Pierced.

Driving home from Miss Jane’s service Saturday, grief was still hanging heavy in the air. Jeff and I were talking about music and a song he played reminded me of something I hadn’t heard for a while. As I hummed it, he said, “That’s ‘Pierced.’” I found it on YouTube and played it through the car speakers — it’s one I hadn’t heard since 2003, the year I gave my life to Jesus.

The opening chords hit, and suddenly I wasn’t a middle-aged woman driving home from a funeral. I was that brand-new believer again — a 33-year-old single, broke mama of two babies under three — and yet somehow freer than I’d ever been. Jesus had rescued me from so much and set me free that in those moments, the “problems” I faced didn’t even rattle me. Back then, I didn’t have a plan; I just had a Provider. I’d open my mailbox and find an insurance check from ten years ago, or a refund I never expected, and it was always more than enough. I didn’t cry so much back then; I just smiled and said, thank You, Lord.

He pursued me relentlessly every day. I’d open His Word and it felt like He was talking straight to me. Strangers would say things in passing that confirmed what I’d just read or prayed about. I can’t explain the kind of faith-building that was happening in those days—only that I knew it was Him, proving who He was to me in the most personal, abundant ways possible. I had no doubts.

It’s funny to me now that I was so free with my belief. You’d think it would be the opposite — that He’d have to gain my trust over time. But for me, it wasn’t like that at all. I knew exactly where I was when He came into my life, and I knew what bondages He broke off me in an instant. His love pierced straight through everything that had held me down. I came up from that stool where I’d been repenting a clean, brand-new woman. It was an experience I’ll never forget — and I’ll go to my grave knowing it was a true conversion, from lost to found.

Somewhere along the road — through the people hurts, the church hurts, the long prayers that seemed to hang in mid-air — I got older in my faith but tighter in my spirit. Pain has a way of building calluses you don’t notice until you can’t feel things the same way. It doesn’t mean God moved or you love Him any less; it just means life layered over that simple trust until it got hard to breathe underneath.

And yet, in His mercy, He keeps peeling it back.

Sometimes with a song.

Sometimes with loss.

Sometimes with silence that turns into presence if you stay still long enough.

Richard’s gone now. Miss Jane’s gone. Even my old kitty, Pawley, is gone. And I know God didn’t take them to reel me in; He’s not cruel like that. But He’s using their homegoings to draw me near again — to remind me that His plan has always been good, even when it feels like subtraction. He draws me to come into His peace and let go of the restraints of this earth I feel deep in my bones.

When that song played in the car, I felt it: the same Spirit that met me in my living room 22 years ago. He hasn’t changed. I just forgot how light faith feels when you stop trying to control what only He can carry.

So this is me urging you — and reminding myself — to revisit those early days of salvation. Not to live in the past, but to remember what it felt like to believe without filters. The God who provided then still provides now. The One who saved us still sustains us. King David was wise when he wrote in Psalm 51:12, Restore to me the joy of your salvation and grant me a willing spirit, to sustain me. That is my prayer today.

Maybe that’s why He lets an old song find us again — so we remember who we were when we first learned who He is.

Music has always been a huge part of my life, and the soundtrack that’s come out of my walk with Jesus is my favorite of all. God knows exactly how to reach me through a melody when words won’t come. Sometimes it’s a new song that lifts my head and leads me into worship, and sometimes — like this time — it’s an old one that brings me back to where we first met. He uses music to speak from the Father’s heart straight to mine, right when I need reminding that He’s still right here with me.

Pierced ~ Audio Adrenaline, 2003

Make me

Take me

Break me

I am pierced

Make me

Take me

Break me

I am pierced

Though I am wounded

And unworthy

Though I am selfish and untrue

You are holy

You're the healer

You forgave me

And made me new

You made me new

Make me

Take me

Break me

I am pierced

Make me

Take me

Break me

I am pierced

Oh this love how can it be

That my God would die for me

For my sins His wounds did bleed

Jesus you were pierced for me

Make me (Make me Lord Jesus)

Take me (Take me Lord Jesus)

Break me (Break me Lord Jesus)

I am pierced