Singing Scripture Part 1

 

During the month of May, we turned and tuned our hearts to the hymnal that sings within us ~ God’s breath that moves within us and stirs the jukebox of our souls to perpetual praise.  While the focus for May was primarily on hymns, we can celebrate all the music from your life.  We can honor melodies from your first school dance (remember a popular song from your middle school or high school days?), the music that blared on the road trip in college you took with friends (insert Willie Nelson here singing, “On the Road Again”), weddings where tears welled up in your eyes as a soloist sang, concerts you’ve attended that moved your heart, Broadway musicals that caused goosebumps to race and run up and down your arms, and, of course, Disney movies ~ which have tunes so catchy they worm their way into your mind to replay and repeat.  Whenever, wherever, and however music moves your soul, that is a moment of prayer. This happens not only in churches but also in the cathedral of nature when the wind whips through the trees, birds sing, and grass grows.  Music can be a prayer in concert halls to your own living room to your car stereo as you drive down life’s road.  All of this contributes to the unfinished symphony our still Conducting and Composing and Creating God is curating in these days in your life, mine, and for the sake of the world God loves. 

 

One of the truths we named and noticed last month is that the hymnal is a prayer book and theological textbook.  Our hymnal is also a reflection on scripture.  Many hymnals have a scriptural index in the back and will list a scriptural reference under the hymn number.  For example, hymn #1 in the New Century is Immortal, Invisible God Only Wise.  And in the right corner, under number in tiny print is 1 Timothy 1:17.  If you open your Bible to that book, chapter, and verse you would read these words: “May Eternal One, immortal, and invisible—the one and only God—now be honored and glorified forever and ever. Amen.”

 

Who knew that hymn title was scriptural?  You might also notice that Psalm 36:6 is listed under the #1 too.  This verse is, “Your righteousness is like the mighty mountains; your judgments are like the great deep; you save humans and animals alike, O Lord.”  When I open the Bible alongside the hymnal, the two become conversation partners.  The reference to Psalm 36:6 shines and sheds new light on the third verse of Immortal, Invisible God Only Wise, “Your life is life giving – to both great and small; in all life you’re living the true life of all.  We blossom and flourish as leaves and as flowers, then wither and perish – but naught dims your powers.”  The sense that God’s immortal, invisible life is flowing through all that is around us.  God’s immortal, invisible, animating Spirit moves for the sake/salvation/shalom (or wholeness of all).  What if today you Googled the words to How Great Thou Art and opened your Bible to Psalm 145 putting the two in conversation.  Or you could also put How Great Thou Art in conversation with Genesis 3:8-9 ~ focus on that image of God walking in the evening breeze ~ asking that great question, “Where are you?”  How might God be asking you, “Where are you?” today?

 

I pray you will find ways to let the hymns of faith and scripture find a thread that tethers and ties the two together.  Amen.