January 3, 2010
A Celebration of Music for the Arrival of the Fritts Organ

PSALMS, HYMNS, AND SPIRITUAL SONGS
Psalm 96
Colossians 3:12-17

Some of my earliest memories of church have to do with music and singing. As I have told some of you before, when I as young, both my parents were members of the choir in old Second Presbyterian Church here in Houston, before we became members of St. Philip for a while, and so I sat in church with my grandparents. I could look up in the front and see my Mom and Dad up there along with the other choir members, the choir director, the organist, and the ministers.

When my cousins and I spent the night at my grandparents’ house every Friday night, my grandmother would lull us to sleep by singing hymns -- Abide with Me; Nearer, My God, to Thee; Be Thou My Vision; My Faith Looks Up to Thee; Breathe on Me, Breath of God. They were the popular hymns of her youth in the South, and we learned them phonetically, long before we could read.

I am sure that you could tell similar stories about the power of music in worship. It is a primary way we have of expressing what we think, how we feel, and who we are in God’s grace.

The basic message of our music is praise, and praise for the reality voiced in Psalm 96 -- God reigns! And because God rules the world, then in our imaginations we picture a congregation of no less than “all the earth.” This includes us humans certainly, with all our similarities and differences, but it also includes the heavens, the earth, the sea, the fields, the animals, and all the trees. And it isn’t just “we” Presbyterians, or we Protestants, or even we Christians -- we are somehow partners in this enterprise of singing praise with “all the families of the peoples.” We are all joined together in this song of praise to God.

That is what we are about every time the organ or the piano begins to play and the choir and we begin to sing, every time we ask this gift of artistry to express our deepest feelings, hopes, dreams, and fears, even when we aren’t sure ourselves what they are, even when we can look around us and find what appears to be ready evidence that God does not rule, and we have been left on our own with that responsibility, and we are doing a mighty poor job of it.

Nevertheless, when we raise our hearts along with the music, and when we raise our voices in song, it is, as Walter Brueggemann calls it, “an act of profound hope.” But it is even more than that -- the conviction of our singing that God reigns empowers us even now, in the face of injustice and brokenness, to defy such realities and to raise and to live toward God’s “new song.” As Jane Parker Huber writes to one of our best-known hymn tunes:

Live into hope of captives freed
From chains of fear or want or greed.
God now proclaims our full release
To faith and hope and joy and peace.

But our music does even more than this. Have you ever noticed how much of a Sunday service is music? As much as half of the time we spend together in worship is spent in music. Music calls us to worship, prepares us, lifts us up, reminds us of our pains and sorrows, connects us with our past, expresses our prayers, interprets Scripture to us, leads our thanksgiving, inspires our discipleship, and sends us forth into the world.

Some of you children might be wondering, Did Jesus sing? Of course he did! He apparently knew many of the psalms and poetic prophecies of the Scriptures by heart. Some of his last words from the cross were lines from the psalms. So when we are encouraged by Paul in the Letter to the Colossians to embody the Christian life, what do we hear? We hear of community virtues such as compassion, kindness, humility, meekness, and patience. We are enjoined to forgive as we ourselves have been forgiven. Love is to be the mark and binding cord of our fellowship, with peace and thanksgiving characterizing our worship. Then the word of Christ will dwell richly in us, and there will be nothing less for us to do than, in gratitude, to “sing psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs to God.”

So, on this day, in the midst of our praise and prayer, our song and Scripture, our worship and life, we give praise to God through music, we give thanks to God for the special music ministry among us of almost countless people over almost 60 years. Over these years, they have set the tone and mood of hundreds of worship services, blessed our worship with their artistry and skill, and enriched our life together by their devotion, commitment, and willingness to serve. And we prepare our minds, hearts, and voices for the installation of our new organ, and for the many ways we and others will be ministered to in the future through it, and the music it will produce.

So, as we give thanks for this special day in the life of our church, and for the gift of music in our worship, let us glorify God by singing Hymn No. 481, “Praise the Lord, God’s Glories Show”.