Singing our Faith
Text: Revelation 1:4-8
Tonight is our celebration hymn sing. I have to admit I’m looking forward to it, because it’s a chance for us to sing songs of our faith that have a particular meaning for each of you. They might be in memory of someone, in celebration of an event, or chosen simply because we like them. Whatever the reason, it’s an opportunity for us to get together and simply let the song be the prayers for the evening.
When Roger and I were putting together this evening’s program from all the requests that you had submitted, we found it fascinating that when we did this the last time only about one-third of the choices made this time are the same ones from last time. It means that tonight will not be a carbon-copy of the service we did three and a half years ago, but will still be a chance for us to gather together and to sing the songs of our faith.
…and while we’re at it, here’s an interesting coincidence. Here we are at the Second Sunday of Easter, and today is one of those rare days where the Book of Revelation is part of the suggested readings for the day. If you want to know how rare, the book of Revelation accounts for only 1.6% of those suggested readings. By comparison, without exaggerating, fully 20% - 170 of the hymns that are present in our Book of Praise draw their inspiration from the last book of the Bible.
Most of the time we think about Revelation as this dark and scary book relegated to the very back pages of the Bible. Usually it has become the territory for Bible-Thumping fundamentalists proclaiming that the end of the world is nearly upon us. Historically, we’re in good company, because Revelation has been used to predict the end of time since at least 300 AD… with usually a fever pitch being reached around the turn of each century, and amplified at each Millennium. However, maybe this question is obvious… how many of those predictions have been right?
It seems that the problem is not with the book, but how we perceive, understand and interpret it. Using it as future history has not really been all that helpful, and yet Revelation helped the early church survive an extraordinarily dark time in its early life. It helped early Christians in their struggle against real, genuine persecution and the immediate threat of it at the hands of the Roman Empire. It did so by revealing the real players behind the scenes, and to call into question any earthly ruler who claims to have divine authority… it evokes the images of God setting the Hebrew Slaves of Egypt through the various signs of awe and wonder.
Not only that, Revelation was a book that also spoke to the glory of worshipping God… having these magnificent scenes of heavenly worship… using powerful impressionistic-style images to speak about the unimaginable glory of God. At its heart, Revelation is a worship book… it is about worshipping God who is ultimately in control no matter how hard the earthly rulers try to say otherwise… and it is why it so easily transposes into some of the most powerful and loved songs of our faith.
Listen again to the short passage from this morning’s reading from Revelation… and listen for the song lyrics…
4 John to the seven churches that are in Asia:
Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, 5and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.
To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, 6and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
7Look! He is coming with the clouds;
every eye will see him,
even those who pierced him;
and on his account all the tribes of the earth will wail.
So it is to be. Amen.
8 ‘I am the Alpha and the Omega’, says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.
Did some of this sound familiar? Perhaps echoes of a song that you might know? Maybe you can’t quite put your finger on it, but it’s there?
Here’s one:
“let the water and the blood, from thy riven side which flowed, be of sin the double-cure: cleanse me from its guilt and power.” – Rock of Ages #240 – But that’s just one of them.
I did just a quick count, and was able to come up with 10 hymns that draw their imagery from these four verses alone. Even our closing hymn evokes the “Alpha and Omega” image of God being the first and the last. It is the same image in that window over there, that is dedicated to Bert and Gertrude Dutcher… Listen for the “Alpha and Omega” image in verse 2.
I should also note that while we might think that it’s fine that Revelation influences 20% of the Book of Praise, we might be led to think that it’s not the 20% that we sing… Our favourite hymns surely don’t draw from that book back there. But here’s something interesting… of the requests that we received for this evening’s collection, we have twenty-seven selections that you have made… twelve of them draw from Revelation… almost half of them. It means that these powerful images of worship from Revelation resonate with us on a core level that I don’t think we even realize. We sing our way through it.
The more I work with it, the more I have become convinced that the Book of Revelation is not really one to read and study in the traditional sense, it is more a book that we sing… as a guide in worship… and can be a voice of support and hope in the midst of tragedy and despair.
Think of it this way, Revelation is not the type book that we need to pour over and try and crack the code. Misguided interpreters have been doing that for centuries, and they’ve missed the mark. There’s not a code to be cracked at all… the images that Revelation evoked sparked hope to an early church in crisis. But get this… we have this whole other catalogue of songs and hymns that Revelation has inspired that we have all but ignored when we try to read the last book of the Bible. I think that’s a huge mistake… So many of us connect to the great hymns of the faith that draw their inspiration from the last book of the Bible, so perhaps a way for us to connect with this mysterious book is not so much to read it, in the same way we might a novel… but instead read it for the poetry that it is and see what songs and hymns echo in our hearts. In other words, it’s a book we sing far more than we read. Maybe then we experience it for the poetic work that it truly is...
Methodist founder John Wesley once wrote “To Sing is to pray twice…” What he meant was when we sing, it is a special kind of prayer, and has us praying on two different levels… once with the words, and once with the music itself. The styles of music may indeed change over time, but the essence of it is the same. Music as a prayer form is timeless. Music can connect us with God in a way that we may not fully understand… but it can shape us and affect us in a way far deeper than any sermon. When we get together tonight to sing, we can let our songs be our prayers.
Amen.
Tonight is our celebration hymn sing. I have to admit I’m looking forward to it, because it’s a chance for us to sing songs of our faith that have a particular meaning for each of you. They might be in memory of someone, in celebration of an event, or chosen simply because we like them. Whatever the reason, it’s an opportunity for us to get together and simply let the song be the prayers for the evening.
When Roger and I were putting together this evening’s program from all the requests that you had submitted, we found it fascinating that when we did this the last time only about one-third of the choices made this time are the same ones from last time. It means that tonight will not be a carbon-copy of the service we did three and a half years ago, but will still be a chance for us to gather together and to sing the songs of our faith.
…and while we’re at it, here’s an interesting coincidence. Here we are at the Second Sunday of Easter, and today is one of those rare days where the Book of Revelation is part of the suggested readings for the day. If you want to know how rare, the book of Revelation accounts for only 1.6% of those suggested readings. By comparison, without exaggerating, fully 20% - 170 of the hymns that are present in our Book of Praise draw their inspiration from the last book of the Bible.
Most of the time we think about Revelation as this dark and scary book relegated to the very back pages of the Bible. Usually it has become the territory for Bible-Thumping fundamentalists proclaiming that the end of the world is nearly upon us. Historically, we’re in good company, because Revelation has been used to predict the end of time since at least 300 AD… with usually a fever pitch being reached around the turn of each century, and amplified at each Millennium. However, maybe this question is obvious… how many of those predictions have been right?
It seems that the problem is not with the book, but how we perceive, understand and interpret it. Using it as future history has not really been all that helpful, and yet Revelation helped the early church survive an extraordinarily dark time in its early life. It helped early Christians in their struggle against real, genuine persecution and the immediate threat of it at the hands of the Roman Empire. It did so by revealing the real players behind the scenes, and to call into question any earthly ruler who claims to have divine authority… it evokes the images of God setting the Hebrew Slaves of Egypt through the various signs of awe and wonder.
Not only that, Revelation was a book that also spoke to the glory of worshipping God… having these magnificent scenes of heavenly worship… using powerful impressionistic-style images to speak about the unimaginable glory of God. At its heart, Revelation is a worship book… it is about worshipping God who is ultimately in control no matter how hard the earthly rulers try to say otherwise… and it is why it so easily transposes into some of the most powerful and loved songs of our faith.
Listen again to the short passage from this morning’s reading from Revelation… and listen for the song lyrics…
4 John to the seven churches that are in Asia:
Grace to you and peace from him who is and who was and who is to come, and from the seven spirits who are before his throne, 5and from Jesus Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn of the dead, and the ruler of the kings of the earth.
To him who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, 6and made us to be a kingdom, priests serving his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion for ever and ever. Amen.
7Look! He is coming with the clouds;
every eye will see him,
even those who pierced him;
and on his account all the tribes of the earth will wail.
So it is to be. Amen.
8 ‘I am the Alpha and the Omega’, says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.
Did some of this sound familiar? Perhaps echoes of a song that you might know? Maybe you can’t quite put your finger on it, but it’s there?
Here’s one:
“let the water and the blood, from thy riven side which flowed, be of sin the double-cure: cleanse me from its guilt and power.” – Rock of Ages #240 – But that’s just one of them.
I did just a quick count, and was able to come up with 10 hymns that draw their imagery from these four verses alone. Even our closing hymn evokes the “Alpha and Omega” image of God being the first and the last. It is the same image in that window over there, that is dedicated to Bert and Gertrude Dutcher… Listen for the “Alpha and Omega” image in verse 2.
I should also note that while we might think that it’s fine that Revelation influences 20% of the Book of Praise, we might be led to think that it’s not the 20% that we sing… Our favourite hymns surely don’t draw from that book back there. But here’s something interesting… of the requests that we received for this evening’s collection, we have twenty-seven selections that you have made… twelve of them draw from Revelation… almost half of them. It means that these powerful images of worship from Revelation resonate with us on a core level that I don’t think we even realize. We sing our way through it.
The more I work with it, the more I have become convinced that the Book of Revelation is not really one to read and study in the traditional sense, it is more a book that we sing… as a guide in worship… and can be a voice of support and hope in the midst of tragedy and despair.
Think of it this way, Revelation is not the type book that we need to pour over and try and crack the code. Misguided interpreters have been doing that for centuries, and they’ve missed the mark. There’s not a code to be cracked at all… the images that Revelation evoked sparked hope to an early church in crisis. But get this… we have this whole other catalogue of songs and hymns that Revelation has inspired that we have all but ignored when we try to read the last book of the Bible. I think that’s a huge mistake… So many of us connect to the great hymns of the faith that draw their inspiration from the last book of the Bible, so perhaps a way for us to connect with this mysterious book is not so much to read it, in the same way we might a novel… but instead read it for the poetry that it is and see what songs and hymns echo in our hearts. In other words, it’s a book we sing far more than we read. Maybe then we experience it for the poetic work that it truly is...
Methodist founder John Wesley once wrote “To Sing is to pray twice…” What he meant was when we sing, it is a special kind of prayer, and has us praying on two different levels… once with the words, and once with the music itself. The styles of music may indeed change over time, but the essence of it is the same. Music as a prayer form is timeless. Music can connect us with God in a way that we may not fully understand… but it can shape us and affect us in a way far deeper than any sermon. When we get together tonight to sing, we can let our songs be our prayers.
Amen.
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