How’s your Bible-reading plan going so far this year? Matthew West recently did a Bible study on the life of Daniel, and was so inspired that he wrote his song “Unashamed.” Scripture says that despite knowing he’d be thrown in the lion’s den, Daniel went to his upstairs room with the windows open toward Jerusalem. He got down on his knees and guess what he did. He prayed anyway. Matthew shares, “That is an unashamed faith, and that’s how I want to live my life. I wrote this song as a reminder that someday we’re going to stand before the Lord, and I know we want to hear Him say ‘well done.’ I want to be like Daniel. I want to stand up for Jesus in this life until He calls me home and I stand before Jesus in eternity. My prayer is that this song will be a rallying cry for the believers to live out these words that Paul wrote in Romans chapter 1: ‘I am not ashamed of the gospel.’”
What does it mean to completely and deeply surrender to the Lord? Benjamin William Hastings celebrates that in his song, “Abandoned.” He shares, “This is a surrender song… It’s coming from the perspective of everything God has done for us and the ways in which He surrendered and modeled that for us. How would we not do the same? At first listen, this song may come across like it’s about our abandon and sure, it is, but to me, it’s more about His. He who not only chose the cross but had ‘angels at His fingertips’ and chose to remain. Every second, deciding again not to give up but to persevere. To repeatedly pursue surrender, even at the hour of greatest agony. I can’t think of a more inspiring sentiment than this, and I guess that brings me back to why it may sound like a song about our abandon; Maybe that’s the only way to respond to His.”
Listen for “Unashamed” and “Abandoned” on uplifting LifeSongs!