God calls us to sing and sing well. Rob Smith reflects on what God is calling us to do in singing as his people and how singing builds us as disciples.
 

 

 

 

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TRANSCRIPT:

The following is an uncorrected transcript generated by a transcription service. Before quoting in print, please check the corresponding audio for accuracy.

G Day, I’m Pete Hughes and you’ve clicked on the Rich Australia podcast.In our last episode, we heard Andrew Heard do an excellent introduction to the idea of singing in church.And what is that like?This one, Rob Smith is taking us through what it means to sing in church, and this is such a great impassioned plea to sing well in church.
If you haven’t heard the introduction, it’s certainly worth listening to that.So I’ll put the link in the show notes, but here is Rob Smith.Enjoy.I’ll hand.It to you.Thank you Toby and thank you Andrew for for setting things up.
If not setting me up, that’s but let me just I’ve got the biggest clicker I’ve ever seen in my life here, but hopefully that will help us.I do have some slides you’ll also find on the app, if you haven’t found it already.
There is an outline for this address there not with the quotes on the slides there also, I think accessible, but that may be helpful for those who like taking notes or at least following the structure of things.Why do God’s people sing?
You know, what are the powers and the purposes of congregational song?How does our singing together relate?So that call that command to love the Lord our God with heart, soul, mind and strength.These are the questions.
Well, I, I’m going to be talking about with you, thinking about together with you.And as many of you will be aware, I, I have been thinking about these these things for a long time.I’ve been reading about them, writing about them, speaking about them, and yes, have some books out there that have tried to digest the wisdom that God has so far given me.
And of course, it won’t surprise me at all, some of you, if some of you have heard me before, read me before, and therefore some of the things I’m saying this morning will be very familiar to you.I suspect that will be the case for some, if not many of us.But even if it is the case, I’m confident it won’t hurt you to hear certain things again, particularly in the context of this conference and the aims of this conference as we seek to understand how to love God Better Together.
I’m sure you are convinced, as I am, that the glorification of God is the primary purpose of our existence.It’s why you are here.It’s why we’ve been made.It’s why we’ve been redeemed.It’s also, unsurprisingly, although as Andrew said, perhaps not uncontroversially, the primary purpose of our gatherings, right, the 1st and greatest commandment applies across the board, the church life as well as to all of life.
Now, as I’m sure you understand, glorifying God together is hardly reducible to singing.We glorify God in many ways.Indeed, we should glorify Him in every way.But certainly as we listen to His Word together, as we give attention to hear His, to His voice that we might hear His voice, that brings glory to God, right?
As we pray together in faith, that brings glory to God.So we serve one another in love, that brings glory to God.And yes, of course, here’s whether that sort of Nexus between edification and glorification is really important to appreciate, right?As we edify, we glorify, and as we glorify, we edify.
Those two things roll together and run together and must never be set at odds against each other.But of course, none of those things I’ve just mentioned requires us to sing.And yet of course God calls us to sing.I heard that Ray mentioned how many times, Ray?
How many commands?Was it 50?Yeah.OK, so this is not this is not a sub theme in Scripture.There are many commands, many exhortations, many calls to sing.And of course God gives those to us.
Well, for many reasons, and we are going to focus this morning on three of the principal reasons, three key purposes why we should sing together, why we indeed we do sing together.
And again, you may have heard me talk on these themes before, but I want to think together with you about singing as a way of praising God, singing as a way of praying to God, singing as a way of proclaiming God’s Word.So that’s the shape.
So let’s begin at the beginning, singing and praise.Now you don’t have to read too far the Scripture to realize that biblical praise is verbal.It comes out the mouth, it’s articulated.
Now again, it doesn’t always have to take the form of song.You can speak praise.You can chant praise.You can recite praise.You can shout praise, but of course you can also sing praise.In fact, there’s no escaping the fact that singing is a vital form of praise according to Scripture.
And there’s a specific Hebrew word that means to sing praise.Zama.Have a look at Psalm 96 on the screen.There we are, is it?There?There we are.Oh, sing to the Lord a new song.
Sing to the Lord all the earth.Sing to the Lord, bless His name, tell of His salvation from day-to-day, declare His glory among the nations, His marvellous works among all peoples.For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised.He is to be feared above all gods.
Now apart from the very obvious and very strong link here between singing and praise, the other thing you see in this, in these verses is that praise sun praise has two aspects to it, a vertical, horizontal adoration proclamation.
We praise God to God and we praise God to others, right?We sing to the Lord, we bless his name, and we sing of the Lord as we tell of his salvation, as we declare His glory.
And of course, often we’re doing both at once.In fact, you can’t help but do both as once, both at once.Because when we sing to the Lord, well, unless you in solitary confinement, others will hear.And even if you are in solitary confinement, the angels will hear.
But of course, when we sing of the Lord, he is present, present to receive his praise.Now the importance of singing our praises to God.I think it’s clear, just as we said a moment ago from a number of times, God calls us to this activity, but the fact that he has to call us and command us and urge us and exhort us, that tells us something, something really important.
It tells us that while praise should come naturally to us, and of course often it does come naturally to us, it doesn’t always come naturally to us.We need help.We need prodding, We need beckoning.In fact, praise can be a battle.
It be, can be something we resist for reasons many.And so it’s something we need to be exhorted to do, summoned to do.And of course, that shouldn’t surprise us, really, when you think about it, right?Every aspect of Christian obedience is an arena, is an arena of conflict.
There’s nothing God wants you to do, calls you to do, desires you to do, that’s in the flesh.And the devil aren’t going to work their Dundas to stop you doing.And so praise too is an arena in which we, the people of God, have to fight to be faithful.
And fight is what we need to do.We need to be aware of the forces pitted against us.Spiritual forces, physical forces, emotional forces, relational forces, cultural forces, traditional forces, sometimes even theological forces, defective theology, all these things can seek to deflect us from giving God the praise that is rightly His.
And so let me talk to you about some strategies for engaging in the battle to give God the praise that is indeed rightly His.How do we push back against sin, the flesh and the devil?How do we seek to praise God as Scripture calls us to, with a whole heart?
Not with a half heart or a part heart, but a whole heart.How might we do that, do that more, do that better?Well, three suggestions.First, we need to regularly remind ourselves and remind each other that God truly deserves our praise like He really does deserve our praise.
Let me just give you some psalms that tell you that Psalm 7 verse 17 I will give to the Lord the thanks with the praise.Yadah is the Hebrew word here due to His righteousness.
He is due praise because of his righteousness.And I will sing praise to the name of the Lord, the Most High, Psalm 18, verse three.I will call upon the Lord who is worthy to be praised, and I’m saved from my enemies.Somebody asked me once and said, why did you write the song by the name Worthy of all praise And just, well, perhaps rather flippantly, I said because he is.