SandraMcCrackenHymns

In Feast Or Fallow

The album title was the first seed of inspiration for this project, and it marked the moment when I decided to make a sequel to The Builder And The Architect.  The spark of inspiration was not from a text, but it came to me while I was driving down the highway, watching America’s fields and farms out my car window, while reflecting on agricultural themes.  Wendell Berry, a farmer, poet, and philosopher has inspired me with stories about tending the soil and of practicing the old wisdom to leave the land fallow for a season so that the land can be more productive and sustainable.  Life is like farming, with seasons of planting, waiting, harvesting, and resting.  We find evidence of God’s provision and purposing while listening to these delicate and ancient rhythms.

I wanted this song to be a thesis statement for the album as a whole, speaking into our collective fears like an anthem of good news.  In the middle of writing it, there was a devastating earthquake in the already impoverished Haiti.  I wrote verse 3, while watching reports just days after that event.   My response is taken from the first question and answer from the Heidelberg Catechism:

Question 1. What is thy only comfort in life and death?

Answer: That I with body and soul, both in life and death, am not my own, but belong unto my faithful Saviour Jesus Christ; who, with his precious blood, has fully satisfied for all my sins, and delivered me from all the power of the devil; and so preserves me that without the will of my heavenly Father, not a hair can fall from my head; yea, that all things must be subservient to my salvation, and therefore, by his Holy Spirit, He also assures me of eternal life, and makes me sincerely willing and ready, henceforth, to live unto him.

I was honored to have Derek (Webb) and Thad Cockrell trade verses with me on this album version.  The rich, diversity of their soulful voices is a picture of community and what it sounds like to sing truth together over all manner of life storms, “Whatever comes, we shall endure.”

Lyrics

When the fields are dry, and the winter is long

Blessed are the meek, the hungry, the poor

When my soul is downcast, and my voice has no song

For mercy, for comfort, I wait on the Lord

CH: In the harvest feast or the fallow ground,

My certain hope is in Jesus found

My lot, my cup, my portion sure

Whatever comes, we shall endure

Whatever comes, we shall endure

V2 On a cross of wood, His blood was outpoured

He Rose from the ground, like a bird to the sky

Bringing peace to our violence, and crushing death’s door

Our Maker incarnate, our God who provides.

Chorus

V3 When the earth beneath me crumbles and quakes

Not a sparrow falls, nor a hair from my head

Without His hand to guide me, my shield and my strength

In joy or in sorrow, in life or in death

Chorus

words and music by SANDRA MCCRACKEN. © 2010 DRINK YOUR TEA MUSIC (ASCAP), admin. by SIMPLEVILLE MUSIC, inc. All rights reserved.  Used by permission.