Great Is the Lord

This is a track from Atlanta worship band Houseflies third album, Housefires III. It is the oldest song on record and is based on Psalm 96: 4. ("Great is the Lord! He is most worthy of praise! He is to be feared above all gods.")

Houseflies vocalist Pat Barrett wrote the song with his friends Daniel Bashta and Ben Smith. He told NewReleaseToday the story of the track: "The song came out in an afternoon with us writing at my house. It came out of Psalm 96. It's a very proclaiming song, announcing that the Lord is great and worthy of praise. That's a lyric in the song, 'great is the Lord, most worthy of all praise.' We started writing based on that Psalm, and Ben had an idea for the bridge melody after reading those words. Psalm 96:4 says 'Great is the Lord and most worthy of praise.' We realized that was the chorus. It felt simple, and yet it really made us want to start singing the song right away. We did. After we finished the song, we each led the song at our three different churches the next Sunday morning, which was powerful."

The bridge was something that Ben Smith came up with when he premiered the song at his church. Barrett recalled: "After we led it that Sunday, Ben let us know he started singing the spontaneous line 'in the morning, in the evening, at the end of all days, I'll sing, I'll shout, You are worthy of praise.' That wasn't part of the original song."