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June 2003 Table of Contents
Stories Behind the Songs
Saved At An Amway Meeting
By Lindsay Terry
Open the Eyes of My Heart
Ephesians 1:15-23 "The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints..."
"Hey, I'm gonna get rich!"
Those were the words of Paul Baloche, as he was sponsored into the Amway organization. Well, wealth did not come, but something much more wonderful and lasting. A little further in this story, Paul will give you the details of his unique experience. If you know someone in Amway you ought to share this book with them.
Paul grew up a Catholic in his hometown of Maple Shade, New Jersey, in the Philadelphia area. He was born there in 1962, and his parents, Roger and Angele Baloche, were proud of young Paul who was an altar boy and who often expressed his desire to become a priest. But, in his teen years his life began to turn in the wrong direction. He began to play in bands that performed in unsavory places-in the clubs of Philadelphia and Atlantic City. He became caught up in the whole rock music scene. What happened next is unusual.
Paul told me, "At eighteen years of age, I went to one of the week-end Amway conferences where they tell you how to grow your business. Sunday morning was an optional part of the weekend, so I decided to attend a nondenominational service, expecting to pick up some pointers on how to become successful in this business. The same guys were up giving testimonies who had been speaking in the meeting the day before. They told us, 'It's not about money, it's about Jesus.' They told about how their lives had been changed. I was like-WOW! I was really affected by it all. They even had a worship band that I really liked.
When they gave an altar call for any who wanted to receive Christ, I went forward and asked the Lord to come into my life and He totally changed me. I started going to an Assembly of God church and became a part of the music ministry."
Later, Paul moved to California and began to play guitar for singers who were leaning toward the worship part of ministry. He usually attended First Evangelical Free Church, in Fullerton, California, where Chuck Swindoll pastored, or Church On the Way, in Van Nuys, pastored by Dr. Jack Hayford.
Paul was always a person who kept a journal, in which he put word ideas or prayers that were meaningful to him. He didn't consider himself a songwriter, but he began to put some of the prayers in his journal to music. That leads us to his very meaningful explanation of how he came to write his famous song.
"'Open the Eyes of My Heart' is a prayer that comes straight from Ephesians 1:18. The essence of the song is our petition, asking God to opens the eyes of our hearts. There were some contributing factors that had a bearing on my thinking. I have led a great number of worship schools with organizations such as Youth With a Mission, Integrity Music, and Maranatha Music. It hit me one day that the conferences are good and valuable, but I was not teaching in exactly the way I should have been.
I thought, 'It is all backwards to teach the externals, lifting of the hands, kneeling, and even singing-which are all good-but we should teach people that they should respond to the Heavenly Father without being taught what to do. Their response to the One who gives us life and breath should be natural.'
I began to realize it is not more teaching we need, but a revelation of God and a crying out to Him saying, 'God, open the eyes of my heart. Reveal to me how I might 'taste' and see who You really are, so that I might be changed from the inside out. May I respond sincerely, and not in a way that I have been taught. Help me to have a response of gratitude and admiration, and a sense of awe and worship toward Jesus.'
During a service when people were being prayed for in our church, I had already sung several songs we knew. Then I began to sing some of the prayers of my heart, such as 'Open the eyes of our hearts, Lord,' a prayer that I had taken from the Scripture. I sang it through a few times and suddenly thought, 'Hey, that almost feels like a song.'"
Paul added, "I recorded the song on a project, but did not feel any different about it than any of the other songs on the CD. I remember that I was surprised when I later heard that it was being used at great youth rallies."
In addition to his travel schedule and his recordings, he is the Worship Leader of the Community Christian Fellowship in Lindale, Texas, and has been there in that capacity for twelve years. He and his wife Rita, author of "I Will Celebrate," and other popular worship songs, have three children.
REFLECTION: May God grant you the ability to see clearly today-from the eyes of your heart-that our Heavenly Father invites us to worship and fellowship with Him, and along with His invitation comes an expectation, that we should be responsible children of God, and obey Him in all things.
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