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FamilyChristian.com: "Wait for Me" could end up being your career song. Why do you think that song has resonated with so many people?

Rebecca St. James: It's such a key issue. Every young person deals with the issue of sexual purity. Parents are very interested in that subject because they want to encourage their kids in the right way. Even married people, I think, relate to that song because it's a song about commitment. It's a song about celebrating Christian marriage, and the joy of it. I'm passionate about wanting to help save young people from making a really bad decision and save them from a lot of agony. I've had so many young people come up and say, "Hey, I so wish I'd waited. Tell people not to make the mistake I've made." And then I've had their young people who are now married and they waited and they're like, "It's so great. I'm so glad we waited. You can do it!" The other thing I talk about is second chances and that's what the song talks about too. If you've made a mistake, there's forgiveness, there's a second chance from now on and so it's a song of hope as well.

FamilyChristian.com: And how are you going to delve deeper into that topic with your book, Wait For Me?

Rebecca: I think one of the things that people liked about the song "Wait For Me" is that it's personal. Girls adopt that song as their own. One of the things I want to carry into this book is to make it very personal. I'm going to interview different people: married people in my life that I respect, that have stood strong and waited; people who haven't waited and what they learned, what they would say to people now and what protective mechanisms, or boundaries they can put in place to help them wait. I want it to be very practical but very real. I want to share stories and different things that have happened in my life that have brought me to a place where I'm so passionate about this.

FamilyChristian.com: Speaking of books, what are you reading now?

Rebecca: I'm reading Blessed Child by Bill Bright and Ted Dekker. It's a novel. I'm also reading What the Bible Says About Healthy Living. It's really good.

FamilyChristian.com: Going back to the song, "Wait For Me," tell me about singing at the funeral service of Cody Prosser.

Rebecca: Cody Prosser was one of the guys killed in Afghanistan by a stray bomb. Two days before the memorial service, his widow's parents emailed me and said, "Could you come to the memorial service because our daughter would really love you for you to sing 'Wait For Me.'" We didn't know why she chose "Wait For Me" since it's really a song about purity and she was already married. But what had happened was that the last gift Cody gave his wife right before he left for Afghanistan was my Transform CD and "Wait For Me" was apparently their song. It was very, very meaningful to her so at the last minute we cancelled all that I had on that day and caught a flight out to L.A. We got there and she just beamed. She was so grateful that we'd come and sing that song for her because it was so meaningful to her. It was a reality check for me too, to have everything put in perspective by seeing someone who just lost her husband and what she's going through.

FamilyChristian.com: That must have been a pretty emotional moment.

Rebecca: She was just like, "Thank you so much." It was also powerful because there were different speakers sharing and one of the guys said, "The courageous don't live forever but the timid never live at all." There were moments like that that were really powerful and I felt personally challenged to not live in fear but to really live in trust and faith in God. That's what Shawna, his wife, is going to have to do. She's going to have to really trust God like she never has before.

FamilyChristian.com: Did you have an opportunity to talk to her?

Rebecca: Yes. They were only married for three years and they only became Christians within the last couple of years. She was so graceful and peaceful throughout the whole thing.

FamilyChristian.com: Let's talk about the new record. If you were going to write a review for Worship God, how would you describe it?

Rebecca: Passionate edgy pop-rock with half of the album full of songs people would be familiar with from church and then half brand new, fresh worship songs.

FamilyChristian.com: Tell me about recording "It Is Well."

Rebecca: On the morning of September 11, I was flying back from Orlando to Nashville to record tracks for the album. I only found out after I'd landed what had gone on in New York and in the different places and I was quite overwhelmed about it. I had people calling up, because I was flying at the time, saying, "Are you okay? I'm really worried about you." So it was kind of an emotional day, as it was for everybody. I went straight to the studio from the airport and I was meant to do vocals. I'm sitting there going, "How am I going to do vocals on a day like this?" So I thought, "Well, what song could I do?" Matt, my producer, asked me, "What song do you want to do?" The only one that really seemed fully appropriate was "It Is Well." It just seemed so appropriate. I think when that guy wrote that, hadn't he just lost his family?

FamilyChristian.com: Yes, he [Horatio G. Spafford] and his family were emotionally drained after his son died and he lost much of his business assets in the Great Chicago Fire. To get away, he planned to take his family to Europe. Last minute business delayed him, so he sent his wife and four daughters on ahead. The ship sank and all four daughters drowned. As he crossed the ocean to meet his wife, he sailed past the place where he lost his daughters. In the midst of his mourning, he wrote "It Is Well With My Soul."

Rebecca: Oh, that is amazing. I'm getting chills. But I knew that the song was written in a time of grief and horrible fear and hurt but with God's peace amidst that. And His peace, His love casts out that fear that he would have been feeling about facing the future alone. And so that song, knowing that the world can seem to be falling apart but it is well with my soul because God is with me.

FamilyChristian.com: So in addition to "It Is Well," you have "Breathe," "Above All," "Better Is One Day..."

Rebecca: And "God of Wonders" and "Let My Words Be Few."

FamilyChristian.com: How did you choose those songs?

Rebecca: I really wanted to choose songs that deeply resonated with me. I chose songs that I felt had that power to draw you deeper into a love relationship with Jesus and draw you into true worship. Songs like "Breathe," which is a song of desperate longing for God. I love the passion and the hunger that that song emanates.

FamilyChristian.com: What does worship mean to you?

Rebecca: When I have a few moments to spare, I often go for walks. I feel closest to God in His creation. I've even gone on moonlit walks just God and me, talking to Him, sharing my heart. Sometimes I think, "Well Lord, it would be nice to have someone special in my life here right now." Then He reminds me that He is there with me and how special it is that during this time of singleness, I can be growing that intimacy and love for Him now, so that when I'm with my love that I'm going to marry, that foundation, that first love is in place. I think that's what true worship is all about: intimacy and connecting with God and adoring Him and expressing love for Him in return for the love that He's shown us. So in those moments outside, that's when I've really expressed that desperate longing for Him. That's what this song does to me.

FamilyChristian.com: That was a great answer for that question. What are some of your favorite worship CDs?

Rebecca: Delirious. That would probably be my all-time favorite, their King of Fools CD. I really like "History Maker." I actually wanted to do "History Maker" on this album but Matt said their original version was so cool that what do you do to change that? I think that would probably be my favorite.

FamilyChristian.com: Why do you think that worship music has become so popular in the last couple years?

Rebecca: Well, I know that around the world, there's been kind of a worship revolution for awhile. Even in the last 10 years, worship has been just massive in Australia and in England. There's this whole worship revival. I've known that it was going to spring out here and I've been waiting for that. A real passion and love for worship has been underground, I think, here in America—obviously worship is in the church always—but that real hunger for it is just really springing out now. So I think it's just hitting now—what's been going on around the world. I think people are hungry for God. I think they're also seeing that man's way doesn't work and selfishness and the pursuit of material things, all these are a dead end. But what will last is pursuing Him in worship and in a lifestyle of worship.

FamilyChristian.com: Speaking of worship bands, I'll give you a chance to make a shameless plug. Do you want to tell me about Fusebox?

Rebecca: Fusebox is my band, and they're their own band as well. They're just about to come out with a brand new worship CD. I think the thing I like about these guys so much is their heart is sincerely for God and for ministry and for pointing people to God in a very real way. I've seen that. I've worked with Brad, one of the guys in the band, for five years and so I've seen that pursuit of God consistently. And I've known other guys for at least a year. I think they really understand that people are hungry for worship right now too and want to do that in a relevant way. It's really rock worship. I'm excited about how God's going to use them because I've seen God using them out on the road with me.

FamilyChristian.com: Tell me about the sabbatical you're taking.

Worship God by Rebecca St. James

Rebecca: I'm going to seek to learn the art of just being, just resting in God, that whole thing of being still and knowing that God is God. I want to learn the art of not having to do things and be active all the time, but just really rest and experience His complete peace. I'm going to go to Australia for a couple of months and maybe take my grandma to England because her ancestors are from there and she's never been. That'll be awesome. I want to grow as a woman of God, too. I want to have some time to just really grow and prepare for one day being a wife and mother. I want to learn some of those things now, and just be with friends and hang and be goofy and be a kid and swing dance. I'm swing-obsessed.

FamilyChristian.com: What is God teaching you now?

Rebecca: I think just to rest in Him. It's strange, when you're writing songs you never know how they're going to speak to you later on. Even my song, "Quiet You With My Love," ministers to me because it's a song about just resting in God—"Come to me all who are weary and I will give you rest." In the busyness of life, [I'm called] to rest in Him and to know that He holds me. He's my Daddy.

Jen Abbas, a writer in Grand Rapids, Mich., originally conducted this interview exclusively for FamilyChristian.com.

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