2020 was a very difficult year.
I know I don’t need to tell you that because you also lived through it.
Lockdowns, uncertainty, financial stresses, a virus we knew little about… we all carried a load that year that we had never carried before. For me, it was a year at home with a precious new baby. A new baby that had reflux and colic and who seemed to be allergic to sleep. Like really… allergic! We even had a sleep school stay at a Sydney hospital to try and encourage him to sleep… even just a bit! I had two little girls I was suddenly meant to homeschool (I decided children ‘learn best through play’…and pretty much left them to it).
And then, right in the midst of all the hard, a good friend of mine decided the fight was no longer worth it, and just gave up fighting.
There is no grief quite like the valley you walk through when you lose someone in your life in that way. And for me, the grief and anxiousness I felt were immense. I cried out to God to help me feel better. I cried out to God all the- whys? I demanded to know what He was doing, and why He allows the awful things He allows.
I began listening to sermons by Timothy Keller. I listened right through a series on Suffering. And one afternoon, folding mountains of laundry in my very tiny living room, Tim’s words smacked me right in the face. ‘Suffering reveals to us what we truly think and feel about God. Do we want God purely for the good things He gives us, all His benefits? Or do we want God simply for who He is.’ (Paraphrased)
I was so struck by it I paused, tiny socks in hand and in tears. I had known the goodness of God in so many tangible ways over the years. Moments of deep comfort, moments of being held through huge trials.
But did I want God for God? Was I prepared to place my hand in His and say ‘even though I don’t know why you are allowing this grief and this anxiety, I trust you.’
Tim went on to talk about the kindness of Jesus in the cross and of how God never allows our suffering to be beyond what is absolutely necessary to conform us to the likeness of Christ. And how if we would but cling to Him through the fire of our trials, we would emerge refined and even MORE beautiful because of the flame.
On my knees and in tears I wrote the song ‘Servant’. And I sang it over and over and over again until I could mean it as I sang.
Fast forward to October 2022. I’m sitting in Gnome studios in Nashville about to record my first EP- North and South – the radio edit. Erich (my producer) shows me the track ‘Servant’ from the acoustic EP which I had planned to do later on. I hadn’t heard what he had done with it yet, the beauty of the arrangement, the acoustic guitar and the swell of the cello… well… I burst into tears (poor Erich, we’d only met face-to-face the day before!). I knew in that moment that the EP ‘Yours’ was more important. It became the project we decided to finish and release first.
I can say that I have found God to be good in the middle of my grief. I am still learning to cling to Him through the fires of life and I still don’t know why God allows the things He allows… but the sweetness when I sit with Him and share my pain with Him and talk and just soak in the fact that He is WITH me in the midst of it all. Oh, that sweetness is what I’m praying for, for you.
That whatever you walk through you will know Him in the middle of it. He loves you. He knows you. He knows your fire. He is right there in it with you! Let’s cling to the promise that He uses ALL things for His glory and for our good. And may we all come out the other side of the fire… a little more like Him.
Hebrews 12: 3-11
Servant Lyrics
Whom have I in heaven but you?
To whom do I belong?
When your fire came for me, it found my heart was wrong.
And you let me feel the heat, to prevent a greater flame.
All the things that I had trusted in, could not help me that day…
Whom have I in heaven but you,
On what else can I stand?
When your fire came for me, I found I was on sand.
And you let me feel the hurt, to prevent me greater pain,
Not a tear shall fall that you will waste…
Cos I am a servant, I belong to you,
I give you nothing, but you give me you.
Whom have I in heaven but you,
To what else shall I cling?
When your fire came for me,
I was clothed in earthly things
And the fire raged right through
And it left me standing bare
But you picked me up and you made me new
Clothed me in a righteousness from you.
Cos I am a servant, oh I belong to you,
Oh I give you nothing, but you give me you…
Yes I am a servant, oh I belong to you,
Oh I give you nothing…
But you give me…
Wonderful counselor,
You give me,
Awesome and mighty,
You give me
Loving and tender, You.