Story time, words and music Music,
it has been said, carries us beyond ourselves and into an
experience of God. It touches the heart of us.
It enhances words and communicates without words at all. In the
Bible, hymn and laments and especially the Psalms are
inspired by the heights and depths of human experience.
They express great faith, great doubt and timeless prayer.
Psalm 23 is the life story of a person of great faith,
someone who can readily see the Lord as his shepherd.
And the writers of Psalm 19 offers a metaphor of the
stars performing a hymn of praise to their creator. The
Song of Songs provides a rhapsody of the thoughts and
feelings of a young woman and her beloved as they journey
towards the consummations of their love. Mary's
song, the Magnificat in Luke 1, 46-55, offers praise to
the power of God. Music
is integral to the telling of story in Christian worship.
Not only are there hymns to lead us through the events of
the Church's year, but also to help us make the truths of
Christian faith a part of our own lives. From 'We
three kings' at Epiphany and 'Forty days and forty
nights' in Lent to 'The strife is o'er, the battle done'
at Easter. And hymns like 'Lord of all hopefulness'
tell the story of our own day, lived in faith. And
how many of us used the musical settings to reinforce our
understanding of the words of the Eucharist, the Gloria,
Creed, Agnus Dei and Lord's Prayer? Classical music
stimulates our feelings and memories without the need for
words. Popular music may well be ephemeral, but its
lyrics often tell stories, many of them spiritually-based
or searching for life's meaning. Faith's story,
through music, can still be heard in many ways. |