In the two years since Abandon’s Forefront Records debut Searchlights, the San Antonio-based band scored a Dove nomination, tons of critical acclaim and tours alongside Fireflight, Building 429, Remedy Drive, Teen Mania’s Acquire the Fire, plus a plethora of major faith-based festivals.

Amongst all the activity, the modern rockers crafted their sophomore album, Control, which finds the quintet taking their next natural evolutionary musical step and finding their greatest lyrical depth to date. Control released on April 19, 2011, and substantially builds Abandon’s pedigree.

I can’t get enough of the sound and message of this great band. Abandon’s sound has been described as The Killers meets Coldplay--which is a great description. I would also compare them to The All-American Rejects, Fall Out Boy, and Mute Math. They have a steady rush of uncommon creativity that has both modern flash and worshipful depth.

Brothers Josh and Justin Engler had moved from their home state of Indiana to Texas while in high school, where they met a pair of cousins, Dave and Stevan Vela, at church. As they gelled by jamming in the worship band, they felt a growing desire to write original music together, and the rest is history.

I had the great opportunity to interview lead singer Josh Engler about “Feel It In Your Heart.”

Please tell me the story behind writing the song “Feel It In Your Heart.”

The song represents the theme of the whole album. This song and this album is about letting God have control of your life. It came out of a couple of years of spending time on the road away from our families. We experienced growth and we starting joking that we had to be careful what we wrote about in our songs as God would test us. Most of what we wrote came from experiences we were already having during our spiritual growth. Seeing something like the Northern Lights in person made us marvel at the natural, God-orchestrated phenomenon happening in such a beautiful state outside of human control.

Growing up, we were sheltered a bit and it’s interesting how your perspective of life changes. As we have toured, our core beliefs have remained intact, but it’s interesting how our “Northern Lights” moments have changed our perspective.

The song and the album is about dying to yourself. The song sums up the idea that you have to be tuned in to Heaven to have the passion for your beliefs. In the first verse of the song, I sing about all the voices out there. There are thousands of bands. Most sing about vanity. What we’re saying in the song is make sure you are checking with God and “feel it in your heart.” We want to show love and encourage one another through our music. God’s called us to be salt and light in our workplaces, classrooms, and our lives.

Please tell me about any Bible verses you used to write the song.

John 3:30: He must increase, but I must decrease.

How can listeners apply that message in their walks as Christians when they listen to the song?

Visually, the album cover shows the Northern Lights as a way of showing a natural phenomenon uncontrolled by men. What could our lives look like if we give control totally to God? Who is ultimately in control? Are you in control, or is God in control? We basically want people to come away with an answer to “Who’s controlling your life?” We’re not really looking for a quick answer, but more to challenge your perspective and to provoke thought and motivation.

It’s brave to question where you’re at and search out your heart. This song is about that type of self-examination. We need to give the Lord complete control and have an ability to lay our burdens before the Lord and relinquish our control. When we don’t surrender our lives over to God and hold onto it ourselves, we limit ourselves, but when we let God take control, it’s way better than we dreamed or hoped. We’ve learned to be good stewards of our time and to hold one another accountable each and every day. And by us being open about what we’re going through, we hope to open up topics of conversation with our listeners. A lot of times, we find that if someone digs a song, we have the opportunity to talk about what we went through personally and maximize the ministry potential.

Here are the lyrics:

There's a sound in the air
Can you hear it everywhere?
Voices trying to be heard.
Love is more than just another word.

Oh, you can turn it up loud as loud as it will go.
But it will never make its way to your soul.

No no,
until you feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart, your heart

You gotta
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart

Oh oh oh

All the world is listening
for a sound that is different
Clear the static
Cut the noise
Heaven help us to find our voice

Oh, you can turn it up loud as loud as it will go.
But it will never make its way to your soul.

No no,
until you feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart, your heart

You gotta
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart

You can say, say all the right things
But in the end what does it all mean?
Yeah, you can say, say all the right things
But in the end what does it mean?

You gotta
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart

You gotta
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart
feel it in your heart

Oh, Oh, Oh whoah

All the world listening
All the world listening

Here’s Matthew Henry’s commentary on John 3:30: “John was fully satisfied with the place and work assigned him; but Jesus came on a more important work. He also knew that Jesus would increase in honor and influence, for of His government and peace there would be no end, while he himself would be less followed. John knew that Jesus came from heaven as the Son of God, while he was a sinful, mortal man, who could only speak about the more plain subjects of religion. The words of Jesus were the words of God; He had the Spirit, not by measure, as the prophets, but in all fullness. Everlasting life could only be had by faith in Him, and might be thus obtained; whereas all those, who believe not in the Son of God, cannot partake of salvation, but the wrath of God for ever rests upon them.”

“Feel It In Your Heart” is already one of my top songs of the year and has quickly jumped up the charts with the super-catchy dance-flavored rock beat, similar to “Misery” by Maroon 5, but with an uplifting message. The song is about casting aside life’s numerous distractions in favor of plugging into God’s plan, in turn, stirring up an undeniable passion to go forth with an eternal mindset.

Our theme verse during our time at the Dove Awards was John 3:30. With all the fanfare and celebrity of the Doves, I was concerned about the sin of pride. I prayed for The Holy Spirit to give me some biblical guidance for conducting artist interviews and a theme verse in praying before each of our artist interviews and on Monday night the Lord gave me John 3:30: "He must increase, but I must decrease." This song is a great reminder of that Truth. Amen.

(You can watch the music video here.)