If You Aren't, You Should Be

I have battled with myself tons of times before. Asking why I should write more songs. I have told myself that nobody likes my style, everyone only wants to hear the popular songs, etc. But it’s all stupid thinking.

After Elly and I released Art of Love I had a friend mention something to me, and it made me realize there are so many reasons why you should be writing songs. So here we go:

1.) It helps your community with a sense of identity.

There are things going on in our communities and congregations that can’t truly be summed up by the song on the radio that is going out to everybody in every generic situation. You have the ability to write songs specifically for your people in their circumstances.

2.) It helps you keep building your gifting.

Paul told Timothy to continually pour himself into his gifts in a manner that people could see so that they would know how he is growing. The same goes for us. When we write, or keep growing in our ability to play, or do sound, it puts pressure on us to keep growing in the place we are serving. It doesn’t allow us to box ourselves into a place where we just show up and pick out songs for Sunday.

3.) It helps you pick out your song list.

When you are writing songs, your heart comes out without you really thinking about it. This helps because when it comes to picking out your set for Sunday, you will feel much more drawn to the songs that you feel need to be done. The ones that you don’t feel for that time will seem more “blah” to you.

4.) It tracks the moves of God in your congregation.

Not only can you write songs asking God to do certain things in your city, but it tracks how He is moving in your congregation. When you can’t help but write songs on grace, others can tell that He has probably been doing a movements of grace awareness in your congregation. If you feel like singing about His Majesty and Glory, it probably means He has been doing a movement of awareness of that.

5.) Lastly, it is your testimony.

This is the one my friend gave me that really got to my heart. So many times, I realize that in a year I won’t like the song that I wrote today, or at least I won’t feel as amped about it. Why? Because I have grown. God is showing me new stuff. But this one helped me learn to find a lot of joy in every song I write. Because years down the road, I will have a collection of songs that shows my story. If people wonder how I got to where I am and the way I grew, they can look back and track my story through my songs.

I hope all of these encourage you to write more. We all should be. There aren’t enough songs written to sing to God. And it really should be easy because His praise should be an effortless flow from our hearts and out of our lips. I hope one day, someone who has read this hands me their songs and says, “This is my story with God.”

Be blessed and worship on.