Okay, before we get started today, I've got a question for you, not you Ann, our listener. Where are you listening from? And you know that we're from Detroit, Motor City, Shelby's in the Philly area, and our Family Life Today headquarters are in Orlando. So we're coming to you guys from all over the country, but what about you?
We would love to know if you are in one of those areas or where else you consider home. Text FLT plus where you're listening from to 80542 to let us know. So again, you're going to text FLT plus where you're listening from to 80542. One Sunday, he comes up and he says, you play the guitar, don't you Mr. Card? I said, well, yeah, Dr. Lane, but guitars are for attracting girls in the student center.
And he said, here's my sermon for next week. Write us a chorus. I didn't want to be a songwriter. I grew up in Nashville. Everybody's a songwriter, but Dr. Lane asked me to write a song.
You better believe I'm going to write a song. Welcome to Family Life Today, where we want to help you pursue the relationships that matter most. I'm Shelby Abbott and your hosts are Dave and Ann Wilson. You can find us at familylifetoday.com.
This is Family Life Today. We have a real treat for you today. Yes, we do. We got to sit down with an artist, a man, a theologian, a singer, a songwriter named Michael Card in Franklin, Tennessee.
And let me give a shout out to our Nashville listeners and station partners. So many of you are familiar with Michael Card, but if you're not, let's just say that he's a spiritual hero and he had a real impact on us and especially you, Dave. Yeah. I mean, if you don't know him, you might know this song, El Shaddai, El Shaddai. You want me to keep going?
No. You wrote that song way back. I mean, you might know it from Amy Grant, but I couldn't be more proud to introduce him and his work to you. His songs and his books will absolutely draw you toward Jesus. And I think that's it. I think it's his profound love for Jesus that's so compelling, not only in his life, but in his songs.
Yeah. We got to go to his house, to his church out there in Franklin. And so today is going to be day one of a three-part series with Michael Card that I think you're going to find fascinating.
It's a conversation about the mysterious love of God and this mysterious Old Testament word called hesed. Okay, Michael, my best Michael Card story, for me anyway, is 1995, I think it was. What do you think? Yeah, probably that. Were you in high school?
You know, you and I were born the same year, so you know exactly where I was in 95. But a good buddy of mine, his wife wanted to get an acoustic guitar and learn to play. So he buys her one for Christmas and surprises her. And his surprise was, he goes, Dave, you got to come over on Christmas morning and play my acoustic guitar for Sonya and I.
When I give her the guitar, I want her to hear a song that she loves on this guitar. And I'm like, you want me to come and leave my family on Christmas morning? Yeah. And come join you and your wife with no kids. And he's like, yeah. So we meet in this park in Michigan.
I don't know why there wasn't any snow or whatever. And I pull this guitar out and walk out literally out of the trees and sing, there is a joy in the journey. And I sing a Michael Card song. I don't think I could play that on the guitar. That's a hard, you're a pretty good guitar player if you can play that on the guitar. Oh, you could play it on anything. I've seen you, I know, I've watched you play it on piano, but why didn't play it as good as Michael Card might play it, but I got it done. Well the musical key to that song is it's all black notes.
You know, the, that's joy in the journey. With your knuckles? Yeah. That's what it is?
You could play it with your fist probably if you want to. Well, Michael Card, welcome to Family Life Today. I don't know if you've been on Family Life Today before, have you?
I don't know if I have either, but I mean, I hear you on the radio in Nashville. Yeah. I can remember our second year of marriage sitting in our family room, all by ourselves, newly married, following Jesus, being missionaries. And struggling in our marriage. Struggling, but playing the hope of the words that you wrote and all of them pointed to Jesus and man, it just filled us up. So it makes me teary that we get to be here.
We saw you, I don't know, a couple of years ago in Rochester, Michigan at a little church. I'm sure you do a lot of these, but I did not know how many songs, 450 songs. Yeah, but that's in like 40 years. So that's not that many songs per year.
Here's what most people don't know. You've written a lot of books. Yeah. Yeah. How many books?
26, I think, or 27. Okay. Which is easier, to write a song? I would much rather write a book than a song. I hate writing songs.
Really? Writing a song is, I guess, we have four kids and I was there when all four of them were born. Writing a song is about like having a baby. Writing a book, because a song is concentrated and you've got three, four minutes. It's got to rhyme.
It's got to fit the melody. And a book, you have a blank page, you start with a book. And my favorite part is researching stuff. But see, I research for my songs. And in fact, that's how I started writing books. I was talking to some lady from Thomas Nelson years ago and I said, yeah, I've got all this research for my songs. But she said, why don't you write a book? And I never thought of that. So that's how I started writing books. All my heroes are book writers. They're not musicians.
Really? No, I'm Nashville. So how'd you get into music?
I mean, how did that start? Well, I did kind of grew up around it. You know, Earl Scruggs, the banjo player, his son, Randy got me into, I grew up, we had 50s bands and we had bluegrass bands. I just grew up playing. I lived in North Nashville and all my friends were the sons of musicians.
I could go over to Randy's house and play a pre-civil war Martin D 45. It was just sitting on the couch, which is why I play. I'm left-handed. I played right. I've never seen anybody do what you do.
I play right-handed guitars because of that guitar. He bought it, found it at some pawn shop for nothing. And he took it to Martin and Martin refurbished it. And they said, well, what do we ensure it for? And Martin said, there's no number. Really? It's priceless.
And they just left it out on the couch. So yeah. Am I going to play some goofy left-handed guitar when I can go play a pre-civil war Martin D 45? No, I'm glad I do that. Cause I have access to much better guitars.
Yeah. But you played left-handed guitar, but you didn't flip the strings. Dave has talked about this a lot. It's so puzzling to him. Well, that's because that guitar had regular, it was right-handed guitar.
So that's why, but how did you learn the bass notes are at the bottom? It's not hard. It's not that different.
Whatever. It's not Hendrix played that way for a while. And then he, he eventually McCartney plays left-handed. There's a bunch of left-handed flips it. Like does he split the string?
He's got the E at the top. Okay. I didn't know that. The thing is I can pick up anybody's guitar and play it. Yeah. That's good. Yeah. I'm so glad I did it because you're a genius because I'm a genius.
No, it's because I'm greedy. And I could go to Randy's house and play his D 45. But your dad was a doctor. He was a musician though. He played jazz. I didn't know that he played big band jazz, which I refer to as let's forget about World War II music. I can't stand big band jazz. His band used to practice in our basement and it's the loudest thing.
You know, 30 guys all playing horns and yeah, but yeah, my dad played, played trombone, big band jazz. What about your faith? When did that come into the picture? I came to faith when I was like eight and you know, about 13, 14 Jesus movement hit and I was part of that. I almost brought my high school Bible to show you guys. I read a book of the Bible a day for years. I found that if I could stop by what I was doing by three in the afternoon, I could generally read a book of the Bible.
And that started when you were about 14, 15. Wow. You've been talking like Genesis chapters.
Yeah. You know, if you start at three, uh, I mean, you can read most of the gospels in two hours. Look at those audio Bibles and just see how long it is to listen to it. And that, that gives you an idea about how long it is.
It takes to read it. But I did that for a long time and I was a Jesus freak. I mean, people forgot that movement happened. We were too, but we were at the end of that.
Yeah. I'm sure I probably was obnoxious and turn some people off because that's all, all I was interested in. What did your family think of that? Both of my grandfathers are preachers. My mom's dad was president of Southern Baptist Convention. So very Baptist.
Fred Brown was his name. And my other grandfather edited the Baptist hymnal, the old grain Baptist hymnals. So we were Southern Baptist boy, like through and through. And so my parents, you know, I think they were concerned that I was going a little bit, you know, kind of off, but I think all my other friends were doing drugs. And so I think they were, they were glad that, you know, Jesus was kind of my drug, but people have forgotten that time happened. But my mentor believed that in response to kind of the drug culture, which opened kind of a demonic door into the culture, he felt like God poured his spirit out in response to that. Would you call it a revival back then? Oh, it was absolutely.
I think so too. Yeah. Did you do anything like this? I guess you wouldn't because you've got preachers and you've got believers in your household. I didn't grow up in it. So when I walked in the door after receiving Jesus, I walked in like, everybody's going to hell unless they receive Jesus. No, I didn't do that.
I didn't do that. That's probably wise. It wasn't wise. But when I did tell my mother about 14 or 15, I was basically going to be a Bible teacher.
I wanted to go to school and get a degree and teaching at school someplace. My mom cried and it was, they weren't happy tears because she remembered her father and how hard it was for him being a pastor. I didn't want to be a pastor. That's not what was never interested in that, but I wanted to be a really serious Bible teacher.
And you are. Well, I don't know about that, but I was discipled by one of the greatest Bible teachers that ever lived. So give him the credit.
If anything I'm sharing is helpful. It came from Bill Lane, but my mom cried and it wasn't, it wasn't happy. And my dad was fairly ambivalent about it. He was a doctor and kind of busy and yeah. We've been listening to the first part of a great conversation we had with singer, songwriter and author Michael Card when we actually visited him in Franklin, Tennessee.
Yeah. And I know you're already getting a feel for why so many people have been impacted by Michael. And I'll tell you what, a man like Michael Card doesn't just happen. He's a great example. Isn't this true of someone who's learned to love Jesus through a process of discipleship, which is what God's plan is. You know, people have poured into him. God took this, I mean, he calls himself a Jesus freak from being a baby in Christ to maturity by giving him a spiritual mentor at just the right time. So here's more of our conversation with Michael Card. I can tell by talking to you, you love theology, the word. Well, my mentor was William Lane.
Okay. He wrote the new international commentary to Mark, which John Stott says is the finest commentary in the English language period. John Stott said that. And Bill wrote a two volume commentary on the book of Hebrews, which made all kinds of major discoveries. He figured out how to translate words that no one else had figured out how to translate. He was this genius, Harvard PhD, spoke 16 languages.
Had a photographic memory. How did you become your mentor? Well, I went to Western Kentucky University. I was majoring in forestry because I'd given up on that dream of being a Bible teacher. And I was going to be a, I was going to, I wanted a job that didn't involve people. So I wanted to do bird counts for the forestry service. That was my big plan.
And it's kind of disillusioned. And Bill had just come to Western and so I'm still a Jesus freak. And so I have to have to take a religion class.
So I take, take one of these classes. And if you're a Jesus freak in a university, the guy that teaches Bible is the enemy, right? So Bill, I, you know, I heard that he was a good, good teacher. So I take this, um, Life of Paul class or something. And he walks in the first day, sits on the corner of the desk and he said, my name is William Lane. And all you need to know about me is I'm a man under the authority of God's word.
This is secular university, Western Kentucky University. And my mouth fell open and I thought, I'm going to take every class he teaches. And I did, I was with him for six years. I was holding his hand when he died. He moved here to die. He moved to Franklin to die.
He was in Seattle, Washington at Seattle Pacific university. He calls me, he had multiple myeloma. He called me and he said, can I come to Franklin and show you how a Christian man dies? And so he moved here. He lived 18 months, uh, had a huge impact, especially in the black community because he was a reconciler on top of everything else.
When I first went to his church, it was a black, he was given leadership to a black church, Cecilia in Bowling Green. So he, he really is the person who took my life, took the pieces of the puzzle and kind of put it together. One Sunday, he comes up and he says, uh, you play the guitar, don't you Mr. Card? I said, well, yeah, Dr. Lane, but it's guitars are for attracting girls in the student center.
And he said, here's my sermon for next week. Write us a chorus. I didn't want to be a songwriter. Songwriters are losers. You grew up in Nashville. Everybody's a songwriter, but Dr. Lane asked me to write a song. You better believe I'm going to write a song.
So for six years, I was there at Western going to his church on Sunday and studying with him during the week. And basically, I mean, most of the songs I can point back to the that's some idea, Bill Lane. Do you remember the first song?
The first song was a stranger on the shore, John 21, second miraculous catch a fish. He had preached that sermon and here's the thing for all those years. He did all the work. You know, I had this great sermon with three points.
Well, those are my two of those are verses and one's going to be the chorus. And he was on top of being brilliant in terms of his scholarship. He was very creative in terms of his preaching and very quirky. Let me ask you this going back to this mentoring. I think when listeners hear that young people hear that old people hear that there's a longing in our hearts. All of us long for that person that he shaped your life.
Like who would you be without him? Yeah. So what would you say to that listener that that's longing for that and they don't have it? Well, we never at first place, we never used the word mentoring.
I didn't know. I didn't say, Dr. Lane, will you mentor me? We just spent time together. I was asking, I was doing a paper and went to his office and ask him a question about the Pharisees. And he said, well, let's take a walk on Tuesday.
I think it was Tuesday, Wednesday. Let's take a walk and we'll talk about Phariseeism. So I get to talk. I get to hear this guy talk about Phariseeism. It's incredible. What I didn't realize was he meant every Tuesday, every week. I didn't know that. And so we did. In fact, I wrote a book called The Walk. Based on this. Based on that.
Yeah. Because that's when things, I mean, really Bill Lane is the guy I said, he took, he took all these pieces of my life and put it all together. And, you know, talked to Susan to marry me and then married us. He performed the service. And I said, I was holding his hand when he died. Did he die?
Well, he died very well. Yeah. I saw how a Christian man dies. He said he was going to show you that.
Yeah. He died. Well, he had three funerals. It took three funerals to bury him. There was kind of the black community had those pastors at a funeral. And then we had a funeral at our church where he was going, Christ press. And then we all had one big together funeral.
And I think in that one, there were six or seven pastors on the podium, black and white, which Bill would have loved. And, oh, and he, and he wanted to be buried in the black cemetery in Franklin and they wouldn't let him, they wouldn't sell him a pot. So I can show you his grave.
It's right here in Franklin, right across from Kroger's, but he's buried right next to the black cemetery. And that's, that was his dream as a reconciler. I want to, you know, I want my grave to be in the black cemetery and he, we couldn't make that happen, but he was amazing.
He was an amazing person. And where did that passion from him, and you have it too, to reconcile and you write about it when you talk about it, has said, am I saying it the right way? Hesed. Hesed.
So we can jump into that a little bit. As you talk about that word. So I'm even wondering if William Lane translated that word. I would have given anything to have a discussion with him about Hesed.
We didn't, no, we didn't talk about that. We, most of our linguistic discussions were Greek anyway, but he, he could read Hebrew. He could read Aramaic.
He could read Egyptian hieroglyphics. He taught himself French in two months. He spoke French fluently. I remember one time I was writing a paper and he pulls a book in French off the shelf. You do handle French, don't you, Mr. Carter? No, Dr. Lane. I bear, you know, I struggle with English, so no, I don't read French, but that's the kind of the quirky genius that he was. But no, we didn't get to talk about Hesed.
I wish, I wish we did. We've been listening to one of my musical heroes, Michael Card, talk about spiritual mentors in his life. And I just got to say, Bill Crimmins, who mentored me in my first years in college as a new believer, if you're out there, if you're listening, thank you. You've literally changed my life.
And Michael had those kinds of people in his life as well. And they're, they're just so important. And tomorrow we get to hear him talk about Hesed Love. You're not going to want to miss tomorrow.
Okay. So we've got a special treat for you coming up. Michael Card recorded a song for the Family Life Today audience while we were with him in Nashville. And we'll get to hear that in just a few minutes. But first, you know, Dave was talking about his mentor and Michael, his influences, and no doubt, you can probably think of someone who helped you in your early years of walking with God. So why not take a moment today, maybe even right now, to reach out and say thank you for their devotion to you when you were first learning the ropes as a new believer. I know it'll bring life to them and probably a smile to your face today.
It doesn't take too long. And what a way to breathe life into someone else because they breathed in so much life to you. I'm Shelby Abbott, and you've been listening to Dave and Anne Wilson with Michael Card on Family Life Today. Michael's written a book called Inexpressible, Hesed and the Mystery of God's Loving Kindness. It really helps you to dig deeper into understanding how God really embodied compassion, mercy, and faithfulness in his own life toward us through the person of Jesus Christ. You can get your copy right now by going online to familylifetoday.com, or you can find it in the show notes.
Or give us a call at 800-358-6329 to grab your copy. Again, that number is 800, F as in family, L as in life, and then the word today. You know, hesed love, which is what we brought up today and Michael's going to talk about a little bit more tomorrow, it's a covenantal love, an unwavering, steadfast kind of love. And that's just one piece of the love puzzle that God has for us. And we really try to explore that in Family Life's all new latest marriage study, The Art of Marriage. Session one in Art of Marriage is all about unpacking this incredible love and discovering how we can mirror Christ's unconditional love for our spouse, even when it seems impossible to do so. So whether you're seeking like really fresh small group material, which I'm a small group leader in my church, and I'm always looking for that kind of stuff, or you're making decisions for your own church's next event, or you're an avid enthusiast of just transformative resources, Art of Marriage is designed to inspire and transform marriages. So you can preview session one at artofmarriage.com, or you can find more details in the show notes. Trust me, it's worth the journey.
Again, you can find a link to that in the show notes. Okay, let's hear that special song that Michael Card recorded just for the Family Life Today audience. If you are wounded, and if you're alone. If you are angry, if your heart is cold as stone.
If you have fallen, and if you are weak. Then come find the worth of God, that only the suffering you seek. Come lift up your sorrows, and offer your pain. Come make a sacrifice, of all your shame, there in your wilderness. He's waiting for you, to worship Him with your wounds, for He's wounded too. And He has not stuttered, and He has not lied. When He said, come unto me.
You're not disqualified, if you're heavy laden. You may want to depart, but those who know sorrow, they're closest to His heart. So lift up your sorrow, and offer your pain. Come make a sacrifice, of all your shame, there in your wilderness. He's waiting for you, to worship Him with your wounds, for He's wounded too. In this most holy place, He's made a sacred space, for those who will enter in, and trust to cry out to Him. And you'll find no curtain, no reason left for fear. And there's perfect freedom here, to weep every unwept tear. So lift up your sorrows, and offer your pain. Come make a sacrifice, of all your shame, there in your wilderness. He's waiting for you, to worship Him with your wounds, for He's wounded too. Family Life today is a donor-supported production of Family Life, a crew ministry, helping you pursue the relationships that matter most.
