I always felt You beside me
In the songs I used to sing
In the pages full of color
Their stories meant everything

(you were never alone)

But somewhere in the growing up
The joy turned to their rules
And I started feeling smaller
In a home I thought I knew

I thought if I didn’t believe
The way they told me to
Then I must be the broken one
Maybe I had lost the truth

(I was never broken)

But You weren’t locked inside those walls
They built around Your name
I was not walking away from You
I was walking away from shame

I’m taking back my faith
Taking back my place
Taking back the light
They buried under shame
From the voices that decided
Who was worthy of Your grace
I don’t need permission
I’m taking back my faith

(taking back my faith)

The years turned into decades
And my faith began to fade
I thought I had stopped searching
Till I saw it a different way
My faith was never smaller
Than the truth I had to face
Your love was never hiding
In a perfect kind of place

I’m taking back my faith
Taking back my place
Taking back the light
They buried under shame
From the voices that decided
Who was worthy of Your grace
I don’t need permission
I’m taking back my faith

(taking back my faith)

In a children’s Bible picture
In a song that finds your soul
In the hand that lifts another
When the world has let them go
You were never bound by buildings
You were never owned by walls
If we’re searching with an open heart
You can be found in all

(found in all)

I’m taking back my faith
Taking back my place
Taking back the light
They buried under shame
From the voices that decided
Who was worthy of Your grace
I don’t need permission
You know I still lived Your way
I’m taking back my faith

(taking back my faith)

You don’t have to show up perfect
You don’t have to hide your doubt
You don’t have to clean your story
Before you can come around

Bring the questions you’ve been carrying
Bring the past they tried to shame
If you’re looking for a place to breathe
You can stand with us today

We’ve all got roads behind us
We don’t have to walk alone
If God’s love is for everybody
Then nobody gets left in the cold

So bring your heart still healing
Bring the faith you’re taking back
There’s room for the weary
Your place is here where we’re at

Welcome to God’s church of the world
There’s room for everybody still searching
Every scar and every question
Every soul they called unclean

They can own the building
But they can’t own our faith
They can lock the doors of the church
But they can’t lock us out of God’s house

You don’t have to earn your place
You don’t have to pass a test
You don’t have to prove your worth
To be counted with the blessed

We can bring our honest questions
We don’t have to wear a mask
If faith is something living
Then it lives in how we act

We’ve all got roads behind us
And stories best untold
But if God’s love is for everybody
Then nobody gets left in the cold

So bring your heart still healing
Bring the faith you’re taking back
There’s room for the wounded
We’re all taking it back

Welcome to God’s church of the world
There’s room for every heart still searching
(Every heart still searching)
Every scar and every question
Every soul they called unclean

They can own the building
But they can’t own our faith
(But not our faith!)
They can lock the doors of the church
But they can’t lock us out of God’s house

This was never theirs to hold
This was never theirs to take
Faith is bigger than control
Love is stronger than a gate

We are more than how they shamed us
We are more than where we’ve been
If God’s house is wide open
Then we’re walking back in

Welcome to God’s church of the world
There’s room for every heart still searching
(Every heart still searching)
Every scar and every question
Every soul they called unclean

They can own the building
But they can’t own our faith
(But not our faith!)
They can lock the doors of the church
But they can’t lock us out of God’s house

They can’t lock us out
They can’t lock us out
They can’t lock us out of God’s house

Church is outside their walls
Church is outside their walls
We’re all taking it back

I can put my faith in God
And still wonder what got changed
What was written from the heavens
What was filtered to the page
Was it shaped by kings and scholars
Was it bent by fear or pride

But if we spend our whole lives fighting
Over whose words came through right
We can miss the living message
Standing right there in plain sight
Every road that reaches upward
Still says care for someone

You define your faith
When the whole world turns away
When the crowd says follow
But His love says stay
You define your faith
By the stand you take
With your hands wide open
And not looking for praise

You define your faith
By the love you put in place
When you lift the ones who stumble
And give the fallen grace

I have seen the righteous gather
With their stones already raised
Calling someone else a sinner
Like their own hands deliver peace
But why choose to hate
When someone just chose
To live a different way

If they’re not hurting anyone
Who are you to care anyway
Faith ain’t following the leader
Faith is choosing who you are
When the crowd is moving left
But God keeps calling right

You define your faith
When the whole world turns away
When the crowd says follow
But His love says stay
You define your faith
By the stand you take
With your hands wide open
And not looking for praise

The strong don’t punch down on the weak
They lift them when they fall
If power only makes you cruel
Then you had no strength at all
We are more than what we claim
More than words we say we believe
If faith is alive inside us
Then His light is what they’ll see

You define your faith
When the whole world turns away
When the crowd says follow
But His love says stay
You define your faith
By the stand you take
With your hands wide open
And not looking for praise

You define your faith
By the love you put in place
When you lift the ones who stumble
And give the fallen grace

Some were raised beneath the steeple
Some beneath a far-off sky
Some were taught to call You Father
Some were left to wonder why
Some were given every answer
Before they knew to ask
Some were told the door was open
Then watched it closing fast

But if You knew every heartbeat
Before the first one ever came
If You saw where we came from
And called us all by name
Then I can’t see the mercy
In a world built like a test
Where only those who guessed it right
Are the only ones You blessed

You didn’t create us for damnation
Not born already lost
Not placed across the nations
Just to pay an unfair cost
If You knew us from our beginning
And saw every troubled heart
Then I cannot believe forever
Was a game rigged from the start

I have heard the brimstone sermons
I have felt the altar quake
I have seen them sell salvation
Like there’s only so much space
They put walls around Your kingdom
And put guards at every gate
But Your love is pure and holy
Why do they preach it like hate?

If You hear more than language
If You see behind the pain
If the soul is more than labels
And the fire is more than flame
Then I can’t call it justice
If the lost are left to burn
For living where they started
With the only lessons they could learn

You didn’t create us for damnation
Not born already lost
Not placed across the nations
Just to pay an unfair cost
If You knew us from our beginning
And saw every troubled heart
Then I cannot believe forever
Was a game rigged from the start

I’m not walking out on Heaven
I’m not turning from the light
I’m just laying down the terror
That they told me came from Christ
I still believe You see us
When we’re broken, scared, and small
But their Hell built to hold us
was never Yours at all

You didn’t create us for damnation
We were made for something more
Not a fear that keeps us crawling
But a love that opens doors
If You knew us from our beginning
Then You knew how hard we’d fall
So I won’t believe damnation
Was the reason You made us all

No, I won’t believe damnation
Was the reason You made us all

I had a Bible full of pictures
With the corners worn away
I carried it like treasure
Every Sunday school day
I knew the stories cover to cover
Had the scenes inside my head
But when I couldn’t find the verses
I heard their laughs instead

I was twelve and trying to fit in
Where everything felt plain
In a church defined by money
While I disappeared in shame
They laughed at my Bible
Like the message wasn’t the same
And the book that used to hold me
Started feeling hard to claim

I thought the message was holy
No matter what the pages wore
But they made me feel foolish
For the book I loved before
If this was meant to bring me closer
Why did it push me away?

I lost my faith
Somewhere in the shame
Somewhere in the voices
Speaking for Your name
I lost my place
I lost the will to pray
But I never stopped believing
I never lost You along the way
I lost my faith
But I never lost You
I lost my faith
But I never lost my way

I saw the Sunday hands go up
Then come down throwing stones
Heard them preach an open door
Then lock it like their home
I learned to hide my questions
I learned to play along
Still believed someone was up there
Just not the God they got wrong

I lost my faith
Somewhere in the shame
Somewhere in the voices
Speaking for Your name
I lost my place
I lost the will to pray
But I never stopped believing
I never lost You along the way
I lost my faith
But I never lost You
I lost my faith
But I never lost my way

Maybe I lost the guilt
Maybe I lost the chains
Maybe I lost the fear
They wrapped around Your name
Maybe I lost my faith
But I never lost my way

I lost my faith
Somewhere in the shame
Somewhere in the voices
Speaking for Your name
I lost my place
I lost the will to pray
But I never stopped believing
I never lost You along the way
I lost my faith
But I never lost You
I lost my faith
But I never lost my way

I thought the stain was the story
I thought the damage was truth
I thought the hands that bent the meaning
Had learned it all from You
I saw mercy used like money
I saw grace with strings attached
I saw people build a doorway
Then add a gate and charge to pass

So I stepped back from Your altar
Like leaving meant I could be free
But every time the fire touched me
It relit the ember buried in me
Maybe I was never running
From the God I used to know
Maybe I was pushed into the shadows
By the light they called Your glow

God’s not all or nothing
Faith ain’t clean or gone
I don’t have to burn the altar
Just because they were wrong
I can hate what they consider holy
I can grieve what they let fall
But God’s not all or nothing
And their stain can’t cover it all

I thought doubt meant I was faithless
I thought questions meant I’d strayed
Like every crack in certainty
Was proof I’d run away
But I was grieving something sacred
That got twisted out of shape
Trying to separate my Father
From the imposter that they made

Now I’m not chasing perfect answers
I’m not begging to belong
I can call the wreckage wreckage
Without saying You were wrong
Maybe faith was never fragile
Maybe grace was never small
Maybe all the walls they built around You
Couldn’t hold You there at all

I can leave the guilt behind me
And walk with You beside me
I can question what they taught me
And still search for what is kind
I can hold the broken pieces
Without calling them the whole
I can lose the path they showed me
And still find You in my soul

God’s not all or nothing
Faith ain’t clean or gone
I don’t have to lose the Father
Just because His children were wrong
I can hate what they consider holy
I can grieve what they let fall
But God’s not all or nothing
And their stain can’t cover it all

Their stain can’t cover it all

Monday through Friday
I’m waking before the sun
Before the world starts moving
I’m already on the run
Energy from my car’s cup holder
Prayers along the way
Trying to keep my head up
Trying to make it through the day

It’s one thing then the next
One more fire, just to earn a check
Everybody needs an answer
Everybody needs my best
So I tell myself I’m fine
Like that makes it true

I keep stacking up my evenings
Like rest is something I can still afford
But the weight keeps getting heavier
With every task and chore
I can hide it in the daylight
I can bury it at night
But sooner or later
My soul runs out of fight

It all catches up on Sunday
When the morning light breaks through
And every burden I still carried
Is still waiting in my room
I know the path is open
But I’m worn down to the bone
Sunday morning, God, I’m so tired
Give me the strength to leave this home

(strength to leave this home)
(You’re not walking alone)

Saturday morning
I should finally catch my breath
But everything I left for tomorrow
Is still waiting on the steps
Laundry in the hallway
Dishes in the sink
Half a dozen errands
And no time left to think

I call it catching up
But it feels like I’m just falling behind
By the time the sun goes down
I’ve got Sunday’s excuses on my mind

It all catches up on Sunday
When the morning light breaks through
And every burden I still carried
Is still waiting in my room
I know the path is open
But I’m worn down to the bone
Sunday morning, God, I’m so tired
Give me the strength to leave this home

(strength to leave this home)
(You’re not walking alone)

Maybe I don’t show up wide awake
Maybe I don’t look a certain way
Maybe all the burdens I carry
Are the things You want to trade
Maybe tired is not faithless
Maybe worn out is not wrong
Maybe You were waiting for me
Ready for me to come back home

It all catches up on Sunday
When the morning light breaks through
I gather up the burdens I still carried
That were waiting in my room
I see the path is open
And I’m worn down to the bone
Sunday morning, God, I’m so tired
You give me strength to leave this home

It all catches up on Sunday
But maybe that’s alright
Maybe I don’t need to be ready
To step back into the light
If the doors are really open
Then I don’t walk in alone
Sunday morning, God, I’m so tired
But You gave me strength to leave this home

(strength to leave this home)
(You’re not walking alone)
(come back home)

I used to sit beside my bed
With soldiers on the floor
Plastic heroes in my hands
Fighting bedroom wars

I told You everything
That happened in my day
Like maybe You were listening
With something wise to say

I kept waiting for an answer
Some kind of holy sign
But the ceiling stayed above me
And the silence stayed mine

I knew what ignored felt like
So Your silence, I didn’t mind
But when I finally lost my faith
The only voice that stopped was mine

I had conversations with my Dad
On a bedroom floor at night
A toy box full of questions
And my eyes up in the sky

I kept talking through the silence
Like You heard what no one had
Maybe I was lonely
Maybe I had faith
Maybe both were all I had

Then I grew into those questions
Started searching through the walls
And the God I thought I knew
Was nowhere to be found at all

The room stayed just as silent
As it always had somehow
But I’m learning silence then
Doesn’t mean You left me now

Maybe I blamed You for a love
That someone else withheld
Maybe I called Your silence empty
Because silence was all I felt

But just because You’re my Father
Doesn’t make You my Dad
You didn’t stop loving me
Just because he never had

I still have conversations with You
But not like I did back then
No soldiers on the carpet
No pretending I understand

I keep talking through the silence
Now I know who I’m talking to
One conversation ended
But I still talk to You

One conversation ended
But I still talk to You

There’s a man outside the market
With his whole life in a bag
People step around his sorrow
Like they could end up just as sad
There’s a girl beneath the streetlight
With her jacket pulled in tight
Hoping she can disappear
And make it through the night

I used to think that mercy
Was a word we said in prayer
But it means a whole lot less
If it just hangs in the air
If grace is only spoken
From a safe and distant place
Then maybe it was never grace
(never grace)

God loves us all
Not just the clean and the certain
Not just the ones inside His walls
Not just the good and deserving
God loves us all
The bruised, the blamed, the barely standing
The ones we cross the street to miss
Still reaching for a hand
What good is a life lived punching down
When you could be lifting up?
If God loves us all
Then who are we to judge
(Who are we?)

Who would choose the harder road
The sideways glances, whispered names
Who would risk the thrown stones
Just to fit inside their frame
Who would choose the dirty looks
The empty chair back where they grew
The prayers that sound like loaded guns
From the ones they thought they knew

Maybe they were never broken
Maybe we were looking wrong
Maybe God was standing with them
Where we said they don’t belong
If their truth costs them everything
Just to live without the mask
Who are we to call that sin
When love was all He asked?
(all He asked)

God loves us all
Not just the clean and the certain
Not just the ones inside His walls
Not just the good and deserving
God loves us all
The bruised, the blamed, the barely standing
The ones we cross the street to miss
Still reaching for a hand
What good is a life lived punching down
When you could be lifting up?
If God loves us all
Then who are we to judge
(Who are we?)

We were not given eyes
Just to judge someone’s life
We were not given hands
Just to point out every flaw
We were not given faith
To turn it into chains
We were not given grace
To make somebody ashamed

Let my life be weighed
By the shelter that I gave
By the hungry that I fed
By the lonely I stayed with
Let my faith be judged
By the mercy in my blood
Not the people I condemned
But the ones I lifted up
(lifted up)

God loves us all
Not just the clean and the certain
Not just the ones inside His walls
Not just the good and deserving
God loves us all
The lost, the blamed, the barely standing
The ones we cross the street to miss
Still reaching for a hand
What good is a life lived punching down
When you could be lifting up?
If God loves us all
Then who are we to judge
(Who are we?)

If God loves us all
Let’s not be the judge

You knew where to cut
You knew where it hurt
You left me standing
With the weight of your words
I wanted thunder
I wanted flame
I wanted you feeling
Exactly the same way

But anger comes easy
And mercy hits hard
I could have struck back
But who benefits from scars?

Anger clenched my hand
But I found the strength to stay
I had the chance to get even
I wasn’t too far gone that day
You gave me every reason
To leave you where you lay
But faith gave me strength enough
To help you on your way

I won’t say I’m harmless
I won’t say I’m fine
I won’t hand you my trust
Like it heals overnight
But I saw you falling
With nowhere left to stand
Mercy looked different
When I reached out my hand

Cause grace isn’t easy
And mercy hits hard
But holding hate closer
Keeps you living in the dark

Anger clenched my hand
But I found the strength to stay
I had the chance to get even
I wasn’t too far gone that day
You gave me every reason
To leave you where you lay
But faith gave me strength enough
To help you on your way

I don’t need bitter distance
To keep from wishing you pain
I can choose what is healing
Without feeding the flame

Anger clenched my hand
But I found the strength to stay
I had the chance to get even
I wasn’t too far gone that day
You gave me every reason
To leave you where you lay
But faith gave me strength enough
To help you on your way

Faith gave me strength enough
To help you on your way