There are times when our inadequacies for ministry can be overwhelming. This song came while I was experiencing the pain of someone rejecting God. The knowledge that without God, people are truly lost fills me with great sorrow. And this particular incident drove me to sleepless nights on my knees crying out to God and pleading with Him for this person’s soul.

This kind of pain can make us question whether we should persist in ministry. During this time, I realised that my pain and fervent prayer was a sharing in Christ’s sufferings and the Holy Spirit’s groanings for all who do not have hope in God. Some reject God knowingly, but many do not even have the chance to accept and receive God through Jesus Christ by the Holy Spirit because they have never heard the Good News of salvation. So many are waiting to hear God speak to them through His Word, and so many don’t have even one verse of Scripture in their language. Could I just walk away from God’s calling because of my own pain and feelings of inadequacy? May it never be!

In determination, I gritted my teeth in prayer and cried out – I will not give up God, because You never give up on us. You are working even now – I believe it! I am Yours, use me, shape me, lead me.

Over the next week, the comfort God gave me through His Word was extraordinary. Passages came up in my reading plans that addressed my deepest doubts and fears and drew me into an even deeper commitment to God and the task of sharing His Word with others.

For a long time, I had been asking God for a song that matched with some of my favourite verses in Isaiah 55 – verses 10 and 11 which say (NLT):
10 “The rain and snow come down from the heavens
and stay on the ground to water the earth.
They cause the grain to grow,
producing seed for the farmer
and bread for the hungry.
11 It is the same with my word.
I send it out, and it always produces fruit.
It will accomplish all I want it to,
and it will prosper everywhere I send it.

After such an intense time of hurting, prayer, and healing through God’s Word, God answered my prayer with this song. It remains the vision and prayer of my heart.

By the way, several months after this song was written, the person I was lamenting over and praying for has begun their journey back to God. God is faithful to continue to tend to the seed that He plants in people’s hearts. Sometimes it takes some serious work on His part. But He hears our cries for the lost, and He seeks them out by His Word. May we continually pour out our hearts to Him and do all we can to get His Word into people’s hands and hearts.