"Choose love..."

So, I'm still in vacation mode (beach mode) and, at the last hour, I was looking for a second communion song for this weekend. I maintain a huge Word document with lyrics to all the songs we've used at liturgy, and quite often, I will do a 'search' for a particular word or phrase that really hits on a certain theme.  I began a search for the phrase "choose love."

I only hit on one song with that phrase.  One.

One song.

Out of all of them.

What?

Thank you, Tom Booth, for writing the ever-timeless "I Will Choose Christ."

Here are the lyrics to the refrain:

I will choose Christ.
I will choose love.
I choose to serve.
I give my heart.
I give my life.
I give my all to you.

I was surprised, then shocked that there weren't more songs with this simple, basic, Christian phrase in the body of the lyrics. There were no occurrences of 'choose to love' either.

Tom wrote this song for a Confirmation class at his parish, probably never realizing it would be sung so many times, recorded by mainstream artists (like Kathy Troccoli), or published in hymnals.

To me, it's a classic. It's simple, and beautiful.

And our parish will be singin' it this week!!!

Thanks, Tom.

Ed