All My Hope- Worship Song Story

To be honest, I don’t write that many worship songs.  I love writing songs, but for some reason, only about 5% of the songs I write are worship songs.  It used to bother me, but now I just write what I write and I’m OK with that. Still, there is something special when there is a full worship song stirring in my heart.

I was watching an interview with some worship songwriters and there was a line that stuck out to me.  “A song birthed in worship will work in worship.”   That really resonated with me because there are always song ideas that go through my head while leading worship.

Windows:  Whenever possible I like to leave “windows” in a worship set.  These are times where we play a chord progression or a musical vamp and improvise lyrics and melodies.  Some call this “Spirit led” worship (I think it’s all Spirit led if Christ is central). I love this time because it provides space to listen to the whispers of God and sing them out.  Often those times are the sweetest time in a worship set because it fits the moment so well.  Usually when I do this I want to do something that is simple enough that everyone can sing along after hearing it the first time.  That was how another song I wrote called “Act of Worship” came into being.

The chorus of “All My Hope” came out of that experience.  One night during Encounter (worship and prayer night at Vineyard Cincinnati), we went into one of these “windows” and I just started singing “All my hope is in you Jesus.”  I sang it over and over and the band started playing with the idea and making it really fun.   I had been thinking about this idea a lot over the last year after reading “Surprised by Hope” by N.T. Wright.  What does it mean that my hope is in Jesus and why do I trust that?

The next week I sat down with the idea and decided to work on writing it.   I wrote for several hours and played with ideas to flush it out into a song.   I thought I had finished it and recorded a demo of it.   After listening back I thought it sounded so flat and weak and had none of the energy or feel that it had when singing it at Encounter. I depressingly threw it on the pile of failed worship song attempts.

A couple months later, the chorus started going through my head again and I felt compelled to sit down and take another crack at writing it.   So I did and thought it was a little better.  I had taken the song from being a 4 out of 10 to a 6.5 out of 10.   I sat down to record it again and Charlie Hines walked in.   He asked to hear it and so I played it for him.  He got excited about the song but had a couple parts that he thought could be improved.

The next morning I got a text at 9am from Charlie because he was at the church with his guitar and wanted to work on the song.  When someone as good as Charlie is excited about a song it really makes you want to work on it more.   We sat down and hammered out details on that song for a few hours and really made it better.  Charlie added a pre-chorus that expanded the idea and better led into the chorus.

After we thought we had something, I invited Brad Wise (creative director) down and we played it for him.   He said there was a couple places where he wanted us to pull him in further.  “Give me one more thing to grab on to,” he said.   An hour later Charlie texted me the line that brought the whole chorus together.

That was the point it felt like a song I really wanted to sing, a song I wanted our congregation to sing.   I don’t know how long it will last or if anyone outside our church will use it, but I don’t really care about that.  I used too, but now I feel like the best thing is if the song serves our congregation well.   Someone said people get more of their theology from the songs they sing than the sermons they hear… the best theology I have is that my hope is in Jesus.  The song was birthed in worship, and I am honored to be in a church where the song has life outside of my personal worship.  This song is now ours.

Advertisement