Look at Me

words & music by Doug Howell • © 2021 Creative Measures LLC

put away your sentences
lay your voice to rest
keep your heart in silence
come and be my guest
turn off the radio
blaring in your ear
I’ve got so much to tell you
if you’d take the time to hear
this could be
our special day

won’t you
look at me
I’m sitting in the sun
look at me
I’m laughing as I run
all the leaves
will bow down as we pass by
follow me
I’ll teach you how to fly
I made this day especially for you

you always look at others
and take them by the hand
you tell them that you love them
get to know the ones you can
but sometimes I’m so lonesome
just to talk to you
I want so bad to hold you
but what else can I do
to make you see
how much I care?

please, please
look at me
I’m sitting in the sun
look at me
I’m laughing as I run
all the leaves
will bow down as we pass by
follow me
I’ll teach you how to fly
I made this day especially for you

listen to the wind’s refrain
the gentle summer rain
and look at me
in this moment
and say that you’ll be mine
I made this day especially for you

Reviews

What Beautiful, Heartfelt, and Anointed Words and Music… Brought tears to my eyes! He longs for us to be still and truly know Him!!! Thank You!!!!  —Yolande M.

Thanks for sharing your love for God through music ❤ —David H.

Love this song! Thank you for sharing your music with us! —Terri S. M.

Doug, your voice is as stunning as I remember in 1980. Another beautiful song! —Wray L.

LOVE every song! MAHALO for sharing. (will visit site again for sure) —Sandra N.

Absolutely beautiful. Doug the texture in this song is wonderfully constructed. I love the line “I’ll teach you how to fly”. Made me smile. Thanks —Kurt S.

Love it — good reminder that each day should be treasured, right? —Katie C.

Thank you for sharing. What a beautiful song, and you’re sounding good David ❤ —Dawn D.

I like this one a LOT! —Diane S.

2021 Notes

You may think the lyrics to this one a little strange, me imagining God saying these things to me on a fine day so very long ago. But if you think through it with me for a moment, you’ll understand it’s not so strange!

The idea that we need God goes without saying, right? But the idea that God needs us? That is foreign to most of us. I don’t mean need really so much as want. Of course, God being God, he/they (as you know, God is neither male nor female, but I’ll use “he” here) doesn’t really need anything—in the way we usually think about it, anyway.

As Paul says in his sermon on Mars Hill:

The God who made the world and everything in it, he who is Lord of heaven and earth, does not live in shrines made by human hands, nor is he served by human hands, as though he needed anything, since he himself gives to all mortals life and breath and all things. (Acts 17:24–25, NRSV)

So if God is all powerful, and doesn’t need anything, why does he continually reach out to us, to involve us in his plans? Or why create us in the first place? Could it be that he wants a relationship with us? With me? And if we’re created in the image of God, could the fact that we also need relationship be a reflection of that same need in our Creator? There are plenty of clues to this even before Jesus comes on the scene, but once he does arrive, he removes all doubt: “God so loved the world…” (John 3:16).

But even in the Old Testament, there are plenty of passages that should clue us into the fact that God has a whole range of emotions, including love for his children. Take Hosea 11 (1–4, 8–9): as an example:

“When Israel was a child, I loved him,
    and out of Egypt I called my son.
But the more they were called,
    the more they went away from me.
They sacrificed to the Baals
    and they burned incense to images.
It was I who taught Ephraim to walk,
    taking them by the arms;
but they did not realize
    it was I who healed them.
I led them with cords of human kindness,
    with ties of love.
To them I was like one who lifts
    a little child to the cheek,
    and I bent down to feed them.
My heart is changed within me;
    all my compassion is aroused.
I will not carry out my fierce anger,
    nor will I devastate Ephraim again.
For I am God, and not a man—”

When I was a traveling troubador in the 70s and 80s, I spent a lot of time on the road, and often listened to the radio or cassette player to help pass the time (and keep me awake).

And on that one fine day in 1978, I was bopping along the highway somewhere in Middle America when suddenly it just seemed as if God was telling me to turn off the music already! When I did, I realized he was there: in the sun, in the trees, in the fields, waiting for me to pay attention. Beckoning me to follow him. Wanting to spend time with me. Needing me to be a part of his plans. Challenging me to put away all else—all others—and concentrate on him. Calling me to love him first, before all the people I was on my way to sing to; to look to him, my Creator, even now, for guidance, strength and companionship on the journey.

This song grew out of that experience, and I hope it will remind you, just like it did me on that day, to look at your Creator first and foremost, to put away all that worries you, all that distracts you in your current set of circumstances, and concentrate on the one who loved you into existence. Hello, your Creator wants a relationship with you!

Music Notes

Thanks to Dan Leonhardt once again for his great guitar stylings on this one; and thanks to David Glaser for some lively vocals, too!

It was hard to find an image that conveyed the meaning of this song. Finally settled on this one from Shutterstock because it seems as if the onlooker is being teased to follow into the sunshine, into the beautiful meadow, a mysterious forest, an adventurous life. Go ahead. He made this day especially for you…