Do We Mean What We Sing?

Articles/Bulletins

Kevin Harrington
07/29/12 - Sunday Bulletin

The singing of a hymn should be a great experience for Christians. A hymn can be a prayer, a testimony, praise, or an invitation to others. Many of us apparently don’t take the words we sing very seriously.

We sing “Sweet Hour of Prayer” and pray only a few minutes each day.
We sing “Onward Christian Soldiers” and wait to be drafted.
We sing “Oh, for a Thousand Tongues to Sing” and don’t use the ones we have to speak of Christ
We sing “Blest Be the Tie” and let the slightest offense sever it.
We sing “I Love to Tell the Story” and seldom mention Jesus to anybody.
We sing “Serve the Lord with Gladness” and gripe about all we have to do.
We sing “Cast Thy Burden on the Lord” and then worry ourselves into a nervous breakdown.
We sing “The Whole Wide World for Jesus” and never invite our next-door neighbor to church.

(adapted from “Church Bulletin Bits”)

I wonder how many of us have been singing these songs for years and years and we still have no idea what the words mean. I know I sometimes fall in that category. We get so wrapped up in the music and how it sounds that we lose focus on the words. And then we lose focus on actually applying the words.

When we sing today, try to focus on why we’re singing. Are we doing it for our own pleasure? Or are we singing for the Lord? Ephesians says, “speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your hearts to the Lord” (5:19).

It doesn’t matter what the music sounds like. It doesn’t matter if the person next to you is the worst singer on the face of the earth. It doesn’t matter how fast or how slow the song leader is going. What matters is that we are singing for the Lord. The meaning of the music is in the words and in our hearts. Sing out and sing loud because we are pleasing the Lord with our voices. “And whatever you do, whether in word or deed, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus” (Col. 3:17).

~ Kevin