Story Behind the Song – You Are Faithful

| The King of my heart is the King on the throne //
And the Lord of my circumstance will never let me go |

In late 2017, I learned of a family in my church who had a son named Landen with an extreme heart condition. As I read through his mother’s Facebook posts about what was going on and seeing him go through long stays in the hospital and dangerous surgeries that his 11-year-old body had to endure, I was challenged with some hard questions about God. Why would God allow this to happen? Is God good? Is God with Landen and his family?

As I wrestled with these questions, I continued to scroll through Landen’s mother’s Facebook page and read the stories of what this family was going through. What I continually found was a deep and trusting faith that God was in control and that His ways are greater than our own. This line “The Lord of my circumstance will never let me go” was birthed in this moment. The rest of the prechorus and part of the chorus along with an old set of verses began to piece together around that line and I was broken by the implications of God being the Lord over ALL of our circumstances, whether they are good or bad. I recorded that version of the song on my phone and sent it to the family, just as a private gift and hopefully an encouragement to them.

Only a few days before his 12th birthday, Landen entered into the Kingdom of Heaven. God saw that it was time for Landen to not only find healing from his physical disease, but his ultimate disease of sin as well, and the Lord won the battle over Landen’s disease that day, though it wasn’t the way everyone had hoped. Although this is a hard reality in the lives of the Heinze family, they clung to something that their son prayed only a week before: “God, thank you for what I’ve been through and that you were with me, and thank you for a family that loves me.”

It’s clear to me that Jesus was the King of Landen’s heart and he trusted that Christ is the King on the throne. This caused this 11-year-old boy, wise beyond his years, to truly believe that Jesus is the Lord of his very, very difficult circumstance and He would absolutely never, ever let him go, just like God promised the Israelites in Deuteronomy 31. God is fully faithful to His promises because He Himself embodies faithfulness.

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|My flesh and my heart fail me, I am the anxious one //
My senseless path and sinful ways cause my heart to stumble|

In June of 2018 I was able to go lead worship for a high school camp out in central Nebraska. I absolutely love getting to lead worship for student camps when I get the opportunity, and this was a new one for me that I had never done before. These high school students came to camp with a ton of baggage, as I would find out throughout the week.

The speaker for the week, Phil, utilized these blackboards in the back of the room where students could go write a question on. Many of these students asked great questions about doctrine and apologetics, which are two things that Phil was excellent in breaking down, but what really struck me was the number of questions that dealt with the darkness that these students were dealing with in their lives back home. Questions like “How do I stop wanting to kill myself, prayer isn’t working”, “Why did my friend commit suicide”, “Is porn really that bad”, “Does God think I’m dirty if I’ve been raped”, etc. What I was witnessing was the deep dark depths of the lies that they had been told about themselves, about life, and about God. Phil did a fantastic job, by the way, shepherding and pastoring these students through these tough questions. These students were in desperate need of God’s healing, but had been starved of it because of the lies they had been deceived into believing!

Throughout the week as I read these questions and had personal conversations with students, I kept seeing anxiety in their lives and in their hearts as one of the common trends they would share. No matter what the specific situation was that they were going through, they had deep anxiety that God was not loving or not powerful or fulfilling His promises. Who can blame them? It wasn’t always their own personal sin that caused the anxiety, but sin happening TO them! And yet, as I meditated on that, I also was reminded that God works through the circumstances that happen TO us in ways that we wouldn’t expect (or prefer). That’s when I was reminded of this song I had written 6 months before (see my previous post), and the line “I am the anxious one, my senseless path and sinful ways cause my heart to stumble” popped in my head.

The verses took shape around our desperate need for the King of our hearts to be the Lord over our circumstances, first that sin (in this song specifically, anxiety) is our deficiency (whether it’s our sin or sin being done to us) and requires a faithful Master to overcome. Second, that we would trust that when God takes us by the hand and wants to lead us by His wisdom that we would follow closely and witness and praise His perfect glory no matter what the outcome might be.

I led this song for the first time at this camp, the day after I revised it with the new verses. My prayer was that these students would grab ahold of this song and remember that God is always faithful, even when we are not. He is always faithful, even when the circumstances don’t seem that way. He is always faithful, even when we are anxious and senseless and sinful.

“Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it, prone to leave the God I love;
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it, seal it for Thy courts above.”
-Robert Robinson, 1757 (Original lyrics of “Come Thou Fount”)

“You Are Faithful” is available for listening on all streaming platforms and for purchase on all digital music providers. You can stream the song for free on YouTube by clicking here. This document is also available in a PDF in the resources tab.

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Kevin McClure has been leading worship in the local church for over 10 years in different capacities of student and adult ministries. As a songwriter, musical artist, and worship leader he has had the honor of touring the United States both as a performer and worship leader over the better part of the last decade. With a heart to see believers learn how to take the act of worship beyond the setting of a group gathering, Kevin is incredibly intentional with his time on and offstage to help teach the practice of worship as a lifestyle. Kevin lives in Omaha, Nebraska with his bride Hailey and his two daughters, Everleigh (7) and Eliska (2). His favorite food is coffee (lifesource), loves bonfires, and is convinced that Jesus is a Chicago Cubs fan.