Never One Time

THE STORY

This song was written in early December of 2015, quite by accident. I was playing the piano to provide background music at a viewing. After many hours of almost continuous playing, I was getting bored and started making stuff up. Quite unexpectedly, I started playing the beginning of the melody to the verses of this song. When I realized what I was playing, I grabbed my phone and started recording myself because I thought the tune would be really pretty for a song. The next morning, around 6:30 a.m., the lyrics to the verses starting coming into my head. I ran to the piano, and in the dark started singing and recording. A few of those lyrics I ended up using, but in the middle of it, I realized I’d repeated, “Never One Time” a few times, and decided it would be a cool theme for the song. I spent the rest of the day writing the lines in-between trying to do other things. That evening, after I had taken a nap, I sat down and sang it all for the first time (making up part of the tune as I went).

The only true inspiration I can claim I received for this song came from a friend who has known sorrow and pain far more deep and terrifying than most of us want to imagine. After they had walked through several dark years, my friend told me, “Jesus has been so sweet.” I wanted to include this line exactly, but could only get the line, “Never one time/ Has he been anything but precious,” to go with the rhythm of the song. This song truly came from Jesus. 

Of the few heartaches I have known in this life… looking back on moments when friends walked away and others did not understand me… taking into perspective the roads I’ve walked that have appeared obscure and abstruse… I can attest to the fact that Jesus has never forsaken, ignored, or failed me. And always, in every circumstance, I have found him to be more precious than any friend could ever be.

THE SONG

1) I have sojourned as a stranger
In a world — no friend of grace
On an ocean fraught with danger
While the darkness hid God's face
I have walked with no companions
Down a dark and lonesome path
I have gripped my trembling hands on
To the promise of the past 

2) I have wondered at His leading
Questioned if he knew my way
I have screamed His name in suffering
When that's all my heart could say
I have thought His words misleading
Thought His plans weren't for my good
And I've asked Him, disbelieving
What He meant by what He did

Ch) But never one time
Have I watched Jesus forsake me
Never one time
Has He ignored my pleas
Never one time
Has He been anything but precious
Never one time
Has Jesus failed me

3) And I have felt His hand was reaching
Past the walls that I had made
Through the fortress of my making
Toward the heart He'd made to break
And I have sensed His fingers working
Mending every broken shard
Binding wounds of His own making
Pouring oil on every part

Lyrics & music by Merilee J. Barnard © December 7, 2015