I Still Believe: Walk By Faith

Pick Up Your Guitar

  Pick up your guitar. Jeremy Camp didn't want to. He didn't want anything to do with music.
  It had been two weeks since Melissa went to Heaven. His wife was only 21 and they had been married just 3 and a half months before she passed away from ovarian cancer.
He sat in the couch in His parents' living room alone in many ways. For two weeks His life had been a fog that wouldn't lift.
After everything had seemed to make sense now nothing made sense. Doctors had told them Melissa's cancer was gone. They had married with the dream of having kids and working together through ministry Him through music and Her through Women's ministry and Bible Studies.
But they barely had the chance to begin living out that dream. His Melissa was gone and He wondered where God was.
He wanted to pray but in His despair He didn't know what His own thoughts were. Whatever weak words He managed to send God's way seemed to be getting lost in the fog engulfing Him.
Do you really hear me, God?
Do you really care about every situation?
God? Are you near?
Pick up your guitar: For the first time since Melissa's death Jeremy felt like God was answering Him. His words came crystal clear to His heart.
  But He didn't want to pick up His guitar. He didn't want to go back to music, or anything He had done before. When He would write songs He would write what His heart felt. Except now He felt nothing. He was numb. He was physically and emotionally drained. He had nothing to offer.
No, Lord- no. The last thing I want to do is play my guitar.
Pick up your guitar. I have something for you to write.
  Jeremy relented and began mindlessly strumming some chords. He didn't know why He was playing, but He kept going. Then emotions began to well up within Jeremy. He felt tears forming in His eyes. Words- actual thoughts- came to Jeremy and He began to speak them as He played.
  Scattered words and empty thoughts
  Seem to pour from my heart
For the first time in two weeks, Jeremy Camp was able to express how He felt.
   I've never felt so torn before
   Seems I don't know where to start
  He quickly found a pen and notebook and returned to the couch.
But it's now that I feel your grace fall like rain
From every fingertip, washing away my pain
Jeremy jotted down the words as they continued to come to Him.
I still believe in your faithfulness
  I still believe in your truth
I still believe in your holy Word
  The words were pouring out of Jeremy Camp not from His mind but from deep within His soul.
  Even when I don't see, I still believe
  He alternated between playing the tune and writing in the notebook until He softly sang and penned the final words:
In brokenness I can see that this was Your will
for me. Help me to know you are near.
  Jeremy leaned back, struck by the words that had come to Him, and completely unaware of how God would use those words to speak through me to others who, like me, felt abandoned in life's deepest valley. Who needed hope. Who needed encouragement to allow God to dig into the depths of their souls, down to the very foundation of their faith, and then discover the resolve to decalre "I still believe!"
   Jeremy Camp wrote "I still believe" in 10 minutes. But in reality, He had been writing the song for all His life.