Okay, so there’s this song… but more about that in a minute.
If you haven’t discovered Animoto yet, you need to check it out. This online service can take your pictures and/or video clips and produce killer videos. You can do a 30-second piece for free, or for a modest annual membership fee, get unlimited full-song-length videos. The program generates it for you. You can upload your own music or choose from their impressive library. You can then share your masterpiece with friends and family, or, if you want to improve on it, click on the re-do button and let Animoto give it another whirl.
So with the birth of our grandson and our granddaughter coming to visit for Spring Break this week, cameras have been clicking left and right. So I started tinkering around with Animoto to see what it could do.
It was then I discovered the song.
Written and performed by Mike Schmid, who tours with Miley Cyrus as her pianist, the song is actually a couple of years old, but somehow never made it onto my radar. But it sure got my attention and captured my heart.
Most days I track pretty well with Mr. Rascal and Mr. Flatts and that whole “Everyday Love” kind of thing. But life sometimes hands you those special moments. Moments when your heart is so full, you want to find the Grand Gesture. To write the song to end all love songs, or to perform something so spectacular, every other expression of love would be compared to that.
Wedding days or proposals are like that. Or the birth of a child. Or that child-now-adult’s wedding day. Or the birth of their child (grandparenthood rocks). Or sometimes it’s a moment in-between the big momentous events. But what they all have in common is that you have a full heart, but lack the words or the power to express the depth of feeling.
As a believer in Jesus, the ultimate expression of that is something we call “worship.” It’s when we recognize, in the words of another song from long ago, the grandest expression wouldn’t be enough “to buy one splinter of the tree that Jesus died on.”
Talk about the ultimate Grand Gesture. We’ll never top that.
And that’s what I love about “To Show You My Love.” It beautifully and creatively expresses the desire, but recognizes that our greatest expressions in moments like that just aren’t enough:
If I could make all the mountains spell your name
And all the old streetcars dance in the rain
And promise to hold you for all my days
It wouldn’t be enough
To show you my love
There’s a wonderful application of the whole song to our relationship with the Lord here.
And if you want to hear more of Mike Schmid’s music, you can check out his web site (linked above) or his MySpace page here. You can download his music on iTunes, and you should.
But here, with a little help from Animoto, Mike Schmid, and two beautiful children, is my latest experience of when life and love come calling, and words just aren’t enough.