2009-04-15T13:42:00.001-07:00

If you've found your way here, you may already know that my name is Bill and I enjoy writing songs about God. If you did not know that, well now you do. I hope to be faithful with the songs I write. I'm not sure I know how to do that, but I think this website is a start. It contains the lyrics, chord charts, mp3's, even the stories behind the songs. And it is all free to you. So look around. Enjoy. And thanks for stopping by.

2009-04-15T13:38:00.000-07:00

(back to album) / (back to music)

You Give and You Take Away

download chord chart // download mp3

(verse 1)
Lord, break the bone
And set it in its right place
For, to heal whole
Is worth the pain of the break

(chorus)
You give and You take away
In ways we cannot know
You give and You take away
But I trust You, I trust in You

(verse 2)
When I was in the mud
I prayed for You to save
You came and pulled me up
Just to wrestle me in the clay

(bridge)
Sure - ly I’ve spoken of things
I cannot understand
Sure - ly You’re holy
and I trust You, I trust in You

-------------------------------------------------------

I had a friend in Junior High named Matt Scott. Growing up, I spent many an afternoon playing football or basketball or video games with Matt and his brother Mike.

I remember the day that Matt broke his arm. We were playing football in his backyard with the neighborhood kids. He was tackled, fell wrong and 'snap'...his arm was broken. He rolled on the ground, writhing in pain while his brother ran inside to get their mom. The rest of us stood still, watching and offering the best empathy adolescent boys could offer. It was a pretty traumatic afternoon for all of us.

Matt, of course, was taken to the doctor and put in a cast. He wore it on his arm for the typical 6-8 weeks and couldn't wait to get it taken off. I remember the day he left school early and went back to the doctor to have it removed.

I also remember the next day, when he came back to school...still wearing his cast.

Matt's bone had healed incorrectly. The only option at that point was for the doctor to re-break Matt's arm, re-set it, and allow it to heal again...this time correctly. Matt did not understand. He was angry and in pain and frustrated to have to wait another 6-8 weeks to play with his friends.

The way he saw it, his crooked arm still worked...kind of. It might not have been easy, but he could have learned to throw a football or shoot a basketball again, albeit awkwardly. Why couldn't the doctor just leave him alone? It was his arm, after all.

Thankfully, the doctor...and Matt's parents...knew better.

We serve a God who sometimes has to re-break bones that have healed incorrectly. And in the pain and in the hurt, we often don't understand. But God, in His sovereignty, knows that we will never be whole if He simply removes the cast and lets us go on our gimpy way.

Sometimes we need to lose that job, or that friendship or that girlfriend. Sometimes we need to go through the dark night of the soul in order to come out on the other side...whole.

Jacob, sleeping on the bank of Jabbok, encountered a God who wasn't content to simply save him and relieve him of all his woes. Instead, God punched Jacob in the mouth and allowed Jacob to punch back. He wrestled Jacob, injuring his body and healing his soul.

We cannot always know what the God of the universe is up to. His ways are above our ways. But we can always know that He is holy and faithful; and, despite the outward appearances, we can know that whatever He is up to is for our good.

Just like Matt now knows that the only thing worse than having a bone re-broken is having to go through life with a crooked arm.