Often attributed as “one of the best modern examples of storytelling conveying the power of the gospel”, In Christ Alone was co-written by Keith Getty and Stuart Townend. Stuart on the lyric side and Getty focusing on the melody and music. What resulted from this new found collaboration was a song that epitomised praise and worship covering the Attributes of God, Actions of God and our response for all Christ has done.
In interview with Christian Music Today, Getty says “I struggled to understand and fully embrace my faith amid an unbelieving, universalist, and multi-religious culture (when growing up in Durham, England). It was a journey to believe in the uniqueness of Christ, the Scriptures and the gospel story. By the time I came through this, my faith was stronger, and I really wanted to write songs for the Church that brought the full, rich, life-giving story of the gospel into believers’ hearts and minds.
I then had the privilege of connecting with songwriter Stuart Townend, who had penned the hymn “How Deep the Father’s Love for Us.” When we first met, there wasn’t an immediate personal connection. But we said, “Let’s write one song.” I knew I wanted the song to be story-driven, so I said, “Let’s do a song that tells the whole story of Christ coming to earth-the whole gospel story in one song. Let’s have as many verses as we want, and let’s just go for it.””
A few weeks later Getty sent Stuart some melody ideas, the first of which, penned on the back of electricity bill as a 25 year old, was a magnificent, haunting melody that Stuart loved, and he immediately started writing down some lyrical ideas on what they wanted to say, covering the life, death, resurrection of Christ and the implications of this on our lives. Throughout this process was a deep desire to dig deep into the meaning of God’s word and express it in poetic and memorable way, so that the truths of His word would remain in our minds. So that the truth about God and who we are in Him remains central to our lives as believers.
As the lyrics came to life, Stuart became all the more excited because it places our hope, our assurance, our eternal destiny in the right place—on the solid foundation of Christ. He knew in his own life he needed reminding continually not to live by his feelings or his circumstances, but by the unchanging truth of the gospel. It was an undeniable statement of the power of Christ to sustain us in this life.
They finally got together, and after some fine-tuning, In Christ Alone was born. A song abounding in biblical truths…
