Chris Estes: 0:06

welcome back to the power song podcast. We're going to jump into a power song story with chris bell uh, my guest, who was on last week and we just want to spend some time diving deeper into a particular song and this is a powerful impact that it's had in your life and experience, or whatever that may be. So take it away, chris, just going to dive in, just dive right in.

Chris Bell: 0:30

Yeah, so I think that there is a song that has always kind of been a soundtrack for the Christian life for me and it's called For the Sake of the Call. It's an older Stephen Curtis Chapman song, but the song to me still, when I hear it, the lyrics grab me, when I was really in my formative Christian life as a young teenager, and the song is about the disciples laying down their nets to follow Jesus. It's this incredible song that he wrote, and so the chorus. So that was being poured into my mind that there was no other reason at all, but for the sake of the call, because he called, we lay it all down. And he talked about the disciples laying it down. Then he talked about us like there's nothing we shouldn't lay down for the sake of the call, that if Jesus calls we obey period. And that's where the joy is.

Chris Bell: 1:31

And for me the deep dive on that song was, uh, it would kind of answer the questions of life for me. That came along, honestly, like temptations as a teenager. You know what I mean. Um, how are you going to treat dating? Well, for me it's not what I want right now.

Chris Bell: 1:48

I have a calling on my life and Jesus has said for me to obey in this area of my life, and literally it would be like that song would pound in my mind and kind of drive me forward, and then later on, because I'm going to tell you what ministry is tough, let's be honest and ministry is so tough at times that on Mondays you're hanging by a thread and I've learned that the only thread at times I have to hang on to is my calling, because nothing else, honestly nothing else. You look around, you go, you know what. I should go do something else. When everything is so hard at times, it's not always like that. Most days are great, but when it gets there you have to remember your calling. No, god's called me to do this. And that song, all these years later, chris, resonates for me. Wow.

Chris Estes: 2:37

Wow, stephen Curtis man, what a legend and I wonder. I'd love to know the story behind that song, if he actually wrote that, because of you know, knowing.

Chris Bell: 2:49

You know I've heard him talk about it a little bit he has a great pastor, Scotty, isn't it, Scotty?

Chris Estes: 2:53

Smith, isn't that his name?

Chris Bell: 2:55

Great theologian Nashville pastor and I know that I'm pretty sure one of his sermons inspired that song because it also, I know, inspired Great Adventure. Yeah, but for me it's just you know why do we do what we do and you go okay. Why am I going to pour my life into the local church? Why do I care so much about the kingdom of God, about the gospel being preached, about people becoming disciples? You know why Come back to calling disciples. You know why Come back to calling. You can't convince me that the summer that I turned 13 in a hot little town called Kosciuszko, mississippi, at a camp, that God did not snatch me out of that place. Grab my heart and I don't get to decide what I'm doing with my life. He decided it that night.

Chris Bell: 3:43

This is what you're going to do, dude, and he gave me a passion for it and a hunger for it, and it's been hard at times. It's hard when you do the funeral of a little baby, yeah, and you don't have all the answers for the parents. It's hard when people you've poured your life into kind of turn on you or whatever it's stuff that happens, yeah, and you have to go back to for the sake of the call. For the sake of the call, I'm going to be obedient. For the sake of the call, I'm going to push forward. Yeah, you know what I mean.

Chris Estes: 4:09

Yeah, I had a guest say that his mom used to always tell him don't live below your calling. Like, are you living below your calling? Are you living to your calling?

Chris Bell: 4:17

yeah, you know, something that I'm that I'm convinced of is you should never give a small person a big job, and I don't mean small and height or stature, I'm talking about character. So I'm short, yeah, right, but you but you've got a lion inside, brother, a lion that's a whole nother story.

Chris Bell: 4:35

Yeah, okay but I also think that, um, you know that we should be big in our love and devotion to Jesus if we want to do big things for him. And I think what we tend to do is we want to write the big song or do the big thing and we don't realize that the most important thing is that our heart and our passion for Jesus be big and he'll handle that other thing. Passion for Jesus be big and he'll handle that other thing. And I just think the bigger our passion for Jesus is in devotion to him, the bigger he can use us, the bigger the doors that he can open for us will be, and so that's a big deal to me.

Chris Estes: 5:17

Man, what a great song. There you go, the Power Song Story.

Chris Bell: 5:21

Yeah, go listen to it.

Chris Estes: 5:24

Jump on Spotify and listen to. When did?

Chris Bell: 5:25

that come out. That would have been 89 or 90, but he's redone it. He's got some stuff where he's redone the song and then other people, um uh, have have done some things with it. But just go listen, you know, get over the dated sound of the music but listen to that lyric yeah it is a killer lyric wow truly awesome.

Chris Estes: 5:43

Or just rewind this podcast. Rewind it, just skip back and hear you sing, yeah but you know, I was just messing around. Chris, it's so fun, man. Thank you for letting me be on the podcast. Thanks, man appreciate it. Outro Music.