Give You What Costs (R&B/Pop) cover art

Give You What Costs (R&B/Pop)

R&B/Pop Version

Written by Shane Pierson

Released January 1, 2024

This song started as a journal entry I wrote during General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints a few years back. I found it one day just reading back through my notes in Evernote. One of the prophets referenced the moment...

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Lyrics

I came in late, I said I'd stay

But I was already halfway gone

My hands were here, my mind was driftin'

I told myself I'd get back on

I laid it down like it was honest

Like it was more than scraps of time

But I knew what I was avoidin'

I knew I crossed another line

If it didn't cost me comfort

If it didn't make me bleed

Then maybe what I called an offerin'

Was just me tryin' not to feel

I don't wanna give You what's easy

I don't wanna bring what's free

I don't wanna call it worship

If it never breaks somethin' in me

I'll put it down, I'll stay right here

Even when every part wants to leave

If it costs me my attention

Maybe then it's somethin' real I mean

I live where the noise don't stop

Where the pull is in my hand

Where every quiet second

Gets buried before it lands

I reach for You, then reach for nothin'

Just to feel a little less alone

I say it's just a second longer

But I'm always gone before I know

If I can walk away untouched

If I don't have to choose

Then I've been givin' You the seconds

While I give the world the truth

I don't wanna give You what's easy

I don't wanna bring what's free

I don't wanna call it worship

If it never breaks somethin' in me

I'll put it down, I'll stay right here

Even when every part wants to leave

If it costs me my attention

Maybe then it's somethin' real I mean

I'll buy the ground I'm standin' on

I won't borrow borrowed fire

I won't say I love You with my mouth

If my life keeps climbin' lower

Take the minutes I defend

Take the habits I protect

Take the part of me that always says

"I'll give You more, just not this yet"

I don't wanna give You what's easy

I don't wanna bring what's free

I don't wanna call it worship

If it never costs somethin' in me

So I'll put it down, I'll stay right here

I won't run back to the noise

If it costs me my attention

Then You can have my hardest choice

I won't offer You what costs me nothin'

I'm done pretendin' that it's enough

I'll give You what I've been protectin'

I'll give You the part that's hardest to give up

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The Story

This song started as a journal entry I wrote during General Conference for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints a few years back. I found it one day just reading back through my notes in Evernote.

One of the prophets referenced the moment where King David said he would not offer the Lord something that cost him nothing (in Nehemiah). That line stuck with me longer than most things do. Not in a dramatic way, but in a slow, persistent way that kept coming back up as I thought about my own life.

I started asking myself what I actually offer God. Not what sounds good or just looks faithful from the outside. But what really, truly costs me something.

I realized pretty quickly that a lot of what I do is habitual. Going to church. Saying prayers. Serving in callings. Those are good things, and they matter. But they can also become automatic. And automatic effort does not stretch you. It does not require surrender or demand much from you once it becomes routine.

That realization tied directly into something I have believed for a long time. You cannot idle forward in life. Physically or spiritually, idling is not neutral. If you are not exerting, you are regressing. The body at rest after effort heals. The body at rest without effort weakens. The same thing happens to your spirit.

So, this song lives in that realization. It is me noticing where I convince myself that something counts as sacrifice simply because it fits comfortably into my life. The line that matters most to me is the last one. Giving up what is hardest to give up.

Time with family. Control. Comfort. Work. Identity. Those are the things I protect the most, and those are usually the things that cost me the most to place on the table. This song is about being honest enough to see that and brave enough to act on it.

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