Brandon Lake Reveals the Gift He Wants to Bring to God
By Movieguide® Contributor
Brandon Lake wants kids to know they’re “never too young to bring a gift to God” — the message at the center of his new children’s book Little Lion Lungs.
“So there’s a lyric in [one of] my songs which says, ‘You’ve got a lion inside of your lungs. Get up and praise the Lord.’ And really, it’s like David, right, in the Psalms. Like, it was a creative way of saying, like, bless the Lord, oh my soul,” Lake told TBN. “You’re commanding yourself, like, I’ve got a lion inside of my lungs. Like, get up and praise the Lord. And now’s the time. I do have a gift to bring to God, you know. And this is what I want to teach kids, like, you know, you’re never too young to bring a gift to God.”
The book centers around a young lion named Levi who is discouraged when he sees all the wonderful gifts the other lions are creating for the Lord. While he lacks the skills to create a masterpiece work of art, he soon learns that that is not necessarily what the Lord needs to be pleased.
“This wise lion teaches [Levi] that really, the most important gift that he could bring is a gift of gratitude; a simple ‘thank you’ is more than it seems” Lake explains. “And that he can sing out his own hallelujah, and this book literally teaches what hallelujah means. Like, how many of us have sang that word, said that word, you know. It’s almost become cultural, you know, and it’s like, we want to teach kids that it means ‘Praise the Lord, praise the King.’ And so, they do have something to bring the king inside of their hearts.”
The idea for the book came from over a year of brainstorming how to further share the message at the core of his hit song “Gratitude.”
“Brandon ha[d] been talking about [writing this book] for over a year,” Lake’s wife, Brittany, told PEOPLE. “I would catch him drawing Levi the Lion and just being so creative. And one day I was like, ‘I think you need to do it.’ He had told me the storyline that he came up with in his head, and I was like, ‘Brandon, let’s do it.’ And then he got his team behind it and it just propelled from there.”
Since creating the book, Lake has received positive feedback from the closest of sources, his 9-year-old son, who brought it to school.
“Our nine-year-old did a buddy reading day at school and he brought our book,” Brittany said. “He read it to a kindergartner, and he said that they read it twice because they loved it so much.”
Little Lion Lungs is now available.
Movieguide® previously reported:
After Brandon Lake wrote “Gratitude,” the song inspired him and his wife, Brittany Lake, to create a book for kids about bringing their gifts to God.
“So it’s inspired off the song ‘Gratitude,’” Brittany explained about the book, called “Little Lion Lungs” on June 7. “We have three boys… And what better tool to help our kids learn about worship? What it means to bring a gift to the king, and it’s just the heart.”
“And Brandon’s been dreaming it up, and we’re finally like, let’s do it,” she said on FOX & FRIENDS. “It’s time.”
“Little Lion Lungs” started as an idea for a clothing line.
“I was just doodling a lion and so many kids have been coming out of these shows that have been inspired by that lyric in ‘Gratitude:’ ‘You’ve got a lion inside of your lungs. Get up and praise the Lord.’ Kind of like how David did in the Bible. ‘Bless the Lord, oh my soul,’” Brandon said.
