American Idol Shouts to the Lord!

So, did you catch any of Idol Gives Back last night? It was a nice evening, even though the only live part of it was the contestants and Ryan Seacrest on the phones. (Which is okay... do we really care if it's live?)

The best part was the finale. Ryan introduced the final eight, and when he said they'd be singing "Shout to the Lord" my mouth fell open. (It really did. See, this isn't a cliche - people actually do this!) I mean, this is a heavy-duty praise song. Maybe it wasn't the one I was thinking of. Maybe there was another song with the same name. And then the contestants came out and sang the whole song. Amazing. If you didn't see it, here's a YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o2OZ6xp95Xg - the video's not the greatest, but the audio is pretty clear. It still gives me goosebumps to watch it.

Over the last few weeks, I've been pleasantly surprised by the number of spiritual songs the group's been singing. Dolly week was a treasure trove of inspirational songs I'd never heard before, and when Dolly sang "Jesus and Gravity"... WOW. It was like being in a revival. Last week, Christy Lee Cook sang "Anyway" by Martina McBride. Another song that I hadn't heard before. Now they're both on my iPod.

AI did tweak "Shout to the Lord" just a bit. At the beginning, instead of singing "My Jesus" they sang "My Shepherd." Some might see this as a big deal, but I'm okay with it. My feeling is this - millions of people heard that song. Those of us who are Christian know who the Shepherd is, and the song remained just as powerful. And what about those who haven't met Jesus yet? I'm certain there are people out there who were deeply touched by the words of the song, even if they don't know why. For them, a seed's been planted. What an awesome thing that is!