More About Hymns

I have posted hymns on here lately for two reasons: first, they are a wealth of theological and devotional truths that are packaged in memorable ways, and second, it helps to examine them in different contexts. Often, when we sing songs week after week, month after month, year after year, we tend to sing them on "auto-pilot." Our brains know the words, we push air over our vocal chords, our lips move in the proper way to pronounce the words, but somewhere in the process our heart has dropped out. Over-familiarity breeds contempt, or at least complacency.

Yet, singing during worship should be more than the vocalization of theological and devotional truth. It should exude passion and praise. Our songs should flow from our inner being with intensity and emotion. Most of us have had the experience of being move deeply by a song. Whether the song made us laugh from our belly or cry from our soul, they affect us in ways we cannot always fully understand. Immediately, we file them away in our memory banks for later use.

If a song about something in this fading world can touch us so powerfully, shouldn't songs about the great and eternally glorified King of kings and Lord of lords move us? And sometimes they do. When was the last time you were moved when you sang, "Praise God from Whom All Blessings Flow?"

Praise God, from whom all blessings flow; Praise him all creatures here below;
Praise him above, ye heav'nly host; Praise Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. Amen.

The thought of blessings flowing into our lives from God should cause us to break out in singing, just as the song suggests. Let us praise him. Take time to meditate on the hymns that we sing, and even the ones we don't. It helps make their meaning sink into our hearts, and flow freely in our singing.