The Story

I wrote Sunday Morning on November 16, 1986 when I was a few days shy of 19. This song came to me as sort of a surprise, and for that reason I've always had a unique kind of respect for it. That is to say, I remember vividly starting out to write this song primarily as an expression of self-pity. It is about a lonely person who goes to church. But as I wrote about my fictionalized self in the third person, it was as if in my prayer the Lord met me, right there, and asked me to look at my situation with different eyes. As a result, the ending of the song literally surprised me as I wrote it, and spoke to me at a very deep level of my need. Jesus essentially told me that I was not the real lonely one in a religious, communal, or social setting; it is He. He is lonely and aching for us to see Him.

The Lyrics

Sunday morning and he walks into your church

He sits in a pew towards the back

He listens to the sermon and he sings the hymns and he prays the prayers

Why still does he feel like no one here really cares

 

We go to church and we sit in our separate private clans

Unaware of the need our brother has

Do you see a tear trickle down his face

Or are you trying to soak up all God’s grace for you

 

Don’t you know that Jesus died for that one you’ve refused to see

Jesus’ love isn’t only for you and me

 

Back in church again, and yes I see him sitting there

But tell me please, what should I say

I say “good morning” look at him and I even shake his hand

I’ve done my duty, now I can be through with this man

 

Just like that I left him in my church today

Never meaning to give him a second thought

Then I looked into the hand that I shook with his a

And I saw the blood from the wounds of the nails that held him high

 

Through the eyes of the least of them

Jesus searches us

What answer will you give when he asks “where is your love.”

- See more at: http://www.mariehosdil.com/audiolyricsstories/#sthash.A5ZtNB69.dpuf