After earning his 12th No. 1 hit, and his fourth consecutive one, with “Me On Your Mind,” Matthew West is back with a new song and video. The father of two just released “How Good of God,” a song that was inspired by one of his daughter’s burdened outlook on life during the pandemic.
“One day during the height of the pandemic my wife noticed a piece of paper on the nightstand next to my daughter’s bed,” West recalls. “She had written a list of everything that was going wrong in our world at the time. My wife showed the list to me and it broke our hearts to think that our little girl is going to bed with so much bad news on her mind. So, the next day we decided we would sit down together as a family and make a different kind of list.
“We took turns talking about something good in our lives, something we are thankful for, something that brings us joy,” he continues. “The craziest thing happened! That list we made was much longer than the list of troubles. That experience inspired me to sit down and write ‘How Good of God.'”
West’s wife, Emily, also helped convince him to write “Me On Your Mind” as well.
“I remember telling my wife the idea of this song about how God has us on his mind while we were on a walk one day,” West remembers. “I was looking ahead as we walked down the road and didn’t hear much of a response from her. But when I turned to look at her, she had tears in her eyes and quietly said, ‘You need to write that song.’ It was a rare moment when I could tell a song was going to be special even before it was finished. It’s exciting to see the song resonate in a similar way with so many people and I hope all who hear it will be powerfully reminded that no one is just a face in the crowd. We are known, seen, listened to, and loved by the God of all grace.”
West will likely perform both sogns during his own headlining A Night of Worship at the Mother Church with Matthew West and Friends, held at the Ryman Auditorium on August 21. All of West’s music and tour dates can be found at MatthewWest.com. Tickets for West’s headlining Ryman show are available at Ryman.com.