Monday, April 6, 2009

Hello Love

Last Friday Dave and I went to the Chris Tomlin concert in Tampa. It was AMAZING! It was seriously like a worship session for 2 hours straight! God is so good.

I wanted to post about this concert because of the amazing ways God works in peoples lives - all over the world. Chris Tomlin is an incredible christian artist. Over the past year or so he has been working on a new CD. He wrote a song called Love, which soon became the title of the CD, but the story behind it is amazing. After some talk with his producers about the song Love, they thought it would be great if they had an African children's choir singing in the background. But, they live in Nashville and never imagined that it could ever actually happen. Well, a few days later Chris got a text letting him know that the Watoto Children's Choir from Uganda was in town and had a day off on Thursday, the VERY day they were scheduled to record the song Love. Wow - God is good! So, his producers got on the phone and invited the Watoto Children's Choir to come on Thursday and help record this new song. Sure enough, they came dressed in their sweet African attire to record the amazing song that it is. When God wants something done, he gets it done!
Love - by Chris Tomlin and the Watoto Children's Choir

These children are the strings that pull on my heart as I listen to this song. The entire Watoto Children's Choir are children who live in an AIDS orphanage in Uganda. Many of them left behind after their entire family has been taken by the disease. Many of them with no hope, no future, and no one to love them. That is where the orphanage comes in. This orphanage was created specifically to shelter children with this disease - to give them a sense of peace, hope, love, and a future. It was also designed to show them that they have a God who loves them unconditionally; who loves us all unconditionally. Just the thought of that brings peace to my soul. In a world where there is so much suffering taking place - suffering that we don't think about because we are blessed enough to live in a country where we are educated and free - it is comforting to know that we have a God who is taking care of us, all of us. He will never let us go without being loved. I love the bridge in this song .. "Love is the answer. Love will find a way. When we love one another, it's a brighter day." God gives us a promise of something so much greater than we could ever imagine. He gives us the promise of eternal life with him, where suffering will cease to exist. These children have a glorious future to look forward to, as do we all. How awesome is it that these children got to sing in a song that expresses this kind of love? I know God was ministering directly to their hearts. When our life on this earth comes to a close, we get to be in the arms of our loving Savior who promised never to forsake us. What more could we ask for? When life is cold, there is a promise - we will never go without LOVE.

Now these three remain: faith, hope, and love. But the greatest of these is LOVE.
1 Corinthians 13:13

For more information on the Watoto children check out their website at www.watoto.com/index.php and to make a difference in the lives of other Uganda children check out www.onemillioncan.com

1 comment:

Matt and Christen said...

Danielle,
THanks for sharing the story behind the song. I always love the context for why the song writer wrote it. The concert sounded amazing.