James Scott
Pastor, Bethany Baptist Church, Swansea
January 27th, 2025
Something Old, Something New,
Something Borrowed, Nothing Blue
Balancing the diet of songs in our church gatherings
God Loves to Hear us Singing
Within the Psalms we find well over sixty commands to sing. When the songs God inspired by his Spirit are telling you to sing, you know that God loves to hear our singing! Singing together as God’s people is really important because singing together is God’s will for us. In Ephesians 5:15-19 we find that Christians singing together follows on from the Apostle Paul’s word of caution to live careful and wise lives in dark days. Our singing with and to one another is set as the contrast to foolishly feeding ourselves with all that the world has to offer, which only produces sin in our lives. Our tuneful, Godly output comes, says Paul, when the input is God himself in the person of the Holy Spirit. To put it another way, the Christian, doesn’t choose substance-fuelled sinning but rather we embrace Spirit-filled singing.
Earlier in Ephesians, Paul has gone to great lengths to remind us of the unity of the Spirit we share as Christians in the local church. This unity, however, does not mean uniformity. In both his letter to the Ephesians and to the Colossians Paul presents a threefold variety of Spirit-filled singing in the shape of Psalms, hymns, and songs from the Spirit. He likely has in mind the deep well of Old Testament Psalms that he could be turned to from memory, but we can also see in the infancy of the first century church, that there are different styles, a variety of expressions of praise available to the Christian – a Psalm is not a hymn is not a song from the Spirit – they are different categories in Paul’s mind.
The purpose of our singing together (Colossians 3:16) is to teach the good news of Jesus to our hearts – Oh how God’s people need to be refreshed over and over again in the gospel, and in various ways! I don’t think this triplet of different kinds of singing is meant as an exhaustive list, rather I think it actually conveys something about the greatness of our God and of His Gospel. Christians sing a variety of songs in a variety of ways because ultimately our worship of our Almighty God who cannot be contained, ought not be constrained.
Ok, so what then do we sing and how do we choose? First, let’s consider the setting for most of our Christian singing – the local church.
A Diverse Bunch
The Spirit-united church is a church of great diversity. Our local churches are people of different ages and life stages and experiences. Different hearts and minds that are moved and stirred differently, who do not think and respond in the same ways. We are all at different levels of understanding in relation to the things of God. But I think there’s a key point that is often overlooked – We’re all musically different too, and I don’t just mean how high or low we can sing, or if we sing in tune or we’re one of the joyful-noise out-of-tune types.
Practically speaking, we each have a musical language shaped by, among other things, our upbringing and culture and the place music has held in our lives at different times. This plays no small part in our church singing. Generally speaking, the boomer generation (b.1946-1964) with everything from Bing Crosby to the Beatles with a bit of Elvis thrown in are going to respond differently to music in comparison to millennials (b.1981-1996) brought up on a diet of Dire Straits to Madonna with a generous helping of Oasis (or Blur). Then there’s the Gen-Z’ers (b.1997-2012) who have been steeped in the pop world of Coldplay and Taylor Swift. And that’s all music outside the church. I’m not even touching on the hymns we were each brought up on in the church, if indeed we were even brought up in the church, which is increasingly not the case in our time.
All that to say, the local church is a diverse bunch, with some typical stylistic preferences among particular age groups and church backgrounds as well as maybe a growing proportion of others for whom these generalisations simply don’t fit. Some might find their affections easily stirred by the combination of melodic phrasing and the language syntax of an old Isaac Watts, Charles Wesley or Fanny Crosby hymn, while others may find these almost totally inaccessible for the very same reasons. On the other hand, some might find their hearts greatly warmed as they sing modern songs by Sovereign Grace, the Getty’s, or Stuart Townend for example, while others might consider them uninspiring.
But one thing remains the same – We all need the same word of Christ to dwell richly among us all as we sing.
First and most importantly, we recognise that the common denominator in all singing that the Christian is commanded to do is not musical ability or understanding or a close match in our preferences from pew to pew, but rather it is the influence of the Holy Spirit who inspires our praises as a fitting response to the gospel. He both fuels and fills our singing. This is the same Holy Spirit who unites Christians in the bonds of peace (Ephesians 4:3). Through Jesus Christ, we enjoy peace with God and peace with one another. Reconciled vertically and horizontally, which incidentally are the same two directions the bible calls us to sing in.
So, when it comes to the four or five songs we sing as a church each week, how can we choose a balanced diet of songs that seek to maintain unity in the church’s diversity?
Let me suggest 4 ways we could think about this. Well, 3 with 1 important principle.
Something Old
It would be a cheap stereotype to say that all older saints love the old hymns. This is not the basis for this category of songs, even if it might be generally true for your church.
Jesus’ church spans 2000 years of history. That’s approximately 70-80 generations. In that time there have been seasons of great growth and blessing in God’s kingdom as well as times of deep darkness. This is true in the life of the global church but equally true of the local gatherings of Christians down through the years. When we sing old songs, we’re embracing a bigger picture of Christianity, we’re connected to those Christians who have gone before us. We stand in our own time, facing our own suffering for example, still clinging to the words of Horatio Spafford from 1873, as he penned ‘It is well with my soul’ in the face of his own immense grief at the loss of his daughters. As we sing, we’re reminded that God is faithful in sustaining his people by His sovereign will, then, just as he is now.
Each local church has to decide what it considers an ‘old’ song, and having said it is a cheap stereotype, we shouldn’t ignore the fact that many (not all) older saints do generally (not always) enjoy and prefer what they may call the traditional hymns of their younger Sunday school days. Singing something old will most likely mean, that for the sake of unity, we embrace the kinds of songs that do our older brothers and sisters good, while we may not enjoy them as much. Remember, we sing to stir our affections for God. Our worship is the gift God receives from us that is his due and not the warmth of the feeling that we experience when singing.
One caveat to bear in mind here is that not all old songs are good or accessible. We have to think carefully when choosing old hymns that speak with both a syntax we no longer use and a vocabulary which is foreign to many. So, whatever your take on using the old English words (Thee’s, Thy’s, Thou’s etc), we need to remember that it is possible for the language used, or the way it is structured, or the tune that is played to hinder or even obscure the truth the song is trying to convey, which means that ultimately the good news of Jesus is not going to dwell richly.
With that in mind, it has to be said that there are many old songs that still convey the glory of God in a way that fan the flames of worship in the hearts of young and old alike. These are the songs that have stood the test of time, are still intelligible and are well-worth singing. So, discover and sing these old songs.
Something New
In recent years there has been and continues to be many gifted song writers and music groups emerging out of local churches from across the world with a heart and a gift to serve the local church with new songs. Many of these songs provide a familiar hymnal musicality which makes them intuitive to sing for both the musical and non-musical alike, whilst using a modern vernacular that makes them accessible to old and young believers as well as the unchurched new convert.
However, modernity is the not the basis for this category of songs.
When we consider the unfathomable glory of God revealed to us in God’s word and God’s world, we ought to conclude that we are never short of fresh reasons to sing. I think this is why at least four times in the Psalms we read a similar command to God’s people and to our own individual souls – “Sing to the Lord a new song.” I don’t think we have any reason whatsoever not to take this literally.
While Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today and forever (Hebrews 13:8) that doesn’t mean that our worship of him should be. A good bakery doesn’t serve up yesterday’s stale bread and pastries for today’s hungry people. Such is God’s great faithfulness that His mercies are new every morning (Lamentations 3:22-23). God is not using up yesterday’s stale mercies, they are freshly baked for us, and so we can come with fresh appetite to enjoy them.
Each generation, each local church, each Christian has the opportunity to sing new songs in response to God’s unchanging glory. Incidentally this is exactly the same reason we can sing old songs, because the truth of who God is for us in Christ remains unchanged, but this is equally a reason to sing new songs that frame our sung worship in today’s common vocabulary and syntax, using today’s musical languages. We do well to remember that the old songs were once new too.
Our sinfulness conspires with our finite minds and limited heart-grasp of God to dull our spiritual creativity for new things, tempting us to settle for what we know and fear what is new or different. But those in Christ are new creations (2 Corinthians 5:17) indwelled by God’s Spirit who fuels and fills our worship. As such, the church ought to embrace the refreshing view new songs can bring to old truth. So, Christians, let’s articulate our sung worshipful thanks and praise to him in new ways, with new songs.
Something Borrowed
I’ve reached an age where I can now hear in new music, samples of older music, or the recycling of musical motifs from the songs of my youth. By and large my young children are totally oblivious to this borrowing of the old in the new and are surprised to know that their new music isn’t that new at all (some would argue it’s not music at all). Something more up my street is the music of film. I was pleased, in the latest reimagining of ‘Superman’, to hear the old familiar theme of John Williams being given a new lease of life. It appears new, but it’s old, familiar, borrowed for a new-ish telling of the same great story.
We find this first in the bible. There are striking and glorious similarities between the song of Mary, known as the Magnificat, found in Luke 1:46-55 and Hannah’s song, found some 1100 years earlier in 1 Samuel 2:1-10. As Mary’s soul magnifies the Lord and her spirit rejoices in God her saviour, she does so by rehearsing the mighty saving power of the God of Israel for the humble and lowly sinner, she does so whilst carrying the king of the universe in her womb, the same anointed king that it would seem Hannah sings of all those years before.
Mary doesn’t need to reinvent the wheel, she most likely knows the song of Hannah from her grasp of the Jewish scriptures. Mary’s Magnificat is neither singing from an old hymn sheet or penning a completely new song of her own. It is both Hannah and Mary’s story. Both point to the same Lord Jesus Christ. There is more to this, I know, I don’t mean to over-simplify the prophetic fulfilment of Hannah’s song in Mary’s, but I think it serves as an illustration of the intersection of old and new.
An excellent example of a borrowed song is the hymn ‘He will hold me fast’ which is neither old or new. An original version of this hymn was written in 1906 by Ada Ruth Habershon from London. Much later, in 2013, Matt Merker of Capitol Hill Baptist Church, Washington, D.C. combined Habershon’s original four verses into two, added an extra verse and set the song to a new tune. A century (and an ocean) apart and this borrowed song continues to help us today to sing joyfully of God’s enduring love, grace and mercy in the face of our sin, doubt and apathy.
So, whether it’s a Psalm sang to a familiar tune, an old hymn with modernised language, or a great song that might not be in the familiar style you’re used to in your church circles – There can be great blessing for our churches to sing something borrowed.
Nothing Blue
Now we come, not to a fourth category, but to a foundational principle for any and all of our songs. We all know what the blue dot on our sink tap means. Blue is the universal colour for cold. Cold means no warmth. In terms of our affections – cold is deadly.
The reason we sing together and we don’t just simply recite words aloud in our congregations is because music is an indescribably wonderful gift from God. When combined wisely with the written truth about God and his gospel, our music is administered by his Spirit to help this good news of Jesus the Son dwell richly among us.
When we sing, our hearts feel what our eyes read, or at least that’s what is supposed to happen.
If we are singing good songs that are centred on God’s word the bible, then as we sing we will find 2 Timothy 3:16 at work. Our hearts are taught, we are reproved and corrected through conviction of our sin, and we are trained and directed in righteousness as we sing of the saviour, Jesus Christ.
When I say ‘good’ songs I mean a song that combines tune and words appropriately, to engage both mind and heart with theological truth that is clear rather than ambiguous and vague, set within a vocal range that suits the majority of people in the gathering. I’m not talking about a song that gives us a nice warm feeling.
Music is meant to stir the affections for God. A good song is one that doesn’t use music as a means of pulling at our emotions, drawing an emotional response without grounding our minds in the truth of the gospel. A good song is one that demands an appropriate heart response to the truth it conveys. At different times this response might be to cry tears of sorrow or joy as we sing, or to beam from ear to ear with gladness in God, or to engage our whole being in ways that outwardly and physically display our inward submission to and humility before God. You might identify with some, all or none of these responses, but it remains that there is no place in Christian singing for blue.
Nothing blue. Blue is cold, cold is unaffected by the universe-shaking reality that God has overcome our spiritual deadness and has made us alive in Christ. A blue response has as much to do with the heart of the worshipper as it does the song choice on a Sunday. We have to be mindful of both our attitude as we prepare to open our mouths to sing, as well as our song choice so that we don’t alienate hearts, minds or both.
And so, we end where we began with an exhortation to address one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart. The way this sounds in your local church will vary, maybe significantly from context to context, but I think that the diet of songs in all of our churches would be better balanced if we considered singing something old, something new, something borrowed, but nothing blue.