ECCLESIOLOGICAL ETCHINGS
November 10, 2022
I am amazed at my capacity to remember lyrics from songs I enjoyed in the 1980s. Of course, I’m probably getting some of the lyrics entirely wrong, but there are some songs I’ve not heard in decades, yet I remember the words at the very same time that I cannot remember where I set down my cell phone. Music has a magnificent capacity to touch certain parts of the brain, certain aspects of our memory. It makes me wonder why the Psalms often spoke of “Singing to the Lord a new song.” A new song? You’d think God would have them humming a few bars of that old melody as a way of reconnecting with what God had done. That would be the more logical thinking for a religion deeply rooted in the past, but God appears to be more interested in teaching us a new song. That’s hard! Yet it’s almost as if God knows the danger of nostalgia that goes unchallenged or a short-sided yearning for what was. If we believe in a Living Word, a Gospel untethered from the past, yet fully engaged in the present, then we must believe in a God who is trying to teach us a new song. If God is the composer, I feel confident the tune will be one you’ll remember.
Put a new song in my heart, Gracious God, for if it is a song from you, then I believe it will be the song I need for a life lived faithfully for you. Amen.
