Shaun GrovesA boy orphaned in a Kenyan slum. A man in upstate New York abandoned by his wife.
Come by here, God.
7 comments on “Come By Here”
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A boy orphaned in a Kenyan slum. A man in upstate New York abandoned by his wife.
Come by here, God.
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Ann Voskamp says:
Someone asked me this week: “Is there anything really wrong with the American Dream?”
Only if you believe in His Kingdom Come.
Come by Here…
I don’t even have to close my eyes and I can hear it: The night you played this in Guatemala. After the city dump and all the kids.
You sang the words, that lump in my throat and that knot in my stomach, and the lyrics — God took them and they did something in me.
They continue to do something in me.
May God come by here and every man come down off the ladders and go lower — laid right down like an altar.
shayne says:
Jeez-o-pete Ann…even your comments are beautiful.
And I agree…the American Dream is the gospel upside down.
Someday lady, when Jesus has come and made all things new…I’m gonna get the chance to meet you and we’ll just talk and laugh and look at Jesus.
(Sorry for hijacking your comments to say Hi to Ann, Shaun. *sheepish grin*)
Kris says:
One of my favorites on that album, though really, they all bring me to the foot of the cross.
I’ve been praying this more lately, that He would come, that we would come to him. Thanks for this bit of worship today. Continuing to pray for you!
Kelly says:
I watched the video on youtube of you singing that song in Guatemala many times. That song and many from that album have been the soundtrack of a crazy journey I’ve been on that has lead me to Cambodia, Thailand, the Philippines and back home to find my place in the work that God is doing in our world.
These songs have been anthems for me to continue to listen to His voice through all the noise. They’ve also reminded me that I’m not alone in this. No matter how lonely it is when it seems like so many around me are okay living in maintenance-mode Christianity, these songs remind me that there’s others yearning for the Kingdom of God, that he’s truly working- and that someday, the glimpses we see of that work will someday be complete. So longing for that day.
So thanks, for being a part of my journey, even though I’ll probably never meet you in this life. 🙂
shayne says:
Love this…
Vicki Small says:
Beautiful, Shaun. Prayer often focuses on asking God to care in a special way for a particular person, or a family who has just lost a loved one, or our children, or . . . whoever needs His touch or His Presence. Intercessory prayer–bearing one another’s burdens.
Other times, we ask God to “Come by here, Lord, where I am; where I lie broken into a thousand little pieces, 950 of them being my heart. Come by here, Lord, where my life is in shambles, or my dreams, or my expectations. Put me back together, again, Lord, or I will die, right here, a tiny piece at a time, fifty pieces or a hundred pieces a day.”
But . . . I sometimes wonder if we don’t have it backward. We sing songs in worship, songs like, “Meet Us Here,” or songs that say, “We welcome you”–as if He will come only by invitation; as if we are not too audacious to think that His house, or wherever we gather together to worship Him, is our place and not His.
He has said that where two or three are gathered in His name, He is there in their midst. He has said, “I will never leave you nor forsake you.” He has said, “I am with you always, even to the end of the world.”
Maybe, instead of pleading with Him to be with us, to meet us where we are (which is where He always meets us), we need to pray, “Help me/us to believe you are here. Help me/us to hear you, to know you hear me/us. Help me to believe you are who you said you are. Help me to believe how much you love me.”
And yet, when I pray for someone who is grieving, I always ask that God will cover them with His blanket of peace and comfort–as if He won’t, if I don’t ask. But He has invited us to ask for what we want or need, so maybe we don’t have it backward, after all.
Daniel Farrow says:
I agree with Ann, and I personally believe that the American Dream is a demonic lie.