On the power of songs

On the power of songs

We all have our songs, our heart cries to God. We sing them in our cars, our homes, on the way to work. We sing them through pain and through joy. Sometimes they are audible and beautiful to the human ear. Often they may be silent, or lack musical expertise, but to God they are all treasured, and they are at the heard of the way He wishes to relate to His people. God Himself sings over us, and we sing back, responding as best we can to His overtures of love.

We sing when we are in love.

We sing when we need spurring on in our battles, our endeavours, our challenges. We sing when our hearts are breaking. We sing at the birth of our children, at the marriage of our families, and at the funerals of our loved ones. Songs help us celebrate our successes, express our intentions and grieve our losses. They give nations their identities and accompany their achievements.

Songs unite generations and peoples. They evoke memories of times gone by, or significant and wonderful events in our histories. They inspire us to dream and to travel the journey of life.

There is also power in the language of song.

Songs and the melodies and harmonies and rhythms that accompany them can evoke powerful and intense emotional reactions. The world knows this. A particular song can inspire someone to great acts of mercy, but can also compel someone to dreadful acts of depravity. A particular song can carry someone through great times of testing, but can also cause someone to give up. A particular song can capture our hearts to serve the broken people around us, but can also lure us to spend huge amounts of money we don’t have on things we don’t need.

Oh yes, when we are talking about singing, we are not talking about something that wanders around on the fringe of society on the edges of people’s lives. Singing is at the heart of this world and all that the world does.

But God is hungry for the sort of songs that express His goodness and His greatness back to Him in worship.

He is desperate for our praise.

He is listening our for our affection because He knows that if the song isn’t sung to Him, it will be sung to someone else.

He calls loudly to all of the earth and all of heaven, “Come and sing to me!”

 

Taken from the book “Now to Him” by Simon Ponsonby and Neil Bennetts

This is from Neil’s chapter Sing: Holding on to the Gift of Corporate Worship

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