Two weeks ago we played a new song at Tallowood called “Victorious.”  It’s a song of corporate worship that praises God for His triumph over sin and death, and looks forward to the day when He will right every pain and injustice.  To those who have experienced pain and hardship in their lives this hope of victory is deeply personal and meaningful.  It was driven home to me during a prayer time with some friends that were experiencing a difficult trial.  As we prayed I was overwhelmed by a peaceful confidence and one simple word: Victorious.  Our God will be victorious.  And not only will He be victorious in the future, but He has already been victorious in the past through the cross and continues even now to be victorious in our lives over darkness and destruction.  This is the precious hope that each of us clings to in a world filled with tragedy and injustice.

After our prayer time the words to the song came quickly and easily.  The verses describe the continuing nature of our victorious God: past, present, and future.  And then the chorus gets to the heart of the issue: our God is victorious for the sake of His matchless name and the glory of His kingdom.  Strangely, the fact that it’s not all about us is reassuring.  If it were for my sake alone that God was victorious, would He be swayed by my disobedience and faithlessness?  But instead it’s not about me, and it’s not dependent on me.  It’s all about God, and that is a reassuring thought.  For the sake of His name, our God was, is, and ever will be victorious!

Victorious

Verse 1:
There is one thing that I know
There is one hope that I trust
Though the weight of sin brings death to men
Our God has been victorious
For His power raised the dead
And He breathes new life in us
And no grave can chain nor death contain
Our God remains victorious

Chorus:
For the sake of His great holiness
By the power of His great love
And to make His kingdom glorious
Our God will be victorious

Verse 2:
For this world is filled with pain
But our God is true and just
And his enemies will bend their knees
Our God will be victorious

Bridge:
Highest King, Risen Lord
You will reign forevermore
Victorious
God of love, we adore
Every knee will bow before
Victorious
And I will bow in worship

You know, time can get away from us all, and as I perused our blog today I was shocked to find that our last post was over three months ago. It’s inexcusable really. But I’m going to redeem myself, and I’ve got some ideas. Stay tuned! (If there are any of you tuned in in the first place.)

Creativity is an amazing thing.  All of us are creative in some way or another.  It’s more than just music or art, it’s problem solving, it’s daydreaming, it’s decorating, it’s writing what you imagine and imagining what you read.  But creativity is also a sensitive and fickle sort of thing and it has an arch enemy: busy-ness.  Jess and I have seemingly spent the last six months in a constant state of busy-ness, and it has crowded creative thoughts out of my mind.  The dreaming, the vision, the new ideas have been replaced by the tasks and the details.  But recently our lives have simplified considerably, and creativity has done the most amazing thing: it came back.

Now I hear music everywhere I go and think toward the future with dreams and projects and plans.  I can’t seem to finish writing a song because new ones keep popping up.  I spend time in my home/office studio with headphones on, a keyboard in front of me, and a guitar on my lap recording demos.  It’s a wonderful thing.  I don’t know where all this creativity will go.  We’ve got a couple ideas.  But right now I’m letting it wander unhindered by direction.  I’m letting the Spirit move however it wants.  And creativity is returning like a flower in spring.  And it’s beautiful!

We are happy to announce an easy new way to download and share the latest music from Dave and Jess Ray!  Using NoiseTrade you can either tell five friends about the album and get a free download, or pay whatever you think is appropriate for the music.  If you click “Tell 5 Friends” you’ll be asked to fill in five e-mail addresses of friends who would like to hear about the music and you’ll get a code for a free download. (And they will get an e-mail inviting them to do the same.) Or you can simply click “Pay What You Want” and pay anywhere from $1 to $25.  So check it out by using the widgets below and help us spread the love!

Friends, I am happy to report that you can now find the new album, The Doorpost Songs: Next Generation on iTunes.  You can find it by searching for “The Doorpost Songs” or “Tallowood Kids” in the iTunes store, or you can just click on the link below:

http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewAlbum?id=316135708&s=143441

Spread the word!  (I hear iTunes gifts are “in” these days!)

The Doorpost Songs: Next Generation is finally here!  We had our release concert on Friday, June 12 at Tallowood with a full band backed by a choir of 100 kids.  The night was incredibly exciting, rewarding, and fulfilling for us.  It was wonderful to see the fruits of our labor over these last six months, and it was touching to see the kids sing these timeless truths with such enthusiasm!

The band was filled out by new and old friends.  Clint Milburn, the guitar player that I played with in Better Days Ahead, flew down from Nashville to be a part of the concert.  He was also heading out to Camp Tallowood the next day with us.  Seth Marcum, a new friend, also flew down to play bass.  He would be a part of the Camp band as well.  John Stanley, a new friend from Second Baptist who attended the band sessions in Nashville and actually played on one of the tracks, played drums, and Jeremy Good, a local musician, arranger, and producer played keys.  Finally, Lisa Pierre join us on background vocals.

We had a great rehearsal on Thursday with the band, which turned out to be an all-star cast.  They had all been listening to the music and had the songs down flat.  The only thing we had to do was put it together.  Having Lisa on BGVs was also a huge help, allowing us to pull off some of the more complex background vocal parts on the album.  The only question that remained was how the kids would sing on Friday night.

Just before 5:00 on Friday we finally gathered to soundcheck with the kids.  I was nervous about whether or not the kids would sing out and know the songs well, but those nerves were quickly put to rest.  They knew the songs cold, and sang their little hearts out.  There were multiple moments when I got choked up listening to them sing these words from Scripture.

Once we had soundchecked we dismissed the kids, put some finishing touches on our monitor mixes, and then grabbed a quick dinner.  (Regrettably I was only able to get a couple bites of my ice cream cookie sandwich!)  Before I knew it the clock struck 7:00 and we stepped on stage to begin the concert.  The lights dimmed and we played the opening video segment before launching into If God is For Us.  I tried to savor each moment, but they passed incredibly quickly.  Each song was met with enthusiastic response from the audience, for which the most credit must go to the kids.  Their energetic, enthusiastic singing carried the night.  In the blink of an eye we went from the first song all the way to Stand Firm, the final track.  The kids sang the final refrain, “Death is swallowed up in victory,” and after one last “trash can” ending, the night was completed.

It has been wonderful since then to receive feedback from kids and parents alike about how they are experiencing the new album.  I’ll try to share some of their stories in upcoming posts.  But for now it’s enough to say that I am both exhilarated and relieved to finally have the album out.  The CD release concert was a wonderful, memorable experience, thanks in no small part to the efforts of the media team (Gary Revis, Miguel Ortiz, Stefan Gerrard, Kyle Smith, Jonathan Lafferty); Alicia Music, the director of the kids choir; and, of course, the kids themselves.  We continue to pray that God would use this album to plant His truth in the lives of the next generation!

Mark your calendars! The CD release concert for The Doorpost Songs: Next Generation will take place on Friday, June 12 at 7 PM in the Tallowood Baptist Church Worship Center as a part of our VBS Family Night. It’s going to be a great night of music and worship as over 100 kids sing the new Doorpost Songs with a full band led by Jess and me. And the best part? It’s absolutely free! So mark your calendar, invite your friends (especially your friends with kids) and come enjoy this wonderful evening!

It’s out of our hands! The Doorpost Songs: Next Generation has gone to the manufacturer and should return in plenty of time for our release concert on Friday, June 12. It’s a great feeling to finally send a project like this off to print. It’s been eight months since our first conversations about putting this project together, six months since I began writing songs, four months since we finished the band tracks, and almost two months since the kids laid down the choir tracks. But here we are, reaching the culmination of all the months of effort. I can’t wait to hold the final product and let people get a taste of what we’ve been working on.

It has also been a rewarding process spiritually, as we live with these songs, each one grounded in such important truths. Lately I’ve been thinking about one of the songs, called Shine Like the Dawn, which comes from Psalm 37. The text calls on us to delight ourselves in the Lord, promising that He will give us the desires of our hearts. Then the part that has been sticking with me:

Commit your way to the Lord;
Trust in Him and He will do this:
He will make your righteousness shine like the dawn,
The justice of your cause like the noonday sun.

What a great image, that the justice of our cause may shine like the noonday sun. How often do we commit ourselves to causes so just that they shine in this way? I find myself often committed to much lesser causes, which mostly involve my own pleasure. I guess that’s why it’s so crucial to find our delight in the Lord, so that the desire of our hearts is simply Him. That is a desire that He is sure to grant! And when our delight is in Him, then our causes will truly be just, shining like the noonday sun!

It is finished!  Well…sort of.  We have signed off on the final mixes for the new Doorpost Songs project, which will be called The Doorpost Songs: Next Generation.  It’s a bittersweet sort of feeling, coming to the end of a project like this.  It’s wonderful to see everything coming together and to hear the culmination of the creativity of the last few months.  But in other ways we miss the process of creating, which is just as fun and fulfilling.  But I suppose the tension between the two is what keeps us moving forward, the creating drives us to the finish, and the finish reminds us how much we enjoy the creating.

We have also received cover comps from our artist, Benji Peck, the same artist who did the artwork for the Dave & Jess album.  He’s got some great ideas that we’re working through now.  We’re looking forward to unveiling the final cover sometime soon.  It’s hard to believe, but release date is only six weeks away!  We can’t wait!

We’re getting closer to having the new Doorpost Songs record finished!  Scott sent us three more mixes over the weekend, bringing the total to 8 out of 10.  Next up in the process will be mastering, which takes place on May 1.  Then it’s off to the manufacturer so that we can have them in plenty of time for the June 12 release date.  We can’t wait to share this with all of you!