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September 2002 Table of Contents
Stories Behind the Songs
Writing Songs by Candlelight
Great Is the Lord
Scripture: I Chronicles 16:14-31
"Great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised..."
"Mom, I just saw the girl I'm going to marry!" was Michael W. Smith's announcement on the phone. "Really! Who is she?," Michael's mother asked. "I don't know. I'll have to call you back," was his quick response. Smitty, as his friends call him, had just seen Debbie Davis walk by as he read a Time magazine during a visit to a record company in Nashville, Tennessee. It was love at first sight. He quickly learned her name from others in the building and went looking for her. He spotted her coming out of the ladies room and readily introduced himself.
He was already into music in a big way, but little did he realize that he had just seen the young lady who would write songs with him, give birth to their five children and be a devoted companion and mother.
Little did she realize that she would soon be the wife of the man who would later become one of the most notable singers and songwriters in the world of praise and worship music, and that millions of people around the world would sing the songs they would write together.
Michael was born in a small West Virginia town -- Kenova -- near Charleston, in 1957. Deborah Davis was the first of the two to make it to "Music City"; she was born there a year later. Michael and Debbie both became Christians early in their lives, Michael at age 10, and Debbie at age 6. She declared, "I vividly remember walking down the aisle in Immanuel Baptist Church and giving my heart to Jesus." In her early years she enjoyed writing stories and poetry. She later would go on to Wheaton College where she earned a degree in biology. Michael, after a year at Marshall University, heard Nashville calling and made his way there at age 19, ready to continue his pursuit of a career in music.
Following the chance meeting at the record company, Michael and Debbie began to date a couple of days later. Michael remembers, "We were engaged three and one half weeks later, and were married four months afterward." During the engagement period they wrote their first song together, Debbie the lyric and Michael the musical setting.
For the past twenty years the Smiths have continued a music ministry that has extended throughout the United States and abroad -- Debbie writing lyrics and Michael composing music, recording, singing in concerts from coast-to-coast, and writing more songs, many of which become favorites soon after they are presented. The Smith family, all seven of them, are active in their church in Franklin, Tennessee.
Debbie related the following story to me concerning one of their early efforts in songwriting:
"I always enjoyed being around the keyboard with Michael. Sometimes at night we would light a candle. Michael seemed to do his best work at night. We would often open the Bible and God would inspire our hearts with a particular passage of Scripture.
We wrote many praise choruses and worship songs during these evening sessions. Although many of them were never used or heard by others, we greatly enjoyed writing them together. They were the expressions of our hearts, in response to the treasures we gleaned from God's Word.
During one of those late evening writing sessions, in 1982, God led us to a particular passage of Scripture that we both thought would be the base for a good song. I wrote a few lines of the lyric as Michael was working on the music. We worked very closely together and the words and the musical setting came together at the same time. We were delighted with the song God had given us and Michael thought it was something that he would like to share with others, especially the people of our church, Belmont Church in Nashville.
Michael often led worship at the church, so during one of the services he taught the song to the congregation. The congregation seemed greatly moved to a spirit of worship as they sang, "Great Is the Lord." Michael and Debbie were inspired to put several of the wonderful attributes of our Savior into their song -- "holy and just," "faithful and true," "His mercy," "worthy of glory," and "worthy of praise." They close this very popular song with an admonition to you and me to, "lift up your voice" because great is the Lord!
I remember I was so overwhelmed as I heard that great crowd lifting their voices in praise, as they sang our song. The massiveness of the people around me sounded like a large choir. I felt so blessed to be used in that way."
During those days Michael was working on his first album, The Michael W. Smith Project, and he decided to include Great is the Lord. Since the release of that album the song has gone on to circle the globe again and again. It continues, year after year, to be among the favorite songs used in churches across America.
Reflection: In this song we are reminded of several attributes of our Heavenly Father; He is just, and our justifier; He is love, and He loved us before the foundation of the world; He is faithful, and how greatly we are sustained by His faithfulness; He is holy, and we can only imagine, but never quite comprehend the extent of His holiness.
This story will appear in October 2002, in a book, "THE SACRIFICE OF PRAISE: Stories Behind the Greatest Praise and Worship Songs of All Time," by Lindsay Terry and published by Integrity Publishers, a division of Integrity, Inc.
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