Singing Hymns

Sunday 3 January


TOPIC: SINGING HYMNS

MEMORIZE: “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord” (Col. 3: 16)

READ: Ephesians 5: 15-19

One healthy habit believers should cultivate is the act of singing hymns. This was a common feature in the early church. In Paul’s epistle to the Ephesian brethren, he enjoined them to be engaged in this activity. “Speaking to yourselves in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody in your heart to the Lord” (Eph. 5:19). Some songs that we commonly sing as praise or worship songs are far from what they are intended. Today, you have all kinds of songs – including those that feed our pride and glorify the flesh and even the devil. Non use of appropriate praise and worship lyrics has seriously hampered our worship. As a result of this, there is so much waste of both our time and God’s time while claiming to praise or worship God.

One thing we learn from today’s reading is that for you to maximize your gains from hymns, you must be born-again, baptized in the Holy Spirit and filled with the Spirit. The truthe is that these hymns come from divine inspiration just as the Holy scriptures were inspired by the Holy Spirit and as a result, you need to be in the spirit to get the best from them. We also learn that we can speak to ourselves through hymns and psalms. This is true! Most hymns are loaded with wonderful words of wisdom that remain relevant to our faith today. There are vital lessons to learn from each hymn. They are so well written that sometimes you cannot but magnify God for the lives of the hymn writers. Colossians 3;16 says, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom, teaching and admonishing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing with grace in your hearts to the Lord”. Another lesson here is that for you to derive the best from hymns, your heart must be full of God’s word. A heart that is void of God’s word will naturally struggle with the message in hymns and spiritual songs. If you are close to your Bible, you will appreciate hymns more than the fellow who keeps a distance from the word. Singing hymns and psalms helps you to maximize worship time. Hymns are ideal during personal or family devotion, naming ceremonies, weddings, house warming, house fellowships and in all church services.

ACTION POINT: Take a minimum of one hymn per day and ask God to minister to you through it.