I’ve been singing at church lately. I sang this morning.
I am by no means a good singer. If I try, my kids laugh at me. But at church? Something happens and it’s a new discovery.
I imagine that God is shaping my voice as it rises toward Him. It has nothing to do with my singing, and everything to do with His delight in hearing my praise.
I’ve started believing that we were made to sing because singing His truth presses it deeper into us. It moves from our heads into our hearts.
I believe in God (brain), but singing to Him squares up my heart.
Somewhere along the way, many of us learned to treat singing as a performance. We decide who can sing and who should stay quiet. I’m one of the people they tell to keep quiet.
Yet when I read Scripture, singing appears again and again as something far more fundamental. It is woven into gratitude, remembrance, celebration, lament and worship. Singing is a birthright.
That’s why church singing feels so freeing right now. It’s a shift from my mind to my heart. I didn’t know I needed that until feeling it.
Singing at church stops me from evaluating myself. For just a few songs, I stop managing how I sound to others. My attention turns toward God.
Another reminder that my life is not centered on me, which is always a good thing.
That’s what worship feels like today.