THIS ONE’S FOR HABAKKUK. For the sake of a song inspired by the last-known words of a prophet most Christians never heard of, we’re putting Habakkuk on the map…with everyone else in the Bible. We’re giving away five subscriptions to over 900 pages of high resolution PDF Bible maps, one gigabyte in each subscription…with free updates. Two winners down, three to go. You’re on at least one list. There are four.
Habakkuk got me in this musical mess over my first-ever release, “I Will Thank God He’s My Savior.”
He inspired me to
- get up out of my office chair in the middle of my workday
- sing a new song
- write it down
- and send it to Hell’s Kitchen in New York City to have bagel-fed musicians make it as smooth as cream cheese.
They did. It’s a miracle. If you had heard me singing it, you would know it’s true.
God parted the water for Moses. He brought fire down on Mount Carmel for Elijah. And he cooked up a divine dish in Hell’s Kitchen for little ol’ me.
The song releases on Friday, February 9, I Will Thank God He’s My Savior. Until then, we’ve been promoting it by giving away free copies of the best Bible study product we have: a free subscription to our Bible Atlas, all the maps we’ve created for the Casual English Bible.® That’s one gigabyte of high resolution PDF Bible maps, many in 3D style. About 900 maps. We still have several Old Testament books left to paraphrase and map. All updates will be free.
Winners and how to become one
This week’s winner is Preston Eastwood, in Texas. Last Monday it was Chuck Alvare of Florida.
Three more randomly picked winners to come: January 28, February 5, and on release day February 9.
Here are three of the four ways to win. You’re already in the running if you’re on one of these subscription lists, and with better odds if on more than one:
- Subscriber to Steve’s YouTube channel
- Subscriber to Steve’s blog feature articles
- Subscriber to the Casual English Bible
This list helps the song most:
The number of names on this list helps Spotify decide if a first-time song release like this song of mine is worthy of inclusion into Spotify’s library. Folks, it’s a looong shot for a first-timer.
You don’t need a Spotify account to get on the Pre-save list (Pre-save means they’ll add the song to your playlist when it’s released). Just fill in your email address and you’ll be on our promo list for the maps and you’ll get a notice when the song releases.
The to-do list you can’t do
I apologize for the promo pitch, but I owe it to Habakkuk.
There’s a bunch of promo stuff you have to do if you want to try to get your music heard.
That’s fine with me. I do stuff all the time. I’d do this, too, if they’d let me.
Here’s the problem.
This is my first song released to the thundering crowd as they run away. The music distributor gave me pages of stuff to do: set up landing pages for Spotify, Amazon, and YouTube for Arteests. I need to pitch the song to Spotify, too. And set up some banner art in places.
But because I’m a first-timer, fresh meat, and a virgin musical arteest, they’ve locked me up and will keep me there until they release the song.
I can’t do any of that promotion until the song is released. And I can’t pitch it to Spotify because you have to pitch it BEFORE the song is released. To do that, you have to get a URI code. Which they won’t give you until…you guessed it.
None of this was clear until a few minutes ago. After days of plowing through a Groundhog’s Day Movie of never-ending roundabouts and Ignorant AI bots, I wrote a human. I had written to other humans. But I never got a clear answer. This human, however, said, “To clarify, you will not be able to pitch a song through your Spotify for Artists for your first release.”
To which I wrote, “Thank you. Finally, a clear answer. God bless your person.”
So, I have to wait for February 9 to do everything: Create landing pages and artist profiles for Spotify, Apple Music, iTunes, and YouTube. Update Social media info. Make the song live on all platforms, reach out to blogs, playlists, upload to Soundcloud.
All the while, I’ll be eager to get back to paraphrasing 2 Kings and mapping it with 3D-style maps.
Sometimes when you follow your gut, you get a pain in the neck.
My funeral video for a stranger
We all get caught up in a passionate plan from time to time, don’t we? We feel compelled, as though it’s one of the most important things we’ll do.
I created a memorial video for a stranger a couple weeks ago. He was a life-long friend of my son-in-law. And my son-in-law is the one who asked me to do the video. The young man who died of cancer wasn’t a person of faith, so as I started working with the photos his family and friends gave me, I felt out of my element.
Somewhere along the way I realized that I was wrong. This is my element. Or it should be. The people who would watch this were hurting. And I had a chance to open the door to their hearts and to give them permission to feel the love and the loss, right there in front of each other.
I worked with passion and tears over that video. And I gave it a week of my life because I felt the need to give them the best I had to give. I hope they felt it when they saw it. My son-in-law trusted me with this. And I didn’t want to disappoint him or do anything except help the family with what they were experiencing.
The passion behind the song
As I write this, I wonder if there’s a connection between the passion I felt over that video, the pain I felt for the people watching it, and the feelings I have about this song.
It’s just a simple song. Not many chords. But it’s the last known words of Habakkuk—a haunting prayer of a prophet who probably died in the disaster he predicted.
His words are above the words I would have chosen in similar circumstances, I suspect.
My prayer might have been as it is today, with the compiling disasters I have faced:
- A young brother dying of a heart attack
- Six months later, another young brother—my last brother—on a vent for a month before COVID took him.
- Today, a mother here and not here, blinded by strokes and increasingly stripped of memories.
- Almost a year ago, a dog’s brown eyes locked on mine as I told the vet, “Okay,” and to my horror watched the lights go out.
What I want my prayer to be
My prayer is, “God, you have a lot to answer for. And I’m coming for you.”
God can take that any way he wants because he knows me better than I know myself. So I’ve been told. And I remain convinced, though angry.
I think God sees me standing in the palm of his hand, shouting the “why” questions people have always asked of him, though he rarely answers.
Habbakuk’s prayer, as he trembled with fear, is what I want my prayer to be.
I hope it’s okay and not hypocritical to sing about where I want to be instead of about where I am.
“I will thank God that he is my Savior.
He gives me the strength to go on.
He gives me the sure-footed speed of a deer,
And to higher ground he leads on.”
I have tried to understand the passion that drives me to bring this song to life, against all odds at this late stage in my career. It’s only recently occurring to me that this isn’t just a song I wrote. These verses are the words I’m living. And this chorus is the song I need to sing until I get to where I want to go.
Maybe that’s what trembling Habakkuk had to do as well,
I Will Thank God He’s My Savior
When the fig tree fails to blossom,
the grape refuses to grow,
when the olive dies in the treetops,
the field is scorched here below,
when the sheep are taken from us,
the cattle are gone from the stalls,
what is left to the measure of life?
What should we do when we fall?
CHORUS
I will thank God, he’s my Savior.
He gives me the strength to go on.
He gives me the sure-footed speed of the deer,
To higher ground he leads on.
When the child in me is broken
And I fail at what I would do,
Angry, ashamed and uncertain,
Not a hint, not a hope, not a clue.
When I lose my sense of direction,
I can’t find my way back to you.
When questions don’t seem to matter to me,
What is there left here to do?
CHORUS x3
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