“Before The Throne” ends with a great benediction song, “All Good Gifts” by Michael Morgan.  Here, Michael discusses the writing process behind that song:

One evening back in January, or possibly even December, I can’t really remember when exactly (the memorable thing: it was one week before the deadline for song submissions and it was cold outside), I was standing in the gallery talking to Nick Nye, whom I hadn’t hung out with in ages, which fact we were lamenting. So, Nick invited me to the Sojourn songwriters gathering taking place upstairs that very evening.

Songwriting brings out my inner hermit. It’s personal with a degree of intensity that keeps songs gestating for great stretches of time (months, years even). In spite of this mild musical agoraphobia, that is to say, against my instincts, I decided to attend. There, I heard about this project for an upcoming Sojourn album, songs for each act of worship: invitation, offering, confession, etc. All songs due Friday.

Hard cut to my apartment, actually considering writing a song in a week and letting people (strangers? gasp) listen to it. A work week at that. Not even the real, seven-day week. Utter lunacy. I picked benediction for a theme right away, maybe because my heart really knows what it’s like to get bogged down during the week and feel miles from the clarity of the Gospel I feel on a Sunday. Maybe?

I had just purchased American V, the posthumous Johnny Cash record, and that basic acoustic sound  felt really resonant. I imagine the simplicity also appealed to the part of my brain that saw writing a song in 5 days being one step beyond a manned Mars mission. So, I stayed up late that night hammering out words. I thought of the things I most often forget about the Gospel - God’s good gifts and grace - and wrote about wanting to keep those things. And I wrote about what gets in the way: making God seem small through forced perspective, how worry accomplishes this task. We don’t get it right. Who knew?

The guitar part was definitely facilitated by that rustic sound of the Johnny Cash record. Nothing fancy, just the meat and potatoes of music: I, IV, V, vi and maybe a IV/IV (for the other theory survivors out there). As for a melody, those are the most mysterious things in the universe to me. Where do they come from? Probably manned Mars missions. Melody is truly the miraculous part of songwriting, to me at least. Speaking of good gifts.

So, I recorded the basics, threw in a harmonica and cobbled the parts together and sent it in around 2 Saturday morning.

It wasn’t the first time a cushion-y deadline saved my neck.

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