A New Song in our Mouths

I don’t know U2 music very well at all.  You ask me a trivia question about an ABBA song, and I’m your gal.  U2 is my brother’s music, something the younger generation listened to.  So, I was floored to learn that U2 took the words of Psalm 40 and put it to music.  Not only that, but they used “40” as their concert grand finale for many years, leaving the stage while the audience sang the chorus of “How Long to Sing this Song” which would go on and on and on.

Almost like the kids songs we used to sing, “This is the Song that Never Ends” or “99 Bottles of Beer on the Wall”.  They can go on for a long time, much to the annoyance of others who listen to them and don’t want to join in the silliness.

There are times we feel like we can’t sing.  Like we are still caught in the horrible pit, out of the miry clay, or in some translations, the miry bog.  Taxes, kids clothes, food, expenses, sickness, family drama, fender benders, and world events, all kinds of things can contribute to that feeling that our lives are out of control and we are in a sticky situation. Sometimes we cry for help and feel like there is no answer to our dilemma, like no one is listening, like we are alone and abandoned.  And sometimes we feel like there is something listening, that encouragement comes when we least expect it, we get a phone call from someone we haven’t heard from in a while, or something comes together and things make sense.

For me, that was music.  When I was struggling with depression as a twenty-something, I stumbled into church one day and the music and hymns were what helped me feel less alone, less hopeless and helpless.  Songs outside the church also supported and encouraged me.  Music like John Denver’s “Sweet Surrender”.  Many folks found country gospel music like “I Saw the Light” or “I Come to the Garden Alone” sustained them in their dark times. Or Louis Armstrong’s “What a Wonderful World” or Judy Garland’s “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” or Natasha Beddingfield’s “Unwritten” and the list goes on.  Hymns like “Amazing Grace”, “This Little Light of Mine”, “Be Thou my Vision” can pull us out of our negativity we may be stuck in. It also reminds us that we’re not alone. 

But music is not enough to help us when we are really in challenging times.  Like a bandage and a kiss on a boo boo, this may make us temporarily flushed with positive adrenaline, but sometimes a panacea won’t work.  Sure, there is something magical about sitting on Connor’s Hill on an August night singing along to Ian Tyson’s “Four Strong Winds” with a thousand or more other Albertans that leaves us all with lumps in our throats, but what kind of love will end conflict in Ukraine or starvation in the Sudan or political unrest in Peru?

I’ll never forget leaving the old Rexall hockey arena in Edmonton after a Neil Diamond concert where thousands of people had sung about brotherly love together only to discover that the same people were now arguing loudly and heatedly over taxis.  My faith in humanity was shaken hard that night as we stood there wondering how we would get home.

Songs are not enough if they slip out of our lips without thinking.  And if they are only about our pleasures and our concerns.  The words that slipped out of John’s lips in our gospel reading were pointing to something beyond him.  John wasn’t singing “I will Survive” like Gloria Gaynor, he was singing, “B-b-b-baby, you ain’t seen nothing yet” and pointing to Jesus.  “Go, follow that guy!  Go, watch him pull you out of the horrible pit, the miry bog.  Go and learn a new song to sing that will spill out of your mouths and bless everyone who will hear you, to come and see!”

John’s excitement was contagious.  How can we share our excitement to the people around us that are feeling stuck, hopeless and helpless?  We tend to do exactly the opposite of what the scriptures suggested – at the first sign of opposition, we have concealed the signs of God’s steadfast love, and hidden the truth of the difference our faith has made in our lives.  We’ve experienced too many cases of toxic bullying that was used to bring people to church, too many ugly songs that preached shame, guilt, fear and superiority.  We’ve listened to stories of racism, injustice and intolerance that have been done in the name of winning souls to Christianity.

Enough!  Time to sing the truth, the new song!  One of joy and liberation, of new light in our troubled world, of power with rather than power over.  This week I was talking to a young lady about our church and she got very excited when she saw our big rainbow flag in our basement.  “I left my church because they preached hate”, she told me. “I didn’t know churches like yours even existed.”  She needed to hear that new song we are singing, and there are others, so many others that also need to hear words of hope.  People who need a light in their lives, a lamb of God to pull them out of the clay bogs of their lives. How can we do that?

Remember that all John the Baptiser said was “Wow look at him!” and all Jesus said was “Come and See”.  Very simple.  Very straightforward.  “Wow, this has happened, check it out.  Wow, I feel much more hopeful with my life, come and try it out.” It’s okay to hear no, just keep singing anyway.

And we may find that people, hungry for a new song of hope in their lives, will join us as we say “Wow” together every Sunday.  The light is with us, we are not alone, thanks be to God!