"You'll Come" - The Story of the Song

You’ll Come,” Story of the Song

“You’ll Come,[1]” by Brooke Gabrielle Fraser Ligertwood, known professionally as Brooke Frazer in 2007, is based on Hosea 6, especially vv. 1-3:

¹ “Come, let us return to the LORD.
He has torn us to pieces
   but he will heal us;
he has injured us
   but he will bind up our wounds.
² After two days he will revive us;
   on the third day he will restore us,
   that we may live in his presence.
³ Let us acknowledge the LORD;
   let us press on to acknowledge him.
As surely as the sun rises,
   he will appear;
he will come to us like the winter rains,
   like the spring rains that water the earth.”

Hosea is the hard but lovely story in which God commands Hosea, one of His prophets, to live out the metaphor of God’s unending love for us even though we constantly and consistently betray Him. Hosea is told to go and marry Gomer, a woman of ill-repute, which he does. True to her reputation, she continues her unfaithfulness and eventually runs off. Hosea, who has every right to have her put away (divorce) or even stoned as an adulteress, nevertheless, humiliates himself before the people and comes after her – time and time again.

The object of the living metaphor is that though we sink into sin and disgrace, as sure as the sun rises and as sure as the rain falls in Palestine in the summer and winter in the season, God will come after us. He will literally “move Heaven and Earth” to bring us back to Himself.

Brooke Fraser, born in New Zealand in 1983, has been writing and singing Christian music and some light pop music since the early 2000s. She has performed with numerous Australian and Kiwi groups, most notably, Hillsong, which has probably the best known version of this piece.

In 2006, Brooke was led to Africa where she immersed herself in Rwanda, ultimately, with her husband, Scott Ligertwood, adopting a Rwandan orphan, Albertine, about whom she wrote one of her most popular songs of the same name, Albertine, which went double-platinum in 2006. In between her musical concerts, she devotes a great deal of time to fund-raising for the children of Africa.

Hillsong’s version of this beautiful piece may be viewed at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2RmZFaruXhs

The text reads as follows:

I have decided I have resolved
To wait upon you Lord
My rock and redeemer shall not be moved
I’ll wait upon you Lord

Pre Chorus
As surely as the sun will rise
You'll come to us
As certain as the dawn appears

Chorus
You'll come let your glory fall
As you respond to us
Spirit reign flood our hearts
With holy fire again

Verse 2
We are not shaken we are not moved
We wait upon you Lord
Our Mighty deliverer my triumph and truth
I'll wait upon you Lord

Bridge
Chains be broken
Lives be healed
Eyes be opened
Christ is revealed

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[1] As a humorous aside, when I first saw this song listed in the program, I misread the title as “Ya’ll Come,” an old country sing used by Alabama’s colorful Governor of the late 1940s and early 1950s, “Big Jim” Folsom as his theme song.