Thesis 70- We must sing the songs of our fathers.
It is easy, too easy, to confuse revolution and reformation. The former pulls up our history by the roots and tosses it onto the compost heap. The latter reshapes, remolds, reforms what has been given to us. Reforming the church, in the 16th century and in the 21st doesn’t mean scrapping everything that’s gone before and starting all over. It means preserving all that is precious that has been handed down to us, while scraping off the barnacles of cultural accretions.
It has been said, by someone far more cynical than me, that the average evangelical believer thinks church history began with their conversion, while the more astute evangelical believer knows how silly such an idea is, and believes instead church history began with Billy Graham. Marshall Mcluhan would understand. Mcluhan labored to disabuse us of the notion that forms carry no content, arguing instead that the medium is the message. When all the songs that we sing in praise to our king were written in and to our own generation we will, unintentionally, even unconsciously reach the conclusion that we did in fact start the fire, that the church began with us.
I am not here arguing against contemporary music. I am not suggesting that drums are of the devil. Instead I am arguing for old music, music that will not only remind us of the rich truths it contains in its lyrics, but will, simply by being old, remind us that our fathers likewise walked in God’s grace, that they built upon foundations laid by their fathers and their fathers before them.
Consider the old 100th. This song, sometimes called “All People that on Earth Do Dwell” was that hymn sung on the Mayflower when it made landfall at Plymouth Rock. Our fathers in the faith, who came to this land to worship freely, sang that song 400 years ago. If that’s not enough for you, consider this. This same song, the Old 100th, with a different title and a different melody, in a different language but with the same words, was sung by the redeemed 4,000 years ago. The Old 100th isn’t the hundredth hymn in some old English hymnbook. It is Psalm 100 in the ancient Hebrew hymnbook. It’s difficult to forget all who have gone before us when we are singing their songs.
Remember, I’m not arguing against contemporary songs. We sing contemporary songs often at Sovereign Grace Fellowship. I’m arguing instead for a well-balanced diet, even when part of that diet tastes strange to those weaned all their lives on pop music. We ought not to ever look down our noses at our fathers. We ought instead to look up into the heavens where they reside, where they, day in and day out, sing praises to our Redeemer. King David, Saint Columba, Luther, Bach and with eyes wide open, Fanny Crosby all sing together, and are joined in that heavenly chorus by all people that on earth do dwell, who sing to the Lord with cheerful voice, Him serving with mirth, His praise forthtelling. Come ye before Him and rejoice.