Song Story

When Billy and I were still in the "getting to know you" stage, the topic of music obviously came up. With both of us being musicians and having spent lots of time in college playing rock instead of hitting the books, we had lots to talk about.

One of those things was Billy's theory that people like the music they like (or not) because of the memories associated with it.

You know those songs you can hear and instantly you have an emotional response? We got to have that experience at church this Sunday.

Now, since Billy used to be a worship pastor, some people might think that music was a really important thing to us in looking for a new church, but we really felt like musical style was quite low on the list of priorities, taking a back seat to solid Biblical teaching, heart for missions (local, domestic, and church planting), and a focus on small groups.

We do think that the lyrics of the songs are important, but we just felt like we could manage with a wide array of possible styles, so it wasn't something we were analyzing at the churches we visited. We were so excited, though, that Summit's music rocks - down to the intentional feedback and everything.

Anyway, this Sunday, we got to sing 2 songs we love: "In Christ Alone" and "Not to Us."

These songs are just songs that are catchy or that we're familiar with. They invoke deep emotions for both of us because these are songs that we had at our wedding. And we had them at our wedding for particular reasons.

"In Christ Alone" (led at our wedding by B.J. Barnes) is an amazing song that tells the entire gospel process in a few short stanzas. We wanted to have this one because we wanted everyone at our wedding to hear the gospel message by the time they left.



"Not to Us" (led by Cassie Hodges - an incredible vocalist who was only 17 at the time!)was also important as a message that even though it was our wedding, our lives are not our own. Our marriage is God's. It will be successful only when God is getting the glory for our triumphs and when we are turning to Him during our struggles. Our lives are unified because God had a purpose for us, not just because we're in love (although we are!).