Without Jesus

My sister and I have been on a songwriting frenzy lately! I love it! It's clear to me that  singing and songwriting  are the ways I express a lot of things to the Lord, but sometimes I feel like that's it. Whenever I start to do something a lot, it seems like that something is what my focus is on constantly! I mean I can just be talking with God and say something and immediately think  I COULD USE THAT IN A SONG! Not that that is bad but it doesn't make me feel connected to God like it used to.
  Last night I was praying and saying just that, how I feel like I've taken something that potentially is good (music), but have turned it into my focus, when my focus should always be on God , which makes me start to feel, well horrible. I hate it whenever I feel like He is not near, and it makes me begin to doubt, and that doubt makes me feel like He doesn't hear my prayers, when the evidence throughout my life shows that He does! I wanted this to change so badly! A picture came to my mind, if I'm depending on myself, then when I fall I would have to catch myself. I don't think that is even possible! You can stop a full face plant with your hands but you can't catch yourself, you can't carry your broken body to a place of peace and comfort. If I depend on other people it is possible that they could fall with me, but if I let God be my Savior, like he intended, I have nothing to fear! His arms will never tire, His love will never fail me.
Once again I had to say, Lord forgive me for taking my eyes off of you. Like Peter as soon as I take my eyes off of you I start to sink!  Although I don't like the pain that comes with it, I do love it when you realize that He is right there, that He has been there all along, you refocus and you can get back up! It shows just how real my God is! I long for a more intimate relationship with the Lord, that doesn't sway even for a second!
 Dani wrote a song yesterday and starting from the bridge it goes like this," when I forget how to believe, would you show me...You are there in the rain, you are there in the storm. When I feel so afraid you are there to keep me warm. You are my life, you are my love, you are my Lord. You are my life, you are my love, you are my hope." It is really beautiful!
I heard a new song from Shane & Shane, and I feel like it is a really good thing to remember. So as I continue to write songs, to speak boldly to people, or whatever I'm doing I need to remember...

Just three chords and a melody
Won't leave you a living legacy
Without Jesus
Just four songs and a parable
Might leave you something terrible
Just five bucks in an offering
Won't buy you some prosperity
Just a sixth sense of morality
Won't get you out of your depravity
Without Jesus, oh, without Jesus

You could memorize
Become a Mennonite
You could speak in tongues
And raise the dead to life
You could build a big church
Call it ministry
Teach 'em all they need to know to run a family
You could sell it all
Be burned at the stake
But what in the world have you to ever gain
Without Jesus, oh, without Jesus

If all I ever get out of laying my life down
Is thorns in the shape of a crown
On the brow of a man from Nazareth
And if all I get is what Jesus did,
And said, and put within my heart
Then I get it all
I have it all
Oh, I have it all
Everything is mine
Oh, I have it all
I have it all