Musical Musing: Blue Tree “God Of This City”

Photo uploaded by BingBing to flickr June 16th 2006

There’s a song that I’ve been hearing in church recently, and every time I’ve heard it, I’ve cried. Every time. Without fail. It was written by an Irish band in a Thai bar while they prayed over the people coming and going from the bar; by its very nature, this song is a prayer… and I cannot sing it except as a prayer myself. And while they sing over the city, I confess I sing over families, starting with mine and moving outwards… because that’s the way I’ve seen God impact lives.

This song talks about the sovereignty of God, but also about His faithfulness in our faithlessness. It speaks about His unique nature, and about the plans He has for us… and without saying it outright, it tells us how much we can rest in the goodness in His plans for us. It resonates in me because I see in the lyrics all that He’s done in my life, and all that He still wants to do… not just in my life, but through my life. If only I will allow myself to be used, to be available to Him, then I will witness to amazing works of God in the lives of ordinary men and women, lives redeemed and changed forever.

You see, before He can be the God of any city, before He can be the King of any people, the Lord of any Nations, He must first be the God of one heart. God is a relational God, and while He has worked through massive miracles, and still can, God is, at His heart, all about building relationships with us one on one. He’s about changing one heart at a time, breaking it and reshaping it, molding it and reshaping it until it’s perfect, carefully smoothing out all the imperfections and rough edges that life in an imperfect world leave on every heart.

Once upon a time, I felt my heart was like a favored mug. Over the years, it had been broken and mended and broken and mended so many times that it was easy to wonder if there was any mug left, or if it was all superglue anymore. And I found one last bit of ceramic left, and I looked at it, and trembled; if this broke, if I lost this last piece, could it be repaired again? Would there be anything left of my heart to be recognised as my heart, like a mug so broken that you couldn’t see what it had been before, when all it was now was lines of superglue holding the bits together? Could I trust this precious, fragile bit of pottery to anyone?

But what good had it done me to cling so tightly to the shards myself? For all my efforts, all I had were superglued bits of unrecognizable mess. I had this one last piece, and how could I trust that I could keep it whole, intact, when I’d failed all the other bits. I gave it over, grudgingly, fearfully, tearfully, hoping that the God I’d been raised with would be worthy of the faith I was placing in Him now, however tentatively.

In the years that have passed, God has not just kept my bit of pottery safe, He’s come in and healed the broken bits I’d tried to repair. Where I had left a superglued mess, God has broken it all apart and begun to remake me. In place of a shattered mess, hemorrhaging hopelessly, hardened by hurts and worthless for any purpose, God is shaping me a new, tender, loving heart. Behold, Beloved… old things are passing away, and all things are being made new. That little bit of potsherd I feared hand over once is now clay in the hands of the Master Potter, forming a new, beating, vital heart, feeding a new, useful life.

My God has made a relationship with me, working patiently with me, walking patiently with me. There are times I stumble, times I need Him to carry me, times He has to woo me out, encourage me to crawl, and then, like a patient parent, cheer me to take first steps in burgeoning faith again. But, oh, Beloved… He has never proven unfaithful. He has never left me alone. When I struggle, He is there. When I am broken, He is there. When I feel alone, He is there.

So it is in victory, looking over my life that I sing this song. God is the God of my heart. He is the King of this person. He is the Lord of this one singular person… and in that, my God has done great and mighty things. I look over my life. There is no one like my God. And there are greater things yet to come from God. Greater things yet to be done by my God. As long as I draw breath, my God will continue to work in me and through me.

And in each one of you, God longs for a relationship. Because as He builds a relationship in each of us, then we see Him become the God of a city. We see Him become the King of a people.

Oh, Beloved, when you let Him into your life, you will see the greater things that are still to come. There is no ONE like my God. There is no one like my God.