Bethel Music’s You Make Me Brave offers a celebration of corporate praise as well as individual expressions of reverence by its featured worship leaders. Recorded at the Bethel Women’s Conference in Redding, Calif., the album brings together a roster of distinctive singers in the common service of extoling the Creator. A ringing note of spiritual triumph runs through these performances, heard in Amanda Cook’s passionate lead vocals on the title track and Jenn Johnson’s spontaneous soul-bearing testimony on “Joy of the Lord.” The theme of man’s relationship with God is interwoven throughout yearning songs like “A Little Longer” and “Come to Me.” Musically, Cook’s “Shepherd” (a moving hosanna accented with strings) and Steffany Frizzell-Gretzinger’s “We Dance” (piano-centered and graced with a crystalline melody) are standouts. “We Step Into Freedom”—a shimmering expression of simple prayerful power—closes the album on an exalted note. What’s striking about You Make Me Brave is its marriage of intimacy and grandeur, a feat not often achieved on similar worship projects. With this release, Bethel Music secure a place alongside Hillsong as a world-class musical collective able to move crowds while capturing faith in personal terms.
