F. Harry Daniel
Second Presbyterian Church
Sermons: December 17, 2006

"Let Us Our Songs Employ"

In Luke’s version of Jesus’ birth someone is always singing. The Christian Church has been singing throughout its history. Dietrich Bonhoeffer sang songs in a Nazi prison awaiting execution. Music and song, he wrote, "in times of care and sorrow will keep a ground-base of joy alive in you." Ludwig Dewitz taught me Hebrew nearly thirty years ago by teaching me Hebrew songs. To this day I can still sing the Israeli national anthem in Hebrew! The churches in Asia Minor to whom the book of Revelation was written were undergoing persecution and yet they are counseled to sing.

They all know something we don’t or perhaps we have forgotten: without song life becomes shriveled and dies. We need songs. They are signs of greater, nobler living. And in the wild winds of chaos and the seas of bitterness, they give a broader, deeper view of life. Song lifts us up out of weariness of body, confusion of mind, anxiety of heart. Even in a world like ours, songs must be sung, dreams must be kept, visions must be practiced.

Song is difficult in a world like ours, but it is not impossible. Black Americans know about singing in a world marked by fear, hatred, and violence and not being destroyed by it. They know where we may find grace in our lives when we thought there was no grace. "Life up every voice and sing till heaven and earth ring, Ring with the harmonies of liberty, Let our rejoicing rise high as the listening skies; Let it resound as the rolling sea. Sing a song of the faith that the dark past has taught us."

Don’t let the music stop. Have you noticed how our society reduces song to background noise? Life cannot, must not be reduced to silence. Songs bond God and us human beings. With theological silence human life withers and dies. We sing to, with and for God, we sing to, with, and for our neighbors, every human being on this planet.

The biblical faith has always been a faith that is filled with song. God refuses to let us still the song. God will not deliver us into the dominion of darkness and its stillness and silence unto death! Is there any one here so sunk into sinful and sullen silence that we cannot, that we will not praise God for such love? Let us our songs employ.

Our songs are to be both old and new. Old songs speak eloquently of God’s faithfulness; new songs speak eloquently of the freshness of God’s love and grace. New occasions teach new duties they also teach us new songs. Fresh composition is a sign of vitality in faith that penetrates and shapes the heart and mind. We must sing a new song. We must learn a new song for new needs. We must fashion new words born of all the new growth of our life, of our mind, of our spirit. We must prepare for new melodies that have never been ours before that all that is within us may lift our voices unto God.

Our songs reveal God’s love and grace. They gently move us closer to Christ and in that we movement discover once again the God to whom we belong, the God who knows our fears, hesitations, agonies, suspicions, and insecurities. They reveal the depth of God’s immense compassion which has no limits, and speak of mercy which comprehends all. They speak of a love which does not leave us, and of a forgiveness which is always offered again and again. This is grace which no violence, destruction, or war can finally destroy. This is a love song that can never be reduced to silence, and which has been and will be sung down through the ages of human existence. We can lay aside all fears and approach with confidence and love. Such love penetrates the vastness of human suffering through out all history. This is the love song that finds us. To whom do we belong? To this God and no other.

Our songs lift us up out of the narrow view into cosmic perspective. They alter our understanding of ourselves and our world and what we ought to be doing. Songs make us into the persons God intends us to be. We human beings have a chance to participate in that work of bringing the world into its fullness in the purpose of God. The single, consistent Creator has a constant purpose for all of humanity, and indeed for the whole universe, nothing less than growing into the likeness of God as self-giving love. The possibility of a sort of rejuvenation is always there. Long before we were born God was at work, creating life, nature, and the world of human beings and things. God is not through with creation. God is not through with us.

Our songs have the power to transform and comprehend pain, ours and the world, as well as our questions. The hurt of here, our groaning and crying out: "Why?" "How long, O Lord?" can be graced. Such grace songs work through us bringing us to newness of life, leading us out of our darkness into light and healing, illuminating what we have lost hope could be illuminated. God’s steadfast love endures forever, even now, even with us, even in this pain.

New forms of possibility are formed out of our songs. There is something defiant about our songs, defiant of the ways things are, defiant of the belief that they have to stay that way! We sing of things better than we know and the world knows. We sing of hope, hope for those in institutions, the sick who receive little or no care, the young who lack opportunities for education or decent work, the dying who remain alone, and all who are lonely and afraid. We can become involved in the struggle for justice and peace without being destroyed by the struggle. As we sing our songs we begin to notice that more energy and passion is granted than consumed in the process. We begin to notice power and commitment and faithfulness emerging in our lives. We are left with courage, freedom, and imagination. Old dreams find their youth again. Even in the midst of evidence to the contrary, God’s victory is sure. The song cannot wait. God has called us to help bring in a new day. And there have always been enough people among us who have dreamed of better things and who have created something new, a way of living closer to the vision which has always been in our hearts.

Our songs bind us together. The blending of voices expresses and strengthens the bonds of affection within the community of love. We are in each other songs. We are together in our songs. That community is the Spirit's gift.

Let us our songs employ. That is the ultimate vocation of the human community, indeed of all creation. Let us this season of the year and from now on, sing our songs with God, one another and the world.