Make Me a Channel (Prayer of St. Francis)

Sarah Hart

Artist Reflection

Oh, how I love St. Francis!

First of all, let's just say the man was a genius. :) This prayer was one of my grandmother's favorites, and I remember singing the song in church all through my growing years. But, unfortunately, I recall always being rather bored with the musical setting! Oh, forgive me; perhaps I just never heard it done well. I just loved the prayer so much, however, that I wanted to try my hand at writing some new music, which I boldly did years later.

I remember writing this song a few weeks after my husband and I had moved into our first house, and I was sitting on the couch in our living room, looking around at the wreckage (it was a fixer-upper) and feeling overwhelmed about all we had to do. We were also struggling through an ordeal with rather difficult next-door neighbors (drug dealers!), and I was trying to wrestle that in my mind, how to be Jesus in such a maddening (and dangerous) situation. So I ignored the housework, and wrote. That's when the music for "Make Me A Channel" came. The prayer seemed fitting to what was going on in our lives at the moment.

As an aside (and to encourage budding guitarists), I was also just learning to play guitar at the time, and I remember not being able to make my fingers do what I heard in my head. That was so totally frustrating!

I think my favorite part of the song is

Father, grant that I may never seek
so much to be consoled, as to console
to be understood as to understand
to be loved, as to love with all my soul.

I wanted those words to have a musical setting that bothered the ear (I threw in a few very strange chords) because those words are a bit bothersome/very hard to practice! It's that "dying to self" thing for the good of others — I find that INCREDIBLY difficult in my own life. I wanted that to really be highlighted.

Thanks, St. Francis, for this brilliant prayer, on being like Jesus.

- Sarah Hart