It’s been seven months since our first album, SEVEN, was released to the world.
If you’ve followed us for any amount of time, you’ve probably heard a lot about this idea of SEVEN being special to us. We’re even welcoming a seventh human male to the group this month. His new parents are really excited that, in a few short weeks, they’ll get to hear him singing at the top of his lungs.
All night. The highest notes he can find.
We didn’t just call the album SEVEN because we tried like six times to record it before we succeeded or even because we had been together as a band seven years before it released. The basic point for us is this: we’re six guys and Jesus is the seventh.
And, yes, Bible college nerds, we believe in the Trinity, but God refers to Himself as One even though He is three persons. And NINE just feels weird.
All throughout scripture you see this theme: things are done in sets of seven. Supposedly, a period of seven years to an ancient Hebrew was akin to our decade. We tend to separate things into tens. God taught them to separate things into sevens.
We see in Matthew 1 that from Abraham to Jesus was three sets of fourteen generations. Three sets of two sets of seven. Naaman was instructed to wash in the Jordan river seven times to receive his healing from leprosy. The woman at the well in John 4 had five husbands before, she was currently with a sixth she never married, and here she sat before the Seventh.
My personal belief is that one of the reasons God did this was to constantly remind us of where we came from: that everything began with a seven.
The creation narrative is actually very fascinating when you look at it. Six days He spent creating and on the seventh day He rested from His work. It actually doesn’t say He ever stopped resting from His works. It seems as though He is still at rest.
Are you?
Hebrews 4 begins to unpack this idea: “there doth remain, then, a sabbatic rest to the people of” Ugh. Sorry. I keep hitting the KJV button.
“There remains, then, a Sabbath-rest for the people of God; for anyone who enters God’s rest also rests from their works, just as God did from his.” - Hebrews 4:9-10
That’s the call. Just stop trying. Give up on your way and let Him do His thing. He’s way better at it than you.
Theologically speaking: you’re not useless, you’re just not good at anything.
Kind of like a cat.
Jesus made this amazing offer while on the earth: “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.” - Matthew 11:28.
The promise the Seventh makes is that you can have rest. He doesn’t promise an easy life with rainbows and unicorns all the time. He may give it at times, He may not. He promises rest in the midst of your toughest challenge. He promises that your heart can be at ease when it shouldn’t be. He promises the ability to sleep in a storm if you’ll recognize who the wind and waves obey.
Hebrews 4 ends with the writer speaking about the immensity of what Jesus did for us and how that applies to us: “Let us then approach God’s throne of grace with confidence, so that we may receive mercy and find grace to help us in our time of need.” - Hebrews 4:16.
Did you see that? You get to rest because of what King Jesus did for you, and that simple act of resting in Him allows you to enter God’s presence and ask for what you need. Your body, soul, and spirit get to enter into rest simply because you welcomed in the Seventh.
You doing nothing gets you everything.
It’s like being the ugly guy with no useful skills who marries the smoking hot, super smart girl whose parents own a billion dollar tech company and just died and left all of their wealth to you because they have no other sons, but their will doesn’t require you to work, they just want you to pursue your dream as a Fortnite master and before they died, they taught their daughter how to cook like a champ and all she wants to do is dote on you and cheer you on in your digital battles.
Can you imagine that? A hot wife, no financial concerns, and no in-laws.
No in-laws. That’s the dream.
Also, I forgot to mention: I, Zack Happy Hawes, am the one writing this and take full responsibility for any and all repercussions from my words.
Misogyny and Soceraphobia aside: The whole point of this album is how broken we are without Him. We’re incomplete without the Seventh. That’s what we wanted the lyrics of this album to reflect.
So low is where I found myself.
I’ve been running around lost in my own devices.
Flatlined, I lost it all again.
Oh oh oh oh. Ay ay ay ay.
The point of this album is that we were weary and burdened before the Seventh. We had no rest. We lived in failure. We were sinners.
But we’re not sinners anymore. We may still sin at times. We may still fail at times. We may still mess up. But the title of “sinner” was removed at the cross. That’s not who we are anymore.
“Do you hear me? I’m not afraid anymore!” - Kevin McCallister
We became saints and sons when the Seventh stepped in. Calling ourselves any less than what He chooses to call us is identity fraud. He gets the last word on His creation.
We’re six sons choosing to rest in His victory over our brokenness. Choosing to walk as Saints and Sons rather than the sinners we were before His rest came in.
Join us if you haven’t already.
- WE ARE ONE
PS - You can also be a daughter. That’s super dope too.
PPS - SEVEN is $6.99 on all major digital music outlets now. See what we did there? We actually tried to make it $7 flat but the CEO of Apple refused to change their pricing structure just for us. And now somebody’s getting their birthday present returned.
PPPS - Don’t be mad at me, Zack Happy Hawes. The in-law discussion is new for me. But I meant every word and should be dealt with accordingly.
PPISSIPPI - We know He’s not the Seventh. He’s the first. “It’s a metaphor, ham-head.” - Lawrence Van Dough
