Loud And Clear
The first collection of mostly original music by Chris.
1. Fullness of His Love : This was originally written to have a harder hitting song to start a gig out with a whole band. I use it in essence as a warm up song to get the juices flowing 🙂
2. All Things : Inspired by the verse, Phillipians 4:13 “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me!” I could spend hours talking about how God gave me this experiences that He used to drive the truth home to me.
When I was in boot camp for the USMC, our drill instructors spoke a lot about intestinal fortitude – that no matter what before you ever give up you can always reach down deep inside and find more strength or courage. I don’t think I had any of that before Christ. I learned in boot camp that because Jesus lived in me through the His Holy Spirit that He is always down deep inside of me – I can grab a hold of Him tight and trust in Him to carry me through.
I found out that God is not as concerned with delivering us FROM situations, but He would rather show us His power in subtle ways in delivering us THROUGH situations! As the song says, “That’s not saying I’ll be a movie star, it’s just saying that I’ll overcome! By the word of my testimony, and the shed blood of His Son!” I think to be perfectly honest, I should have written a song that instead says, ” I can do absolutey nothing without Him!” I can do all things THROUGH HIM! Amen!
3. Same God in San Diego : I wrote this song based upon my experiences in having to leave the security and complacency of home when I was in the Marine Corp Reserves. (I was mobilized to Southwest Asia in late 1990 but was never in actual combat. Prior to going to Southwest Asia, I was sent to Camp Lejune, NC for additional training to prepare should I be placed in that situation.) When I said good-bye to my mom, family and friends, deep in my heart I felt that I was telling them good-bye until we were reunited in glory with Jesus.
Prior to all of that, when my pastor at the time (Gary Awalt) first learned that I had joined the Marine Corp, he caught me coming into church for the Wednesday night service before I went to boot camp. I was emotionally distraught because I didn’t want to leave home but I knew it was God’s will for me to go. I couldn’t get out of the destiny He had in mind for me, nor deep down did I want to but I really wanted to wear the Eagle, Globe, and Anchor. Pastor Awalt lovingly encouraged me with the principle, “Chris, the same God that is Lord over your life here in Southern Illinois, is God and is sovereign in San Diego, California! There is nothing hidden from His sight! Don’t you forget that son! You are still His and He is still yours!” It was a wonderful truth that has kept me going over the years!
4. More Than I Can Contain : The title of this song says it all. Jesus has blessed me pressed down shaken together and running over. I would be lying to say that everything along the road has been easy. Many times easy could not even begin to be an accurate descriptive of my walk with Christ as I am quite sure that any seasoned Christian would attest to. But He has never left, nor forsaken me just like He promised (^Heb. 13:5)! He has always had his hand on my shoulder (even when He has had to use the other one to discipline me with 🙂 And it has always been blessed.
5. Your Security : Once again I could write an entire essay just about how God inspired me to put this one together. NO ONE knows when we are going to step off of this planet into eternity (save God of course).
When I was a very young Christian I thought a lot about what it would be like to pass on and go on to heaven with Jesus. Now don’t get me wrong, I did not have any sort of morbid death wish. I want a long full life here on earth as long as God wills. Perhaps some of it was the excitement that comes with fear but I wondered a lot of the time what it would be like etc. I was excited and almost exhilarated about actually seeing Jesus face to face. I came to the conclusion that no matter when or how it would be, I wanted to be thankful to God for everything He has given to me and done through me. I wanted the very last words that I uttered on this planet to be praise to Him. I thought about Christians in other parts of the world that could not enjoy the blessings of liberty that we do here in the U.S.
I thought about the saints like those listed in the later part of Hebrews Chapter 11, the ones that were sawed in two, etc. I thought about how many of us Christians seem to lack for nothing (compared to those in poverty in most areas of the world.) I thought about old saints that lived full lives with decades in walk with Jesus, and young men and women – even teenagers in some cases that were called home early in life. God is indeed sovereign! Whether I live or whether I die, He is in charge, His way is best, and He can do with me as He sees fit!
6. Loud N Clear : There is a lot to be said about this song. I was first inspired for this song by our radio communications when I was overseas with 3/24. If you did a radio check, the person listening (if they heard your signal well) “read ya Lima Charlie!” or simply “Loud and clear!” I started thinking that I could be considerably more effective for the kingdom of God if I got my “radio” frequency tuned in correctly and limited the noise and heard the Lord speaking into my heart. If I could respond with quicker and more sincere obedience. I don’t think it is an issue with us being able to hear from God, many times it comes down to the question, do we want to hear from God?
While meditating about this, I realized even though our Lord speaks to us ” in a still small voice” many times, we are His sheep and we KNOW His voice! We know He is dealing with us, whether we respond to it the way we need is up to us. We can close the ears to our heart and harden them to His voice, but we REALLY KNOW when He is speaking to us! ^Matt. 4:4. The first command of the New Testament “Man shall not live on bread alone but on EVERY WORD that proceeds from the mouth of God!” The word “Word” in this verse is Rhema – the spoken word. We hear the Rhema according to our reading, studying, and meditating on the written word, or Logos; hence the line “I see the print, I hear the story!”
7. I Am Thine O Lord : An amazing hymn, one of my favorite ever. I think the song is self explanatory.
8. Noah’s Days : I just wanted a rocking guitar driven instrumental. If you go to my YouTube channel (XMathis) you will see a gear review video of my song “Quiet Waters.” These two songs are originally the same. After we got the mix done, Monty called me and said “Bro you might want to reconsider the title of this song. There is nothing quiet about this song.”
I always liked the title Noah’s Days in reference to Jesus’ words about the last days [Matt. 24:37-38] – how the last days would be just like the days of Noah (cross reference Genesis Chapter 6 I think). I think this day and age could described pretty much the same – turbulence, turmoil, and testing.
If anyone is interested in obtaining the “TV-Soundtracks to any of my songs so that they could be used for “special music” in their fellowships or Church, please send me an e-mail and tell me a little about what you are wanting and perhaps I can send you the track.
By God’s grace in the next few months, I plan on recording my next album of mostly original Christian music material. Please be praying for me and the team that this goes well. And be watching for the release.
And lyric sheets to any of my original material is available upon request. Send me an e-mail and I will forward you a PDF version of the sheet.
My first album was entitled EXCERPTS. The more I thought about it, I really wanted Loud And Clear to be the title track of this work because this song and what it is about, I think should be the focal point of this work. Also, I was not happy with how I completed two of the tracks (Christ in the Mirror, and Stoning Stephen) and decided to remove them. I am going to rerecord them on a later project primarily as acoustic projects as they were intended originally. Now if anyone REALLY liked those tracks as they were recorded on EXCERPTS, I will be more than happy to send them to you free of any charges at your request if you REALLY, GENUINELY want them (I can’t imagine why you would, but I will leave that up to you). Don’t get me wrong, I am blessed by God to be able to write the songs that He has given me, and I am very thankful for these two songs, but I was never really satisfied with the finished product on these two but was very excited to get my first project recorded.
I have always looked at my song writing and music as being from the perspective of ministry, more so than artistry, and yes there is a distinct difference.
ALL of the lyrics to my original songs are derived from plagiarizing God’s Book! 🙂