a tribute to Coffey and out of a need “to have some sort of conversation with God” where he could speak to his frustrations and emotions over his best friend’s death.

According to McMillan, the love that he’s singing about in “How He Loves” is not a pretty, “Hollywood hot-pink” love. It is a kind of love that is willing to love even when things are difficult and messy.

He says,

This song isn’t a celebration of weakness and anger. It’s a celebration of a God who would want to hang with us through those things, who would want to be a part of our lives through those things, and, despite who we are, He would want to be a part of us, our community, and our family.

How He Loves Us

He is jealous for me
Loves like a hurricane, I am a tree
Bending beneath the weight of his wind and mercy

When all of a sudden
I am unaware of these afflications eclipsed by glory
And I realize just how beautiful you are
And how great your affections are for me

And oh, how he loves us so
Oh how he loves us
How he loves us so

He is jealous for me
Loves like a hurricane, I am a tree
Bending beneath the weight of his wind and mercy

When all of a sudden
I am unaware of these afflications eclipsed by glory
And I realize just how beautiful you are
And how great you affections are for me

And oh, how he loves us so
Oh how he loves us
How he loves us so

Yeah he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves
Yeah he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves

We are his portion
And he is our prize
Drawn to redemption by the grace in his eyes
If grace is an ocean we’re all sinkin’ (haha)
So heaven meets earth like a sloppy wet kiss
And my heart turns violently inside of my chest
I don’t have time to maintain these regrets when I think about the way

He loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves
Yeah he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves Yeah yeah!

Yeah yeah yeah
Yeah yeah yeah
Yeah yeah yeah

Yeah he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves Yeah yeah!
Yeah he loves us
He loves us
He loves us

Learning to Worship Through Pain

Chris Quilala is recording artist and worship leader with Jesus Culture. He has been involved with the music label and church since its founding. If you don’t know his name, you probably know his music.

Studio 5 caught up with Quilala during a stop on the Outcry tour in Raleigh, North Carolina to talk about his music journey.

Efrem: “You’ve recorded your first solo project, Split the Sky. What experiences birthed that out of you?”

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Chris: “For me, I mentioned this on my last album, my wife and I we lost our son Jethro. He was still born in Dec. 2014 and even in the hospital room we were praying that God would breathe life into him, and we didn’t see that. But we had to make a choice.

We were going to choose to believe that God is good. That God is a miracle working God. That God is a healer.

You may have been told otherwise from whatever perspective you’re looking at.”

“The truth is that God remains the same and my response needs to remain the same.So, for me, writing songs was my way for me to remind myself that God is.”

“I wrote a song called Miracles and it’s just about that miracle working power of God that god is faithful that he is with us, that he remains the same.”

“All that being said it was just a season of writing and a lot of songs came out of that season of writing and a lot of those songs came out of the place of encountering God in the midst of pain doing my best with the skills I have in front of me to remind myself that God is good that God is faithful.”

Efrem: “How do you worship through pain?”

Chris: “It definitely is a choice. For us, during the loss of our son – I remember my pastor telling us, which in the moment spoke volumes, ‘You can trust God with the mystery.’ In the middle of pain, whatever circumstance anyone is going through there is always questions and they may never get answered. And it does take a certain level of faith and trust on our part to say, “God I don’t understand but I trust you.”

Afterword:

I had the same experience 3 years ago, and when this happened to me, I thought I would handle it. But in all honesty, you don’t know how to respond when you lose a child except to surrender and worship Jesus Christ.