Actually, I hadn’t even played guitar before. In my senior year of high school, I was thrown out of a flipping vehicle, and broke my back in a couple places, and my head. I was in Intensive Care; they thought I was going to die and all that. So I was laid up for a month on my back and thought, I’m not gonna be able to play sports my whole life. Maybe I should think about playing an instrument. So I asked for a guitar for Christmas, and that’s how I got started.

But you were a believer at the time of your accident?

Yeah, the summer before that I actually had a really significant spiritual experience. I grew up in Christian school, which can really promote a lot of lethargy in you somehow. But I went to this magnet art program for a month that summer and was surrounded by non-believers. Well, I shouldn’t say non-believers because everyone believes in something. But I was surrounded by people who don’t believe in Christ, and I found myself defending my beliefs very strongly.

It forced me to see how much I really believed it. Right after that real spiritual wake-up that summer, He sealed the deal by showing me, “Remember, you can die anytime that I want you to die.” So my life verse after that accident was from Job 34, where it says, “If God withdrew His spirit and breath, all mankind would die.” People say to me, “I wish I had an experience like that,” but to that I say, “If you’re here, the only reason you’re alive is because God is saying, ‘Breathe.’”

Well, I guess that explains the strong theme of surrender that runs through Over and Underneath.

I think it woke me up to the fleeting nature of this world and everything in it. In Hebrews 10, it says that Moses regarded the reproach of Christ to be of greater worth than the treasures of Egypt because he was looking forward to the reward. The Bible says, “Consider, oh man, that you are just a vapor.” We’re here for just a little while, and when you really start to grasp that, it’s easier to place your treasure in things other than this world. It’s a treasure-delighting issue, at its very core.

We are made for pleasure, you know. Blaise Pascal even said that everything that a man does is motivated by his desire for joy. Even a man who kills himself does so because he thinks that’s going to give him freedom. To quote C.S. Lewis, “It’s not that our desires are too strong; they are too weak, for we are far too easily pleased.”

Wow, you love to talk about the Word, don’t you?

Oh, come on.

That’s a beautiful thing. I know you’re doing some writing now, too. I guess it’s the overflow of your heart to teach.

And here’s the temptation: why do I write? Jesus said, “Come to me, all you who are thirsty, out of you will flow rivers of living water.” Is my writing, my song-playing, a grateful reaction to the mercy I’ve been given in Christ? Is Christ using me, or am I using Christ? As we get more attention, I’ve found that is the temptation. Now I can put it on cruise control, and I can use Christ to write songs and get popular and make everybody love me. One of the songs on the record is called “Satisfy,” and it says, “Satisfy me in the morning with Your unfailing love.” Otherwise I’m going to look elsewhere to get my validation and satisfaction.

I know exactly what you’re saying, and I think we all struggle with that question to some degree. I can become tricked or lured into spending so much time checking my own heart, that without realizing it, my attention can become completely focused on myself. I finally had to come to the point of trust, of trusting the Lord Himself to keep me in check.

The point of the gospel is not to think higher or lower of yourself. The point of the gospel is to think of yourself less.

Exactly. That’s real humility, focusing more on Jesus than ourselves.

My friend always says the world is like a magnet, pulling you away from God and on to yourself, but Christ frees us finally from that constant struggle.

I wanted to close, Mike, by congratulating you on your engagement. That was a beautiful story that you shared online about your proposal, and I hope it’s OK to ask you this, but did you really wash her feet in the course of the evening that you proposed? I was really moved that you recognized the spirituality of that moment.

Yes, I did because it says, “Husbands, love your wives as Christ loved the church.” Christ washed the disciples’ feet, so if I’m going to love my wife the way that Christ loves me, then I need to out-serve her.

That’s the right attitude to go in with. When are you getting married?

May 4.

Oh, awesome, congratulations!

Thank you, I’m very excited.

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**This interview first published on Crosswalk.com on May 14, 2008.