Music Mondays + Sermon Snippets

Yesterday was unique in the sense that Valentine's Day fell on a Sunday. 

Naturally, this pastor chose to prepare a topical sermon on love. I eschewed the theme of romantic love, though I believe Scripture has much to say on that topic. I decided instead to focus on God's love for us. 

The verses of Ephesians 3:17-19 had come to mind early in my preparation process, especially the part where Paul prays that we "grasp how wide and long and high and deep is the love of Christ...".

Have you ever thought about how wide God's love is? How long it stretches? How high it reaches? How deep it goes?

I tried to answer those questions in the message and, in doing so, many great songs kept popping up into my head. 

This one in particular stood out above the rest and I ended up quoting it in my conclusion. 

It is such a great song that pays proper tribute to the amazing love of God towards us. I am always captured by the lyrics of the second verse which state:

Could we with ink the ocean fill

And were the skies of parchment made

Were every stalk on earth a quill

And every man a scribe by trade

To write the love of God above

Would drain the ocean dry

Nor could the scroll contain the whole

Though stretched from sky to sky

Some songs begin with their most powerful and profound statements. This one waits until the second verse to use incredible imagery to capture the limitless nature of God's love for us.

The love of God - it shall forevermore endure, the saints and angels song!

Music Mondays - Faith In Tension

One of the most valuable things I learned in seminary was that we must hold some seemingly opposite spiritual truths in tension. 
God is a God of love but also justice. 
God is fully sovereign but allows his creatures the freedom of choice.

Our modern, Western minds can't always handle that. But to the Middle Eastern perspective, it is totally normal that two things that do not really fit together can both be true.

This reality combined with some CCM radio listening inspired me to compile a list of Christian songs that reflect this 'faith in tension'.

A couple notes (feel free to skip if you just want to get to the songs):

• I decided to to stick to recent music only. To fish in a pool that considers all of Christian hymnody would be too much of an undertaking for the purposes of this author and his blog.
• I also decided to stick to Christian music.  There are some worthy options from those who don't identify as followers of Christ, but I wanted to keep the focus on Christians who are dealing with the tensions in their/our faith.
• I used my own rating system to rank the songs. I had three categories: Clarity of Tension, Theological Depth, and Overall Song Quality. I rated each song on Clarity of Tension (CT) on a scale of 1-10 based on how well the song communicated the tension or paradox it described. Theological Depth (TD) was also scaled 1-10 based on how significantly it grappled with heavy theological issues. Overall Song Quality (SQ) was only rated between 1-5 because I didn't want my musical preferences to get in the way too much. I also added a Bonus rating (0-2) as a sort of miscellaneous category to help break ties and account for additional aspects of each song.

We'll break down my top ten over the next two weeks. 
Here's #10-#6:

10. "Trust in You" - Lauren Daigle

 (Total Score - 20. CT: 8, TD: 8, SQ: 4, Bonus: 0)

Her voice carries this song, but don't underestimate the lyrics. A commitment to faith even if God doesn't work things out how we desire or hope? That's textbook Faith in Tension.

9. "Even If" - MercyMe

(Total - 20.5. CT: 9, TD: 7, SQ: 3.5, Bonus: 1)

This is a new song that got me thinking about this whole idea. It's like if "Blessed Be Your Name" and "What if I Stumble" - both songs on this list - had a baby song. Honest and real. It would probably have a higher score if it wasn't being overplayed on Christian radio right now. Bonus for a direct allusion to Daniel 3.