I decided to write a song each month this year after watching a video blog titled “Make More Music This Year With These 3 Mindset Shifts” from the Recording Revolution. The process of doing a song each month puts you on the clock and forces to work faster. I have learned a lot about mixing since January.  I learned a lot about arranging this month. I must have changed the song 4 times. After a friend listened to the song and gave me comments I changed it again.

My plan for August was to do an acoustic guitar – praise style song taken from an old hymn. The song for August I titled “Tremendous Cost”.

The words for this song are taken from the original version of “I Could Not Do Without Thee” written by Miss F. R. Havergal (1836-1879). There are other version of this song were other people added additional verses and arrangements.

During my search for a song, the title of this song caught me eye, but I fell in love with the lines “Whose precious blood redeemed me, At such tremendous cost!”  While trying to revise this song, I wrote a new verse and bridge, but it was not right. After a number of versions I finally decided to use the first and third section of the original song. I used first section of the original song as a chorus in the second part of the song and the verse I wrote became the bridge.

While trying to write a chorus for this song I started looking for examples of the cost for redemption in the bible. I have some notes below that talk about the cost for redemption.

I Could Not Do Without Thee
By Miss F. R. Havergal (1836-1879)
Meter: 7.6.7.6.7.6.7.6.

I could not do without Thee,
O Savior of the lost,
Whose precious blood redeemed me
At such tremendous cost!
Thy righteousness, Thy pardon,
Thy precious blood must be
My only hope and comfort,
My glory and my plea!

Why will you do without Him?
The word of God is true:
The world to doom is passing,
And you are passing too.
It may be no tomorrow
Shall dawn on you or me;
Why will you risk the peril
Of lost eternity?

But with Him—O, with Jesus!
Are any words so blest?
With Jesus, joy unending,
And everlasting rest!
With Jesus—hearts now empty
Filled with His perfect love;
His perfect peace each moment,
Till perfect bliss above

Tremendous Cost
By Miss F. R. Havergal (1836-1879)
Arranged by William Mitchell

I could not do without Thee,
O Savior of the lost,
Whose precious blood redeemed me
At such tremendous cost!
Thy righteousness, Thy pardon,
Thy precious blood must be
My only hope and comfort,
My glory and my plea!

But with Him—O, with Jesus!
Are any words so blest?
With Jesus, joy unending,
And everlasting rest!
With Jesus—hearts now empty
Filled with His perfect love;
His perfect peace each moment,
Till perfect bliss above

I could not do without Thee,
O Savior of the lost,
Whose precious blood redeemed me
At such tremendous cost!

God sent him for our salvation
At such tremendous cost!
He suffered pain and rejection
In shame he died on the cross

I could not do without Thee,
O Savior of the lost,
Whose precious blood redeemed me
At such tremendous cost!

I could not do without Thee,
O Savior of the Cross
Whose precious blood redeemed me
Whose precious blood redeemed me
Whose precious blood redeemed me
At such tremendous cost!

Notes about the cost of salvation

Numbers 18 (New International Version (NIV))
Duties of Priests and Levites

4 “Everything in Israel that is devoted[b] to the Lord is yours. 15 The first offspring of every womb, both human and animal, that is offered to the Lord is yours. But you must redeem every firstborn son and every firstborn male of unclean animals. 16 When they are a month old, you must redeem them at the redemption price set at five shekels[c] of silver, according to the sanctuary shekel, which weighs twenty gerahs.
17 “But you must not redeem the firstborn of a cow, a sheep or a goat; they are holy. Splash their blood against the altar and burn their fat as a food offering, an aroma pleasing to the Lord. 18 Their meat is to be yours, just as the breast of the wave offering and the right thigh are yours.19 Whatever is set aside from the holy offerings the Israelites present to the Lord I give to you and your sons and daughters as your perpetual share. It is an everlasting covenant ….
….
2 “‘The Levites always have the right to redeem their houses in the Levitical towns, which they possess. 33 So the property of the Levites is redeemable—that is, a house sold in any town they hold—and is to be returned in the Jubilee, because the houses in the towns of the Levites are their property among the Israelites. 34 But the pastureland belonging to their towns must not be sold; it is their permanent possession.
35 “‘If any of your fellow Israelites become poor and are unable to support themselves among you, help them as you would a foreigner and stranger, so they can continue to live among you. 36 Do not take interestor any profit from them, but fear your God, so that they may continue to live among you. 37 You must not lend them money at interest or sell them food at a profit. 38 I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of Egypt to give you the land of Canaan and to be your God.
39 “‘If any of your fellow Israelites become poor and sell themselves to you, do not make them work as slaves. 40 They are to be treated as hired workers or temporary residents among you; they are to work for you until the Year of Jubilee. 41 Then they and their children are to be released, and they will go back to their own clans and to the property of their ancestors. 42 Because the Israelites are my servants, whom I brought out of Egypt, they must not be sold as slaves. 43 Do not rule over them ruthlessly, but fear your God.
44 “‘Your male and female slaves are to come from the nations around you; from them you may buy slaves. 45 You may also buy some of the temporary residents living among you and members of their clans born in your country, and they will become your property. 46 You can bequeath them to your children as inherited property and can make them slaves for life, but you must not rule over your fellow Israelites ruthlessly.
47 “‘If a foreigner residing among you becomes rich and any of your fellow Israelites become poor and sell themselves to the foreigner or to a member of the foreigner’s clan, 48 they retain the right of redemption after they have sold themselves. One of their relatives may redeem them: 49 An uncle or a cousin or any blood relative in their clan may redeem them. Or if they prosper, they may redeem themselves. 50 They and their buyer are to count the time from the year they sold themselves up to the Year of Jubilee. The price for their release is to be based on the rate paid to a hired worker for that number of years. 51 If many years remain, they must pay for their redemption a larger share of the price paid for them. 52 If only a few years remain until the Year of Jubilee, they are to compute that and pay for their redemption accordingly. 53 They are to be treated as workers hired from year to year; you must see to it that those to whom they owe service do not rule over them ruthlessly.
54 “‘Even if someone is not redeemed in any of these ways, they and their children are to be released in the Year of Jubilee, 55 for the Israelites belong to me as servants. They are my servants, whom I brought out of Egypt. I am the Lord your God.

John

16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. 19 This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed.21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God.

Matthew 16:21
[ Jesus Predicts His Death ] From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that he must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, the chief priests and the teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.