i sing a song

'til i get it right

For the past three years Jesus has been dragging the disciples along on his tour of ministry. In the few brief instances when there was any quiet, Jesus has been teaching these disciples. In fact, Jesus has even commissioned them to carry on his ministry.

Now, as everything builds to what everyone knows must be the climax; the moment that will not only necessitate but also authorize the disciples carrying on Jesus’ mission; these thirteen share a meal. Jesus leads them in a meal of the faith. Then it is time to go, the hour is at hand. 

Before they go, though, they do one last thing together.

They sing. They sing hymns together…

Although it most surely does, it shouldn’t surprise us. 

Even though, we each know for ourselves the power of singing the faith; we’re surprised when we let this familiar story speak on its own terms, to find out that the very last thing Jesus and his disciples did together was to sing songs of the faith…

Their last simple act, singing the songs of faith, shouldn’t surprise us, because after all, we’ve each felt the power of hymns in our own lives. We can recall a moment we sat in these pews thinking of nothing other than what we were going to eat afterward, only to rise and sing a hymn that changed everything.

Maybe you felt a lump climb into your throat, as you sang that old hymn your spouse loved so much. Maybe your heart raced a little quicker as your entire life was summarized in the story of God’s love as you sang Amazing Grace. Maybe you felt your faith emboldened as you sang Onward Christian Soldiers. Or perhaps you felt a tear burn down your cheek as you sang words that you hoped against hope could be true: “what tho’ my joys and comfort die - the Lord my savior liveth / What tho’ the darkness gather ‘round - songs in the night he giveth / No storm can shake my inmost calm.” Really?! Could that be true???

Hymns have their way with us. 

Hymns have a way of giving us faith, where before we had anything but. Hymns have a way of telling us our faith is enough, when what little we have seems barely able to get us from the parking-lot into our house. Hymns have a way of compelling us to actually dare, for once, to live by faith (and not by sight). 

Hymns have their way with us; this much is true. Given that, it should come as little surprise to us that the last thing Jesus does with the disciples, is sing hymns…

As the disciples must watch the horror of the sham-trial and crucifixion, they will need hymns to get them to the empty tomb. Even then, these ordinary folks will again need hymns yet again to get them from the empty tomb to daring belief that this messiah they followed actually has the power to conquer that last foe, death.

Before the tribulation and triumph of what’s to come, Jesus and the disciples sing hymns. Their wisdom should not be lost on us, either.

We need hymns, too; don’t we?

I’ve heard some of you talk about one hymn or another that got you through a particularly tough time of your life. I’ve heard others of you talk about singing a hymn when that hymn was the hardest thing to sing, just so you might have faith for what was ahead.

Hymns have their way with us. Hymns sing of a promise that we cannot see, or sometimes even believe, so that we might come to know, intimately, that the Good News is more true than anything else; our sorrow, our doubt, our fear, even.

And we need that, don’t we?

Sure, you may call yourself “Christian,” maybe you’ve even given your life to Christ, maybe you’re a lifelong-lutheran, or maybe you’ve been coming to the church since before you were even born. The truth, though, is given all that, despite all that even, there are times when those hymns sound just too good to be true…

There are days when we can just barely bring ourselves to believe that God gives two whits about our lives, let alone that we could ever be filled with his goodness or lost in his love. There are days when it isn’t so much that our life flows on in some endless song, so much as it is that our life is threatening to go down the toilette. 

We all know for ourselves that there are far too many days when, rather than knowing the blessed assurance of faith, we’re plagued by a cursed uncertainty of doubt. I, in my savior, am happy and blest… That isn’t so easy to say, some days…

Yes, it may be our favorite hymn, but there are days when the words of that old hymn are completely undermined by the assaults of this life. Yes, we may cherish that one hour a week in this house of God, but there are weeks when everything this life has thrown at us is just too much, we’re not sure if we could make it through the service…

Perhaps, though, perhaps those are precisely the times it is most important for us to come, most important for us to sing the songs of faith. Maybe those are even the moments it is most fitting to gather in the house of the Lord, to sing the songs of faith…

You know, when I was researching that scene of Jesus and the disciples singing songs right before the garden, before some would fall asleep, before another would betray and before they all would flee; do you know what I learned?

More than likely, the songs Jesus and the disciples sang were Psalms 113-118. Hallel Psalms, they’re called. See, these hymns Jesus and the disciples sang right before the terror of the cross, weren’t just any hymns; they were hymns of praise…

Hymns of praise. Wow.

With everything that was going to come, with everything that would inevitably come; Jesus and the disciples sing songs of praise. In that decidedly unpraiseworthy moment, Jesus and the disciples sing hymns of praise. 

Nothing could seem more odd…

But you, you know better don’t you? 

You, you who can remember that evening, as it snowed outside and you sang ‘O Silent Night, ‘O Holy Night,’ and for just one moment you stopped thinking about your gifts at home and then, wonder of wonders, that night did indeed become Holy; you know better. You, you who can remember the tears that fell as you listened to ‘Were You There,” and when you dared to open your eyes, miracle of miracle, there you were; you know better.

To the world, singing hymns of praise as everything threatens to break apart under the weight of the world’s misery, is absurd. In the way of faith that sees God at work everywhere, though, nothing is more appropriate that singing hymns of praise when we know we can’t hold things together for ourselves anymore…

In fact, in spite of those assault on the faith we’ve all felt too many times, we know, albeit intuitively, how befitting it is to sing the songs of faith -even, or especially, when those words are hardest to sing.

We sing the songs of faith, to learn the moves to faith, to be reminded of the promises of our faith, to hear the promise that this trial or tribulation will not have the last word. We sing the songs of faith, to get the faith we need for what lies ahead. 

Sometimes, even, we sing the songs of faith, because there’s not a single other thing we can do.

It is that same move of faith, that prompts Jesus and the disciples to sing those songs of praise on the terrible night. It is that same move of faith, that also compel us to do something as audacious as sing Easter hymns at our funerals…

The language of faith, before it is anything else is the language of music. Alleluia isn’t a word, is a cry of praise that can’t be said; only sung.

That’s why we sing the songs of faith.

We sing the songs of faith when faith is hardest to come by, because as we said, hymns have their way with us. Hymns have a way of shaping our vision, our reality. Hymns have a way of announcing the promises to us that we can just barely bring ourselves to hope to believe. Hymns have a way of making us trace the moves of faith, trace the moves of faith until they are ours. Hymns have a way of walking us past what we see, into the the Kingdom of God, into a life of faith.

So next time you sign a hymn, and that’s going to very soon; remember that you’re not rehearsing some idle tune, you’re not harmonizing or even trying to carry the melody; you’re coming before God and begging for the faith you need. When we open this hymnal and dare to sing what before was just marks on a page, we sing the faith. And in our singing, somehow God makes it becomes real.

When we sing the songs of faith, we hurl our faith back at everything life has thrown at us, we hurl our faith in the face of death. When we sing the songs of faith, we confess that since Christ is Lord of Heaven and Earth, how can we keep from singing. When we sing the songs of faith, we ask God to make the faith we sing of, ours; and God, who is always true to God’s Word, does exactly that. 

In the end we sing the songs of faith, not because they’re true; although they are. We sing the songs of faith, so that they may be true for us. We sing the songs of faith so that the faith we sing of, might also become the faith we walk by. We sing the songs of faith, because we can’t do anything else, because God has gotten ahold of us and now these songs of faith have become the truest thing we would ever utter. 

That’s why we sing the songs of faith. 

Amen.