Songs as Formational Tools

Day 123: Psalm 95-100

Come, let us sing for joy to the Lord; let us shout aloud to the Rock of our salvation. Let us come before him with thanksgiving and extol him with music and song. For the Lord is the great God, the great King above all gods. In his hand are the depths of the earth, and the mountain peaks belong to him. The sea is his, for he made it, and his hands formed the dry land. Psalm 95:1-5

Come, let us bow down in worship, let us kneel before the Lord our Maker; for he is our God and we are the people of his pasture, the flock under his care. Psalm 95:6-7a

Shout for joy to the Lord, all the earth. Worship the Lord with gladness; come before him with joyful songs. Know that the Lord is God. It is he who made us, and we are his; we are his people, the sheep of his pasture. Enter his gates with thanksgiving and his courts with praise; give thanks to him and praise his name. For the Lord is good and his love endures forever; his faithfulness continues through all generations. Psalm 100

Do you recognize these words? If you've been in church or listened to Christian radio in the last fifteen years, most likely you do. They have become songs we sing in our churches and in our cars. These words are familiar to us. We like singing them and hearing them. They resonate with us. We remember them. I can still remember many of the songs that I learned as a child. While I don't remember many (if any) sermons I heard, I do remember the songs I sang and the music I listened to. Many of those songs are still meaningful to me now.

Songs form us in ways that I don't think we're always cognizant of (I know that I just ended two sentences with a preposition, which is a major faux pax for an English professor, but oh well.). That's why I think it's important to be aware of the songs we sing--to really listen to them and understand what they are communicating. Are they healthy songs? Do they communicate the same gospel that we ourselves understand and live out? Or might the songs not communicate the same message that we want to be communicating--just look at my last blog post as an example of unhealthy and healthy ways of communicating the message of Jesus Christ.

The next time you hear a praise song or a hymn or any other type of Christian theme, I challenge you to truly listen to the words of the song. Do you agree with what you are saying on a theological level? On a spiritual level? On a biblical level? Or are you just singing the song because you have known it and sung it since you were a kid and, hey, it has a catchy tune? I hope we will all become more aware of the words we sing because we are being formed, and we are also forming others with the songs that we choose to sing.