Thoughts of Hymn

You know when you are sitting in church (well standing in this story because Christians have some weird thing about standing during worship?) Anyway….you know when you are standing in church on Sunday morning and you are giving it your best to even seem like you are in a full on worship? Then from the other side of the room, usually in the back, you hear this beautiful voice singing to glorious God. Again, for sake of story, I am going to pretend that this voice is male, could be female though! He is singing with so much passion it almost sounds like angels serenading you. In the gospel of Matthew the story is told of the Lords supper. We all know the scene, some men gathered around a table full of bread and wine, probably doesn’t smell very good. I am actually going to go on record and assume that the upper room in which Jesus and the disciples had the Lords supper in was probably the first ever man cave. Think about it, big wooded table, food, alcohol, probably had some Sunday night football on and some southern gospel blaring in the background. Anyway, back on course, they go around the table and Jesus, the Christ, presents them with some bread and a chalice. He utters the words, “This is my body, and this is my blood.” Then verse 30 hits us, “When they had sung a hymn, they went out to the Mount of Olives.” What hymn did they sing? Does it matter what hymn they sang? Obviously not because the author left it out, but I can guarantee this, the voice that our Lord and Savior sings with is one of pure masterpiece indeed. As I sit here on my couch at three in the morning, my radio is tuned into 90.8 fm. For those of you that don’t go that low on the radio dial, it is National Public Radio. I love classical music masterpieces. On this evening I go over to the bookshelf and pull off a hymnal that I have collected along the way, an old 1972 hymnal from an old Methodist church. In it some of the finest songs composed by man, yet some are from the very Psalms that my Lord and Savior breathed into life. My Savior, Jesus, is an artist. He is a musician. He is the voice in the back of the sanctuary singing to His own Father in complete and utter awe. Ephesians 5:19 tells us, “Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord.” Don’t forget to give God your all this Sunday morning…you never know who is listening. 

Social Reform

I have been reading a book off and on titled The Life and Teachings of Jesus Christ. This morning I opened up to a section titled Jesus and the Social Questions. Surprisingly enough, Jesus did not concern Himself with social questions at all, yet, was the world’s greatest social reformer. Jesus’ preoccupation was of course the soul, and then the community. The book led me to the Gospel of Luke, which is full of parables and sayings of Jesus. What I found interesting was that the series of parables opens with a very personal story of the “sower.” Jesus puts ourselves in the hot seat and asks in a sense, “What kind of soil are you cultivating, and how well are you at planting seeds?” Now I find it no coincidence that Jesus begins the first of His parables with one completely directed at self. He goes on to tell more and more parables, but what I find interesting is that most of them deal with subjects from a community standpoint. In chapter 10 we have the Parable of the Good Samaritan, which I’m sure all of us could read and reread five or six times a day. Then comes the Parable of the Rich Fool, which tells a tale of a man who has too much goods and not the heart enough to share. We can go on and on through the parables and read story after story of Jesus teaching and preaching about community and fellowship. But it comes down to one word, action. Jesus just didn’t sit around preaching and teaching, Jesus travelled, Jesus met with communities, Jesus went in and out of temples and towns spreading love and the good news. I think too many times we get caught up in the latest thing or the newest gossip, or we find ourselves sitting around for numerous hours on Facebook dwelling into other peoples lives, when we could be out and about loving and sharing the good news with others.