The death of her brother was a turning point for singer-songwriter Anne Wilson.,,,
Out of tragedy came opportunity for musician Anne Wilson.
A knock on the door in the middle of the night is rarely good news, especially when you open it to see the police. Wilson’s brother was dead in a car crash, aged just 23.
“As you can imagine, it’s devastating to receive news like that,” she told The Christian Post. “We were so close. That was such a hard season in my life. He was my best friend, and I loved him with everything in me.”
But answering that door to such devastating news also let new openings in.
The first was a closer relationship with Jesus for Wilson and her family.
“Instead of turning from him, we chose to walk closer to him through that time,” she said. “So I became on fire for the Lord and we just chose to trust him.
“We saw the Lord do a lot of incredible things and [he] was just so faithful and kind to me and my family and it was such a sweet season.”
And there was much more to come from God. Wilson, now aged 20, had played the piano all her life, but suddenly had to worship through music in “such a strong way”.
“When he passed away, I wanted to worship God and I found myself, instead of turning to medication or alcohol or something else, I wanted to turn to the Lord for my medicine. When I needed comfort, or when I needed just to be comforted, [I’d] go straight to the piano and worship and sing.
“I ended up making a video of the song I sang at the funeral and posted it on YouTube. That ended up going viral and I met my manager from that video and that’s how everything started.
“I started working in the industry and doing co-writes and really just processing all the loss of Jacob and what I had gone through with him, and ended up signing a record deal in 2019 and started walking down the path of being a Christian artist.”
She’s now signed to Capitol CMG and has released her debut album, My Jesus. The musician, from Lexington, Kentucky, in the US, describes it as an emotional collection charting how God helped her through tragedy.
There are some lessons in there, too, for the whole Wilson family: “I think one of the most important things that my parents learned through this whole thing was, ‘We’ve raised Anne in this great Christian home yet, she didn’t become a Christian until she found Jesus on her own’.”
Wilson was aged about 11 when a school Bible teacher explained the love of Jesus in a way that finally hit home. Now she wants to share that message through her music.
“I encourage young girls around my age or younger walking through this time. It’s really easy to fall into the ways of the world and give in to temptations, peer pressure, to let the enemy lead you down that path. But for those that stand for truth, and when you stand in who you are as a child of God and pursue the Lord, you’re going to be blessed abundantly.”
