Brother

words & music by Doug Howell (10/73)

brother
I have written so many songs
in my day
but you know I’d give
them all away if I could only
find a simple way
to make you understand
how I feel today

brother
you know I felt just like a song that came too soon
and no one ever sang it quite in tune
I can’t forget the day
God gave me you
cause no one ever sang
that song like you can do

sometimes I think that you must have been there
when God made the world
cause I could swear
I’ve seen his sunlight
shining in your eyes
and I could swear
it’s his life that I feel
each time you smile

oh, brother
if a tree could keep from reaching for the sky
and if a bird could tell how it feels to fly
then I could sing to you
the reason why
I love you so
and need you so
then maybe I could
sing the reason
why

1975 Notes

I often find myself at a loss for words. Most often, he fills me with silence, but some of these times, as in this case, he fills my heart with a song.

II Samuel 1:26

2005 Notes

There’s a sense in which you can’t fully know God without someone else. The Body of Christ is made up of many parts. Only when all the parts do their parts can there be real fullness. Watchman Nee has a lot to say about that.

I guess the time when I wrote this was so magical because I’d never known before what it was like to really share God’s love with someone else. I’d known the longing, but not the sharing. Not with someone so close. I’d always been a dreamer, but on my own. Up in a tree somewhere. Now there was someone else to dream with. And someone to sing to.

The II Samuel reference? That would take a whole book. But the short version is this: I think I used to use that verse as a sort of proof text. Irrefutable, biblical evidence that I wasn’t crazy after all. That there really was a love as deep as the love I felt, a love as unlike the typical boy-girl thing I saw happening all around me. A love well worth dreaming about and praying for and waiting for.