Dare To Sing a New Song
Sing to the Lord a new song;
sing to the Lord, all the earth.
2 Sing to the Lord, praise his name;
proclaim his salvation day after day.
3 Declare his glory among the nations,
his marvelous deeds among all peoples.
Pastor Joe Johns from Fellowship Missionary Church gave a sermon this past Sunday on this Psalm, and he stopped us all right at the beginning with the first verse of this passage, “Sing to the Lord a new song."
If we stop and think about the song, prayer, thought, frustration, grieving, etc. we’ve been singing in recent days, weeks, or months, what is it that we’re hung up on? Do we believe that God hasn’t heard us and we must tell him over and over until the situation improves? Do we believe that person that wronged us needs to apologize first? Do we believe the issue that bothers us the most can’t be improved? Do we think we’ll ever find the right job or the right someone? Do we believe God can forgive us for the sins we’re hanging on to?
We’re all hanging on to something, and God is waiting for us to sing that new song to him. The song that believes He is sovereign and wants to make all things new. The challenge is to believe there is a new song to sing. To dare to believe that this new song will bring new light to a dark place.
As some of you know, my wife and I have a heart for the DRCongo, and so does FMC. In recent weeks there has been another wave of extreme violence and insecurity in their country due to militias raiding towns and threatening an approach on the capital of Eastern Congo, Goma. We have friends there and we believe there is beauty in a country full of people that can be sustainable if only there was peace. The old song calls for more violence to be thrown at violence and we know that more violence will only perpetuate violence. It’s overwhelming to think anything will change in the near future. The new song we’re holding on to is that peace and anti-violence is the only way things will change. For the people of DRCongo to choose the radical action of non-violence. Seems silly, but what else is there?
The new song I need to sing at NeighborLink is that the Church actually can love people outside the walls of their buildings. I can get stuck in a rut as the projects pour in at NeighborLink and believe that we’ll never have enough people or resources to care enough to help. I got a call recently by one of our major project referrers about the influx of bed bug requests they’re getting and wanting to know if we can help. The history of activity at NeighborLink says that we’ll never help with those types of things because of the nature of the project. It’s too messy and just too much for most of our volunteers. The new song in this is that there are people out there that are willing to enter into the disaster with the people living in these conditions to do life with them.
I hope you’ll read through this Psalm and think about the areas in your life that you need to think about and/or pray about differently. It will most likely be the exact opposite of what you’re doing now.
