Try mSpy Phone Tracker for Your Kid's Safety
| Praise You In This Storm (Casting Crowns) |
 |
Click on a word and I’ll read it
Or select some text and then click on play.
Gospel music is having a come back with lots of new Christian bands, especially in the USA. This is a worship song by rock band "Casting Crowns", who take their name from a scene in the Book of Revelation (Rev 4:10-11):
The twenty-four elders fall down before Him who sits on the throne, and worship Him who lives for ever and ever. They lay their crowns before the throne and say: "You are worthy, our Lord and God, to receive glory and honor and power, for you created all things, and by your will they were created and have their being."
I was sure by now
God, You would have reached down
And wiped our tears away
Stepped in and saved the day
But once again, I say, Amen, and it's still raining
As the thunder rolls
I barely hear Your whisper through the rain, "I'm with you"
And as Your mercy falls I raise my hands
And praise the God who gives and takes away
And I'll praise You in this storm
And I will lift my hands
For You are who You are
No matter where I am
And every tear I've cried
You hold in Your hand
You never left my side
And though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this storm
I remember when I stumbled in the wind
You heard my cry to You and raised me up again
But my strength is almost gone
How can I carry on if I can't find You
But as the thunder rolls
I barely hear You whisper through the rain, "I'm with you"
And as Your mercy falls I raise my hands
And praise the God who gives and takes away
And I'll praise You in this storm
And I will lift my hands
For You are who You are
No matter where I am
And every tear I've cried
You hold in Your hand
You never left my side
And though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this storm
I lift my eyes unto the hills
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord
The Maker of Heaven and Earth
I lift my eyes unto the hills
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord
The Maker of Heaven and Earth
And I'll praise You in this storm
And I will lift my hands
For You are who You are
No matter where I am
And every tear I've cried
You hold in Your hand
You never left my side
And though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this storm
And though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this storm
REACHED DOWN= Extend your arm down towards me and touch/hold me with your hand/arm.
We say "reach down" because God is (figuratively) UP in heaven and we are DOWN on earth, but the usual phrase is "reach out", which means, to extend your arm in order to touch or grab something:
- Reach out, touch me
- I reached out as far as I could but the poster was too high up, I couldn't take it.
WIPED OUR TEARS AWAY= If you wipe tears, you dry them or remove them from someone's eyes or face (usually using a handkerchief or your hand). Figuratively, it means to comfort somebody so they feel better and stop crying.
STEPPED IN= [you would have] stepped in = To step in is to arrive, to appear, to come, to enter a place.
SAVED THE DAY= [you would have] saved the day = if somebody or something saves your day, they make you happy because they bring something good or remove something bad from you.
ONCE AGAIN= An emphatic form of "again".
I SAY AMEN= /ˌɑ:men/ or /ˌeɪmen/ I accept your will (what you want).
The word AMEN is used by Christians at the end of prayers. It is a Hebrew word which means "so be it" (= I accept this). This word may still be used, as it is here, with its original meaning to express acceptance.
IT'S STILL RAINING= The rain is a metaphor for sadness or a bad situation. It's the way you feel when you are in trouble and feel sad. This sentence means "my problem doesn't disappear".
AS= when.
THUNDER= In a storm we have electrical discharges in the sky. The light we see is called "lightning" and the sound it makes is called "thunder".
ROLLS= If a thunder rolls, we can hear the sound. We say that a lightning falls and a thunder rolls.
BARELY= Almost not.
- I barely hear Your whisper = I almost can't here Your whisper.
WHISPER= very soft voice. If you speak very softly, you are whispering. A whisper is something said very softly.
MERCY= Compassionate treatment, especially of those under one's power; clemency. Here it refers to God's comfort.
PRAISE= Worship (to honour and love God)
THE GOD WHO GIVES AND TAKES AWAY= God is the one who gives and who takes away. This is a common Christian expression that means that everything we have comes from God, so if He gave it to us, he can also take it away from us. If God is our Father and everything He makes is good for us, then, when something really bad happens to us, we can think that God is taking it from us, and since He wouldn't do anything to hurt us, then it must be good or have a sense, even if we can't understand it. So this idea is supposed to bring us comfort. The expression comes from the Bible (Job 1:21) where Job, after having lost his house, his fortune, his family and his friends says, "The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; Blessed be the name of the Lord!"
I'LL PRAISE YOU IN THE STORM= I'll worship you even in this horrible situation.
If the rain is a symbol of problems, sadness, a bad situation, then the storm is the symbol of grief, big distress, a terrible situation.
LIFT= Raise, put up.
Early Christians used to pray standing and raising their hands up to heaven (see picture). Today, many Christians praise or pray that way too.
YOU ARE WHO YOU ARE= When God appeared before Moses in the form of a burning bush, Moses asked Him who He was, and God replied: "I am who I am", which in Hebrew is "Yahweh" (Jehovah is a wrong Medieval transcription of IHVH, since Hebraic alphabet contains no vowels). So Yahweh is not a name, it's a no-name, just an explanation of God's nature. That's why God next tells Moses: "Say this to the people of Israel, ‘I AM has sent me to you." (Ex 3:14)
NO MATTER WHERE I AM= It's not important where I am, I can be anywhere.
YOU NEVER LEFT MY SIDE= You never abandoned me, you never left me.
TORN= Broken.
STUMBLED= If you are walking and you stumble, you fall down or almost fall down or walk with unsecure steps, as if you may fall down any minute.
UNTO= (old fashioned or literary) To.
- He giveth it unto thee = He gives it to you.
HILLS= Here it refers to the mountains of Jerusalem, where the Temple of God was in biblical times. This psalm was sang by pilgrims going to Jerusalem, so before getting there, they could see from the distance the mountains of the city and they new that God was in those mountains, so they prayed to him lifting their eyes to the hills.
I LIFT MY EYES UNTO THE HILLS... = This little poem is a psalm from the Bible:
Psalm 121
A Song of Ascents.
I lift up my eyes to the hills—
from where will my help come?
My help comes from the Lord,
who made heaven and earth.
He will not let your foot be moved;
he who keeps you will not slumber.
He who keeps Israel
will neither slumber nor sleep.
The Lord is your keeper;
the Lord is your shade at your right hand.
The sun shall not strike you by day,
nor the moon by night.
The Lord will keep you from all evil;
he will keep your life.
The Lord will keep
your going out and your coming in
from this time on and for evermore.
Lead vocalist Mark Hall says that "Praise You In This Storm" was inspired by the band's experience with a little girl, Erin Browning. The band made arrangements to meet Erin, who had performed a dance at her public school to one of the band's songs, and her family on Valentine's Day 2004 before one of their concerts. Right around the time the band connected with Erin and her family was when she was found to have cancer. Erin died on November 1, 2004. According to Hall, "Watching [Erin's mother] walk through this really showed me truth about my worship. Watching her walk through a real storm showed me that my worship was extremely situational". Hall began writing the song before Erin's death and told her about it, but was not able to complete it before she died.
This song talks about a situation most people go through when they are in grief because something terrible happened. You feel lost, abandoned and powerless. Then you start praying to God, hoping He will help you.
"I was sure by now
God, You would have reached down
And wiped our tears away
Stepped in and saved the day"
But a prayer is not a magic spell, you ask to God but He will do what's best for you, not necessarily what you wish.
"But once again, I say amen
and it's still raining"
You can pray and pray and sometimes it just doesn't happen. You know God is there, but it's difficult to feel Him when you are in so much pain.
"As the thunder rolls
I barely hear You whisper through the rain: I'm with you "
But you just don't give up, and if anything it should bring you closer to Him, not farther away.
"and though my heart is torn
I will praise You in this storm"
And the company of God gives you comfort and makes you feel that you are loved and you are not alone. You trust God, so even if you can't understand the situation, you know that God is always good, so whatever happened has a meaning and you must accept it. Well, of course, if it is a problem you can change, you have to get up and do something about it, but if it's something you can't change (for example the death of a loved one), then you must trust God and find comfort in His company and in the idea that it all is for good or has a meaning you can't grasp.
He finishes quoting the beginning of psalm 121, from the Bible, which is a song expressing a complete trust in God, because He will never allow anything truly bad to happen to you. So by citing this psalm, he finally understands that God is there to protect him, not to send him evil, so even if it still hurts so much, everything's alright.
I lift my eyes unto the hills
Where does my help come from?
My help comes from the Lord
The Maker of Heaven and Earth
This group has a great live performance. You can see this song in a concert here:
Official → Music
