Power of Congregational Singing

As we see in Luke’s story, music has transformative powers for those who make it and those who receive it. John O’Donohue once said, “Music is what language would love to be if it could.” Old Testament scholar Walter Brueggemann has multiple blogs sharing how music in church is its most radical offering. 

In my frail old age, I have come to rely more and more on the hymns of the church to sustain my faith, and therefore to fund my hope and undergird what is left of my life. There is something teasingly elusive about such singing; we are able to sing what we cannot say. 

- “Singing Faith Lyrical and Truthful,” Dr. Walter Brueggemann on Church Anew

It is impossible for thoroughly secularized people like us to enter into the holy urges offered by the hymn. And yet we sing, wistfully grabbing an image or a phrase here or there, hoping for a whisper of transcendent mystery that will reposition our lives. But then, once in a while, in a fleeting moment or more, we notice what is being affirmed by that singing chorus of heaven and earth. We notice that our haphazard congregational singing is an echo of the angelic throng, angel tongues, and saints above. No, our singing is not an echo. It is a joining in the singing that goes day and night in unspeakable joy in that fully governed alternative. As Wesley knew so well, congregational singing requires our best imagination, itself a gift of the Spirit. And via our imagination we enter, for a short or longer season, into another world where the governance of God pertains without limit or flaw. We enter that other world; we enter into its joy. We may sign on for its work. We know and trust that the force of this other world does not evaporate when we close our hymnals. It persists. Our signing into that other world may also persist. We return to our more mundane worlds close at hand. But the singing persists and so that world persists among us, deabsolutizing the world in front of us, permitting us to host that other world and sign on for “a more excellent way” marked by faith, hope, and love.

- “Singing the Counter Culture,” Dr. Walter Brueggemann on Church Anew

Singing threatens the status quo when sung properly. We sing what we cannot say. When we say and do not sing, we end in despair that leads to violence and death.

- “God’s Songs of Protest: We Shall Overcome,” Dr. Walter Brueggemann, Day 1