Devotional Reading: Psalm 96

Text: O sing to the LORD a new song, sing the the LORD, all the earth. (v. 1)

“Give me the making of a people’s song, and I care not who makes the laws.” The quotation is attributed the the 17th century Scottish writer and politician Andrew Fletcher. It has the ring of truth about it.

Songs move a people, a nation and the world. Recall how “The Star Spangled Banner” united a nation since the War of 1812, or how “The Battle Hymn of the Republic” solidified the North just as “Dixie” united the South during the American Civil War. The Christian Missionary Movement of an earlier time marched into new fields singing the hymn “Onward, Christian Soldiers”*  In my youth, it seemed that the whole world sang, in various languages, Coca Cola’s “I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing”.

Have you ever considered making your life a hymn to the LORD? The decisions you make, the attitudes you carry, the words you say have are the lyrics to your life.

Today’s Psalm was used as worshipers entered the Temple but it is also a call to carry the hymn of praise out of the worship assembly into the world. You, too, are writing the psalm of your life every day.

O Sing to the LORD a new song, … write your song, your psalm…to the glory of God.

Lord, You write the music and today and every day, I’ll sing the song of Your glory. Amen.

*Contrary to today’s interpretation, it was not a military song, per se, but a call to share the message of Christ.