How do you feel about yourself as a Christian?
Perhaps you feel like a failure. Your prayer life is patchy (at best), and your Bible reading plan is a distant memory. When you’re at church, you look around at the ‘good Christians’ and wish for the same picture-perfect devotion. To make it worse, you’re battling the same old sins, which never seem to abate.
Or maybe you feel good. You pray and read the Bible daily, and give generously each month. Your family is walking with the Lord, and you’ve evangelised to several colleagues over the last few weeks. The battle over sin feels easy, and life feels fruitful.
However you feel—flourishing or failing—the truth is that we come to the Father with empty hands. He’s not checking your good works at the door with a sign reading ‘only successes allowed’. Nope. You come to the Father through Jesus’ spotless record, counted as your own. Whether you’ve had the best or worst week, you are covered with Christ’s perfection, not your failures or achievements. You bring nothing.
This is at the heart of our homegrown song Come to the King. It’s an invitation to return to God with all our brokenness, sin, and weakness. As one line puts it:
“Bring all your heart, you’re welcomed as you are.”
God doesn’t ask us to polish ourselves up beforehand, but to come empty-handed and messy and let him do the mending.
Come with nothing, together.
But there’s another layer to the song. Although it began as a moment of personal devotion, Come to the King is also a song for the church. We return to God in community. On our own, we often become paralysed by guilt, shame, introspection and despair. We need words of encouragement and challenge, and the regular rhythms of life groups and Sunday services to shake us out of ourselves. Shoulder to shoulder, we come with nothing, together.
So, when writing Come to the King, we made a few intentional moves. In the first draft of the chorus, there was no ‘all we need’, only ‘all I need’, which we quickly changed. We wanted something we could belt out together, as one church family. And when our producer suggested recording group vocals, we were keen to try it out. During our Worship Team Night in August, we set up a couple of microphones, filled the room, and recorded the bridge and final chorus live. Rather than only one or two voices, this song now has 25.
Come to the King drops next Friday (14th Nov) across streaming platforms, and we can’t wait to share it with you. We hope you enjoy listening to it as much as we have, and that it causes you to worship without striving or performance.
Until then, you can pre-save the song here so it’s waiting for you on release day.
God doesn’t need us (+ new song out)
Let Your Kingdom Come started with a simple WhatsApp message. “For the next song, I’d love for us to write something with a missional focus”, Pete typed. “I think we’re lacking songs with that kind of theme.” More than that, we needed mission-focused songs that weren’t self-focused. Not singing about what we’re going to do for God—as if he were desperate for our help—but about what he’s already doing in the world.
So we came upon one of the great and freeing truths of our faith: God does not need us. He’s not relying on us for his happiness or fame or mission. We are not the main characters in this drama. The plot line does not depend on us. Jesus is the one building his Church. The Father predestines, calls, and justifies. The Spirit softens stony hearts. God is writing his story with passion and power in his penstrokes. The kingdom is his.
God is ultimately devoted to building it for the sake of his glory, to see the nations come to him and exchange their angry fists for arms outstretched in adoration. As the Psalmist sings, “All the nations you have made shall come and worship before you, O Lord, and shall glorify your name" (Psalm 86.9). Worship is the end goal of the kingdom - of all history in fact.
All of this is good news for two reasons. Since God is the most beautiful, happy and glorious being, 1) worshipping him truly is a delight. And 2) although humanity is tempted to worship ugly, debasing, and disatisfying things, God simply won’t let that happen in the long run. Goodness and joy will outlive idolatry and sin. God’s glory (and our happiness in beholding him) will prevail.
So, what now?
Knowing that God is in control of his kingdom might make you think that our job is simply to sit back, kick up our feet, and watch the light dawn on the new creation. But God has something better in store for us. He invites us to assist him in creating a masterpiece, a world full of his glory.
Imagine a small child working beside a carpenter father, watching in amazement as his rough, weathered hands—sawdust under his nails—turn a block of wood into a piece of art. The father asks him to help in the work, to chisel and sand under his tender gaze. A little apprentice. So too with us and God. Or, to use another image, we’re representatives of a king, sent out to proclaim a message of hope in towns and cities everywhere. To announce good news. The message isn’t ours, yet God invites and honours us in the task of sharing it.
This is the reality we live in. God is in control, his kingdom is on the move, and in a surprising turn of events, he invites us to be part of building it. So, why not get caught up in this mission and make the bridge of Let Your Kingdom Come your prayer? ‘Let your kingdom come in me. Let my heart burn for the lost. ’ It’s one God loves to answer.
Artwork by Emily Ikoshi
New song out now
Our debut single, ‘Crucible’, is available on all streaming platforms. Over the last two years, this song has morphed from a voice memo idea to a studio-recorded single, and we’re so excited to share it with you.
Artwork by Emily Ikoshi
Crucible was an obvious choice for our first release and was truly a team effort. Cezar, Daniel and I wrote its first iteration in February ‘23. Their lyrical and musical talent helped add verses and a bridge to a simple chorus idea. We then took our first draft to Pete, Nats and Bekah, who added finesse and coherence. Through many collaborative sessions, it became the song we sing today and quickly cemented itself as a firm favourite.
Then came the recording. Riley and I went to the studio earlier this year to lay down the drums. Naomi later recorded piano, and Zoe added the lead vocal. Electric guitar, bass, and backing vocals came later. Eventually, after many listens and second opinions, we sent it to a mixing and mastering engineer.
Finally, we have a finished song to share with you! God has equipped our church with many gifted people - Emily created our cover art too! - and it’s been amazing to see how he’s brought us together to complete the project. He does all this for his glory, and our prayer is that this song will lift your eyes to behold and worship Jesus. We constantly need reminding of his forgiving kindness, and we hope this single, whether streamed on the Tube or in the kitchen, will do just that.
P.S. Head to grace.london/music to find lyrics and chord sheets.