Sing to the Lord a New Song!

My 2014 Advent Devotional for University Baptist Church

Psalm 96 - December 18, 2014

The picture I snapped of Raley Chapel the very first time
I stepped foot on OBU's campus for
Dean Woodward's annual Choir Festival.
March 1976.  I was 11 years old and in the 4th grade.

I love to sing!  I love music!  I have since as young as I remember.  At age three I regularly gathered up my mother’s pots, pans, and utensils to create my own orchestra in the living room.  I marched about the house with a wooden spoon as my baton.  In fact, music is the reason I live in Shawnee.  It has both drawn and kept me here.  Each year from fourth to twelfth grade, I made the trek to Shawnee to participate in Dean Woodward’s annual choir festival.    In fact, I thought college was a huge church where great music always occurred!  Despite this, I’ve never been confident in my ability to sing.  Yet, I stepped out of my comfort zone recently to take private voice lessons from one of my students.  I discovered I could reach notes I thought impossible and I can do more than simply match pitch with the radio or congregation.  While you will likely not find me suddenly singing solos, I am singing with greater joy and confidence than I have ever experienced.

The psalmist calls his readers to sing a NEW song to the Lord.  We humans can be particularly adverse to change; routine provides comfort and confidence.  Singing a new song requires us to try something we previously have not or to do that of which we have considered ourselves incapable.  It calls us to step out in faith; to reconsider our limits; to be vulnerable.The Advent Season is rife with tradition and for good reason.  However, is it time for you to sing to the Lord a new song?  Celebrate His coming into the world and your heart in a fresh way.  Disturb your routine; sing of His strength and beauty in the sanctuary in a way that causes you to tremble before Him for He is coming!

Psalm 96

New Revised Standard Version

Praise to God Who Comes in Judgement

O 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 the peoples.

For great is the Lord, and greatly to be praised;
he is to be revered above all gods.

For all the gods of the peoples are idols,
but the Lord made the heavens.

Honour and majesty are before him;
strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.

Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples,
ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.

Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name;
bring an offering, and come into his courts.

Worship the Lord in holy splendour;
tremble before him, all the earth.

Say among the nations, ‘The Lord is king!
The world is firmly established; it shall never be moved.
He will judge the peoples with equity.’

Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice;
let the sea roar, and all that fills it;

let the field exult, and everything in it.
Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy
before the Lord; for he is coming,
for he is coming to judge the earth.
He will judge the world with righteousness,
and the peoples with his truth.