I Will Sing to the Lord!
He stood only five feet tall in his socks, and his huge head looked too large for his body. His nose was crooked, his eyes small and piercing, his body frail. Physically there was nothing appealing about him. He fell in love with a young woman and proposed to her, but her insensitive response was, “I like the jewel but not the setting.” He never married. But may I just offer a rhyme for those who would elevate beauty or looks over character, which is never a good idea? “She chose the setting and soon was regretting, for instead of a jewel, she married a fool.”
This jewel’s name was Isaac Watts, considered the father of the modern hymn. If so, then Watts had over six hundred children, including “When I Survey the Wondrous Cross,” and “Joy to the World.” I am so thankful for people like Isaac Watts, Fanny Crosby, Phil Wickham, Shane & Shane, Keith and Kristyn Getty, Chris Tomlin, and many others who have written songs of praise to our God that we can sing with great joy. James Boice wrote that music “is a gift from God that allows us to express our deepest heart responses to God and His truth…(with) our hearts joining with our minds to say, ‘Yes! Yes! Yes!’ to the truth we are embracing.” Yes! The people of God sang a song of salvation that Moses wrote after God’s mighty deliverance of His people through the Red Sea. As the Psalmist said, “The waters covered their adversaries; not one of them was left. Then they believed His words; they sang His praise.” We who believe, sing.
God in His infinite wisdom created us in His image and put a song of praise in our hearts. We simply cannot help but sing about God and His Son Jesus. God created singing, and He “rejoices over you with singing,” Zephaniah writes. The Bible says that when God created the earth, “The morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy.” Adam wrote a poem, the first one, and who knows but that he didn’t sing it to Eve when he said to her, “This at last is bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh”? The psalm writers wrote a whole book of songs for the people of God to sing, 150 of them. Why? As the greatest psalmist of all, David, wrote, “He put a new song in my mouth, a song of praise to our God.”
And we know our songs of praise will be sweetest when we are in His presence, as John witnessed when God allowed him to see heaven: “And they sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the song of the Lamb, saying, ‘Great and amazing are your deeds, O Lord God Almighty! Just and true are your ways, O King of the nations! Who will not fear, O Lord, and glorify your name? For you alone are holy. All nations will come and worship you, for your righteous acts have been revealed.” We glorify God in many ways, but certainly through songs of praise.
Moses broke into song because God had triumphed over His enemies. It is considered an antiphonal song where Moses would have sung a line and the 2 million Israelites would have responded with the next phrase or section. Their praise thundered as they stood on the shore with their arms raised to God. I am sure there were some in that number who couldn’t carry a tune if their life depended on it. But it didn’t…and it doesn’t! We make a joyful noise when we sing to God and He hears it as a sweet melody.
So, why stand there mute while all the congregation around you sings with all their might to our Mighty God?
Go ahead. Sing!