It has been more than thirty years since I was part of a church where we used song books and sang hymns. Back in the eighties, we decided we were too enlightened for that. It was all overhead projectors and praise choruses complete with clapping, shouting, and the Holy-Ghost-Shuffle. (Okay, I’m over-reacting. We had some great worship services in those days.) But, I regret that we threw out the hymns for so many years.
Although, we never really threw them out. When my grandmother was dying of cancer, and my heart was breaking for the loss, I sang hymns. Years later, when my granddaughter was struggling for life in the neonatal unit, I sang them again. And I’ve sung them almost every day in between. When I’m sad, or scared, or thrilled, or excited. Anytime I can’t find the words to express my heart, I go to the hymns of my childhood. And lately, I’ve been singing them more.
The Bible talks about a time when Isaac dug again the wells of his father Abraham. The Philistines had filled the wells with desert sand and made them useless. But, Isaac knew sweet water still flowed down deep. So he dug in the same places. And he called the wells by the same names.
I think that’s is what I’ve been doing. I’m digging again the wells of “Amazing Grace,” and “Come, Thou Fount” and Blessed Assurance, Jesus is Mine.”
What wells are you digging?
“Victory In Jesus”, “There’s Something About That Name”, “In the Garden”, “Are You Washed in the Blood?”, “Be Thou My Vision”
I love the hymns!
Every Church service I have ever been to (at my regular Church home) has had a projector or overhead which makes me even more grateful for the denominational high school I went to that clung to hymns and hymnals. I didn’t like it so much then but now when I find myself humming “A Mighty Fortress” or “Come Thou Fount” or countless other hymns I haven’t seen in years I feel so much richer for having that resource in my heart.
Those are wells well worth re-digging.
That passage in Genesis has been living on me for most of last year…the redigging the same wells and giving them the same names is deep stuff! One thing we’ve done this with (very intentionally) is the Fire meeting on Friday nights. Jeremy and I have for a long time wanted the young people in our church to have what we had in that meeting when we were high school/Bible college age. So we have redug (that’s a weird word) that well and, like I said, intentionally given it the same name our fathers did. The name may change down the road, but for now, that well is still called Fire. Another thing I think is interesting is that for you, Kathy, the wells of your fathers are things like the old hymns (which are awesome, btw; can’t be Mona Veatch’s daughter and not love hymns), but as God has been speaking to me about the same Scripture, the wells of MY fathers are the “praise choruses” and the “Holy Ghost shuffle”. : ) I want the crazy moving of God’s Spirit and intense worship and a prophetic life. The deep stuff I long for is what you guys helped pioneer. Isn’t that an interesting twist?
Ruth – that is interesting! I think each generation should value the good things from a previous generation. (and throw out the stuff where we were way off!) Then the current generation will build on those things and go even higher up and deeper in that we did in those days.