I was like , “ I ’ m not good at wanting you to come back thinking about it or even giving it much thought .” I think I just kind of like , “ I ’ m good at all the other stuff . I ’ m not good at this .” There was a lot of , “ You ’ re so heavenly minded , you ’ re no earthly good ,” or you ’ re that person on the side of the road with a picket sign and it ’ s painted on it , “ The end is near .” It ’ s like that kind of stuff . I just didn ’ t connect with it .
[ WM ] Or you feel guilty because you don ’ t think about it as much as you should .
[ Stephen ] Exactly . But what I found is this was the thing that the church was going towards when Paul , in Philippians says , the crown , the thing that I haven ’ t gotten to yet , is the return of Jesus . It ’ s the perfection of all things , the renewal and all these , they were longing for it . And I just wasn ’ t ... but I wanted to .
And what I found is that when I started living this , it really made me start seeing a shift in evangelism in my life that got more effective for the kingdom . All of this , because I started loving people better here and now towards his return , I started building things that matter more here and now I was thinking about it towards the return of Jesus . So it wasn ’ t , “ I ’ m so heavenly minded . I ’ m no earthly good .” It ’ s Colossians 3 , “ set your mind above where Christ is seated .” I was actually so heavenly minded , I was becoming more earthly good . And I was starting to see real advancement of the kingdom of Jesus through my life , simply because I started wanting something that is really the heart of God . It ’ s his longing .
And so that ’ s really where the idea of that song came from . So honestly , I ’ m not just saying this . I was not thinking people would ever sing this song or hear this song or go anywhere . The idea was just , can I have something that I ’ ll sing ? And so I brought that idea to some friends of mine later , Hank Bentley and Brian Fowler , and of course my wife Tara . We all kind of came up with what became the song today . And now of course , God ’ s used it in many ways . And at the end of it all though , I hope that it actually is effective . I hope it draws people to want the thing that he wants .
[ WM ] It ’ s a great song . It ’ s a great song that unites us . And because in the end , neither you nor I are going to be writing down anybody ’ s name in the Book of Life , that ’ s not our business . And not only that , we don ’ t even get to read the names from the Book of Life . So that ’ s good . It ’ s a song that greatly unites the church . So , I really do appreciate it for that . Besides the singability of it and the theme of it and all of it .
You ’ re a very busy guy , and I ’ ve seen your touring schedule , by the way , who were you with last night in Atlanta , Maverick City ?
[ Stephen ] Had a full house in the State Farm Arena . I ’ ve actually never done anything like that . It was pretty wild . And we have like 23 or
24 more of those dates to go .
[ WM ] Has this all become a surprise to you ? I mean , do you ever think , “ How did I get here ?”
[ Stephen ] No , I ’ m 46 . I ’ m not 30 . I ’ m way past ... you get it ... I ’ m way past the expiration date that a lot of the music industry puts on people . But I don ’ t know . I think it ’ s something about being the age I ’ m at now . I feel like I ’ m in a really good place to appreciate it , but to also have a better , I ’ d like to think a right perspective , about what God ’ s doing and what matters . I think I often look back on my life and go , “ Man , I really wanted this then , and it didn ’ t happen .” What I didn ’ t see was that my character wasn ’ t ready for my destiny , and God loved me too much to let me go into it until it was . And so , I don ’ t know . I feel like I ’ m in a good place .
14 November 2024 Subscribe for Free ...