Dear NPP,

Paul commanded the Ephesian church to be filled with the Holy Spirit, “addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart…” (Eph. 5:19) What a joy it is to be able to sing God’s word back to him for our mutual edification! Congregational singing is an important part of the church’s worship, and it’s something we want to keep cultivating at North Park Pres.

With the hope of growing in this area, we – the session – want to introduce a Psalm of the month. Every month we’ll pick a new Psalm to repeat each Sunday. This will give the church time to get familiar with the music so that we can all join in singing. Here are a few other benefits we see:

The Psalms are inspired Scripture

One Sunday a few years back we sang, “O For a Thousand Tongues to Sing,” a hymn many of you are familiar with. By accident, when I typed up the bulletin that week I wrote it in as, “O For a Thousand Tongues to Sin!” We got a good laugh over it, and fortunately no one sung the misprint!

 Human mistakes can get in the way of worship, and this is true when it comes to song lyrics. I’m grateful for the hymnals we use because they’re full of songs that are thoroughly biblical. Hymns contain rich theology – but every non-biblical song must be vetted for scriptural faithfulness. God doesn’t just want us to sing to him, he wants us to sing the truth. One of the wonderful things about singing the Psalms is that we never have to worry if the words are true, or theologically accurate. They’re inspired by the Holy Spirit! These are the songs God gave his people to sing in worship.

The Psalms allow us to express a broad range of emotion to God.

Did you know that there are several genres in the Psalter? Some Psalms are upbeat anthems of praise. You tend to find these more toward the end of the Psalter, and they’re in the “praise” genre. Other Psalms were composed for times of sadness, or suffering. These Psalms are in the genre of “lament”. Still, other Psalms were written during a time of trial when the psalmist was declaring his hope in God. Those Psalms are known as “trust” psalms. Other psalms fit under the genres of “wisdom” or “thanksgiving”.  The beautiful thing about the psalter is that it has songs for every season.

John Calvin wrote,

I have been accustomed to call this book, I think not inappropriately, the anatomy of all the parts of the soul …there is not an emotion of which any one can be conscious that is not here represented as in a mirror. Or rather, the Holy Spirit has here drawn … all the griefs, sorrows, fears, doubts, hopes, cares, perplexities, in short, all the distracting emotions with which the minds of men are wont to be agitated.

God wants us to sing to him about all of our hopes and fears, and the Psalms help us to do just that!

Singing Psalms consistently will help us to memorize Scripture through Song.

The psalmist said, “I have stored up your word in my heart, that I might not sin against you.” (Ps. 119:11) One of the best ways to memorize Scripture is to sing God’s word. The repetition of a particular Psalm will help us to better learn the tune, meditate on the words, and sing them from our hearts. Our hope is that the Psalm of the month will not just be the Psalm of the month for our church, but for your family.

Recently, we purchased a hymnal to use at home for family worship. It’s totally worth it! If you want something a little more convenient, you can get the Trinity Psalter Hymnal App on your Smartphone. It contains the entire hymnal with piano recordings of each Psalm & Hymn. This is a great resource for bringing the hymnal home and practicing the songs before church on Sunday.

We sang Psalm 29b last Sunday, and we’re going to stick with it through June!

Blessings,
Pastor Adriel