Hope Darst
Worship Artist & 3-time Dove Award Nominee
Growing up in Kentucky a pastor’s kid, Hope Darst began singing in front of the church before she could tie her own shoes. But by nineteen, she’d become emotionally and spiritually lost. Leaving college in Louisiana for Nashville to seek solace with friends, Hope found Jesus in an unexpected church service. Her entire countenance illuminates when she describes her life-altering encounter with the Lord.
“I wasn’t in a good place at that point in my life,” Hope shares. “I didn’t understand freedom in Christ and was struggling with a lack of identity. I was looking for value in everything but God. At that church service in Nashville I encountered God in a radical way, and experienced healing and freedom for the first time. I’ve never looked back since that day.”
Hope decided Nashville was the place for her and, because of her musical background and gift for singing, believed the natural path for her life was to become an artist. God had other plans. After years of false starts and“almosts”–touring as a background vocalist, working in the music industry, singing on other people’s records–Hope felt God telling her to lay down the dream of being an artist.
It wasn’t until her late thirties, nearly fifteen years later, that Peace Be Still began to take shape. Those fifteen years were filled with the high highs of leading worship for her home church, traveling the world doing ministry, writing songs with fellow worship team members, as well as the low lows of struggling with infertility, post-partum depression, her parents’ divorce and ultimately, crippling anxiety.
For the second time in her life, Hope completely surrendered. That encounter with the Lord colored the songs she was writing, her plans for the future, and her entire outlook. The experiences of the previous fifteen years, including the most painful ones, shaped the message of Peace Be Still. As much as she’d wanted to be an artist in her early twenties, the album couldn’t have existed until she’d lived through every lyric, every promise kept. The result is an album that cries out in both pain and joy. It’s a sureness in God’s plan and how He carries it out, Hope’s heart laid bare, singing her sorrow and her praise. Each song is intensely personal while also echoing universal experiences believers live through every day.
Well worth the wait, Hope Darst has created something more than a standard worship album. Peace Be Still delivers, encourages and inspires, as Hope shares her need for the Savior she knows so deeply yet longs to know more.
