There are two questions which we should ever ask ourselves when about to sing a hymn—first, “Is the hymn true?” Secondly, “Am I true in singing it?” If we cannot answer both these questions in the affirmative, we had better not sing. It is very much better to be silent than to sing what is contrary to sound doctrine, or what is beyond our measure. We should earnestly seek to be true and real in all our utterances, whether in singing or praying. Our God desires truth in the inward parts; and nothing can be more sorrowful to any one who looks at things from a divine standpoint, than to reflect upon the fearful amount of the untrue and the unreal in our public worship. We feel called upon to press the subject, with all possible solemnity, upon the attention of our readers; and we earnestly trust they will accept the word of exhortation, and seek to profit by it.
In our October paper we ventured to offer a few suggestions as to the doctrine of many of our hymns. We might fill a volume with this one branch of our subject; but we must leave the reader to follow out for himself this question, by diligently comparing the hymns which he may be in the habit of singing with the teaching of the New Testament; and if they tally not therewith, let him lay them aside, and seek to express his worship and adoration in words which harmonize with the mind of the Spirit.
Nor is it merely the doctrine of our hymns that demands our attention, but also the tone and character. How very few of our hymns, comparatively, deserve the name of worship-hymns 1 Indeed the very term, “ worship,” seems but little understood amongst us. Some of us seem to think that any sort of religious singing is worship, albeit we may actually in our song be contradicting the plainest statements of holy scripture; or, if not this, at least singing about ourselves, our experience, our exercises, our conflicts, our doubts and fears, which, we need hardly say, are not worship at all. No doubt they may have been the truthful utterance of those who composed them, but they are not the proper vehicle for the worship and adoration of the church of God. Experience is not worship. It may be very real, very true, very precious. God forbid that any of us should make light of experience. Most assuredly no spiritually-minded person would do so. No one who reads aright Rom. 5:3, 43And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also: knowing that tribulation worketh patience; 4And patience, experience; and experience, hope: (Romans 5:3‑4) could think of depreciating experience. “ And not only so, but we glory in tribulations also; knowing that tribulation worketh patience; and patience, experience; and experience, hope.”
But we repeat the statement, singing about our experience is not worship. In worship the soul is occupied solely with God Himself—with Christ—His Person, His work, His glory; and all this by the power of the Holy Ghost. Hence no hymn can properly be called a worship-hymn which does not bring God and His Christ before the heart. Prayer is not, properly speaking, worship. Most precious it is, need we say? Most needful, absolutely indispensable; but it cannot be said to be worship, inasmuch as in it we are occupied with the question of need—our own need—the need of the church, the need of the workmen and their work. True it is to God we come in our need—come in the name of Jesus, come in the faith of His word, come in the power of the Holy Ghost. But, all the while, prayer is not what can rightly be called pure worship. When we get to heaven there will be no prayer, but there will be worship. “ When those living creatures give glory, and honor, and thanks to him that sat on the throne, who liveth forever and ever, the four and twenty elders”—representing all the redeemed, both the Old Testament saints and the church—”fall down before him that sat on the throne, and worship him that liveth forever and ever, and cast their crowns before the throne, saying, Thou art worthy, Ο Lord, to receive glory, and honor, and power; for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created.” Again, “And they sing a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof; for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed to God by thy blood, out of every tribe, and tongue, and people, and nation, and made them to our God kings and priests; and they shall reign over the earth.”
Here we have true worship; and the more our hymns partake of the tone and spirit of these utterances, the more will they merit the title of worship-hymns. We cannot but deplore the paucity of such. Still, we bless God for those we have; and, so far as we are personally concerned, we are quite content to go on singing them until we get to our home above. For example, what can be finer than the following?—Ο Lord, we adore Thee; For Thou art the slain One That livest forever, Enthroned in heaven; Ο Lord, we adore Thee! For Thou hast redeemed us; Our title to glory We read in Thy blood.
Ο God, we acknowledge The depth of Thy riches; For of Thee, and through Thee, And to Thee, are all things; How rich is Thy mercy! How great Thy salvation! We bless Thee, we praise. Thee. Amen, and amen.”
Where is the Christian who could not join with all his heart in singing such a song as the above? Let his attainments in the divine life be ever so limited, let his experience be ever so shallow, let his knowledge be ever so elementary, he ought to be able—in spirit at least—to enter into such a precious breathing of worship and adoration. The merest babe in Christ, as well as the most matured and deeply-taught Christian, can praise God for His mercy and goodness, for the riches of His grace, for the fullness of His salvation, for the blessings of accomplished redemption. He can bless the Lamb with cheerful voice. He may not have the same measure of enjoyment in the worship; he may not be able to enter so fully into the depth and power of the song of praise; but his ransomed spirit can render homage and adoration to God and the Lamb. He can lift up his soul in spiritual and true worship, whatever be his capacity.
Take another uncommonly fine sample of a hymn of praise.
“ Thou, Lamb of God! didst shed Thy blood.
Thou didst our load of misery bear;
And hast exalted us to share
The rank of kings and priests to God.
To Thee we’d render evermore
The honor, glory, praise that’s due;
Might, power, and obedience too,
And in our hearts we Thee adore.
Amen! Amen é
Ο Lord, amen!”
The following partakes of the same lovely tone and character:
Blest Lamb of God! with grateful praise
Our voices now to Thee we raise—
O’er earth to reign, redeemed by blood,
Kingdom and priests are we to God.
Soon, too, in glory shall we sing,
And louder praises to Thee bring;
While every nation, tongue, and tribe,
Strength, glory, might, to Thee ascribe!
Amen! Amen!
Ο Lord, amen!”
Now, one special charm of such hymns as we have here quoted for the reader, is, that all true believers can join in singing them without any hitch or reserve whatsoever. All hymns that have God as their object, and Christ for their subject, can be freely sung by all Christians. It is not so with hymns of experience, if, indeed, such compositions deserve the name of hymns.
Imagine an assembly of Christians singing such a stanza as the following:—
“‘Tis a point I long to know,
Oft times it causeth anxious thought,
Do I love the Lord or no?
Am I His? or am I not?”
Could this be called worship? Certainly not. Could an intelligent Christian sing it in spirit and in truth? Most assuredly not. It is far away below the mark. It is the experience of a soul not at liberty, not at rest. It was no doubt very real, very true, the honest expression of the dear writer’s feelings; but it is not the language of one who knows that he has passed from death unto life, who knows God as his Father, Christ as his Savior, and the Holy Ghost as the seal which God has put upon him, and the earnest of the inheritance until the redemption of the purchased possession. A Christian is one who has eternal life, and knows it. He has the Spirit of adoption, and can cry, “ Abba, Father.” A man who is not clear as to these things, is not yet, intelligently and happily, on the ground of New Testament Christianity. He may no doubt be a divinely-quickened soul, but he knows not the liberty wherewith Christ makes His people free.
But, again, an experimental hymn may be entirely beyond our measure. Its language may be such as we could not honestly adopt. It may give expression to the accents of a lofty discipleship, an ardent devotion, a fervent attachment to Christ—which we dare not make our own, inasmuch as we do not feel ourselves up to the mark.
This we consider a very serious point. If it be wrong—as it most certainly is—to sing hymns that are not up to the true christian standing, it is also wrong to sing hymns which are beyond our practical state. We cannot but fear that some of us err greatly in this matter. We use language in our hymns far away beyond our ordinary state and manner of life. In a word, we are not true in what we sing. If others sing hymns that are not true, we are often not true in our singing.
There is very great danger here. We would ask the christian reader if he does not consider this to be a subject demanding our most serious attention? We do not desire to discourage any true-hearted child of God. Far from it. We would much rather seek to cheer, strengthen, and help on all those who really long to follow Christ. But we cannot shut our eyes to solemn facts. We are deeply impressed with the sense of the gross inconsistency between our private habits and our public utterances. We sing of strangership and pilgrimship—of our being dead to the world, crucified with Christ—and all the while our practical life, from Monday morning till Saturday night, is a flat contradiction to the words of our song.
It is not by any means that we can, or would, cast a stone at another. Far be the thought. God is our witness, we write in a spirit of self-judgment. We feel the urgent need of a deeper exercise of heart in the matter of hymn-singing. We sometimes tremble when we compare the language of the hymns with the language of the life. Again and again, when some specially high note of personal devotedness is being sung, the heart asks, “Are we up to this?” Some hymn, composed, it may be, by an aged, deeply-taught servant of Christ—who for many years has flung the world behind him—is given out, and sung by a whole assembly. The writer of the hymn wrote as he felt—wrote in the presence of God; and, through grace, his whole life is, in measure, the exponent of his hymn. There is the true breathing of a devoted heart—a heart that longs ardently after Christ—a heart that truly finds the world a moral waste, and is only waiting and watching for “ the bright and morning star.” The hymn is most precious. Every true-hearted Christian would desire to be able to adopt it; but how few of us are really up to the mark! No doubt we ought to be. It is the happy privilege of every child of God to tread the very highest pathway of the divine life. We are all called to set our affection on things above, to make Christ our one absorbing object, and to fling aside every worldly entanglement.
All this is most true; but it leaves wholly untouched the question under our consideration. We feel convinced that, as a rule, hymns of experience and deep-toned devotedness are beyond the measure of most of us. It is well to be real and true in our hymns and prayers; and while we should earnestly long for a higher spiritual tone, we certainly should not assume to be higher than we are. If our measure be small, let us own it, and wait on our God to enlarge it. Every true heart can, without a shadow of reserve, join in the following precious aspiration:—
“Ah! Lord, enlarge our scanty thought,
To know the wonders Thou hast wrought;
Unloose our stammering tongues to tell
Thy love immense, unsearchable.”
Yes, and every child of God can join in a hymn of praise—a hymn that has Christ for its theme—His Person, His work, His offices, His ways, His coming, His glory,—Himself in short, its Alpha and its Omega. He, blessed be His peerless name, will be our theme forever in that bright and happy home where we so soon hope to be. Then, thank God, there will be no hitch, no discrepancy, no drawback, nothing to judge. All will be in blissful, glorious harmony, and the rapturous hosannahs of the great congregation shall fill the wide universe of God throughout the countless ages of eternity.
“ But who that glorious blaze
Of living light shall tell?
Where all His brightness God displays,
And the Lamb’s glories dwell.
God and the Lamb shall there
The light and temple be,
And radiant hosts forever share
The unveiled mystery.”
Here we close this short series of papers on the subject of the hymn-book. We have done nothing more than offer a few practical hints and suggestions to the christian reader, which we trust he will receive in the spirit in which they are presented. We must confess we long for more reality, more thorough earnestness of heart, more ardent devotedness of spirit, more uprightness of mind, in our private history, and in our public exercises and utterances. We greatly dread the habit of drawing near to God with the lips, while the heart is far from Him. Oh, may He graciously deliver us all from this most dreadful evil, and keep us ever in the moral shelter and deep repose of His own most blessed presence, for His name and glory’s sake!
P.S.—We add an admonitory word for those whom it may concern, in reference to the matter of giving out hymns in the assembly. It needs much waiting on the Lord—quite as much as kneeling down to pray, or standing up to speak. If a hymn is not given out in the Spirit, serious damage is done to the whole assembly. The tone of a meeting may be lowered, and the current of communion and worship interrupted by the giving out of an unsuitable hymn. It is a mistake to give out a hymn merely because we think it nice. The question is, does the Lord think it suitable? He is so gracious, that we can count on Him to guide in this, as in all beside, if we only wait on Him in integrity of heart. We are wholly cast upon Him. If we act on the mere impulse of our own feelings, we may make the most serious mistakes. There is very great danger in the matter of giving out hymns, inasmuch as many can do that who never think of leading in prayer, or speaking. It needs real dependence on the Lord.
So also in the matter of starting the tune. Even this needs divine guidance. A hymn may be given out in the Spirit, and yet be marred in the rendering, through want of being properly raised, and carefully led. It often seems like offering a blemished sacrifice when a hymn is sung in a careless, slovenly way. We should sing with all our hearts, and to the very best of our ability; and, above all, the person who leads the hymn should look to the Lord for grace to do it suitably, so that God may be glorified, and the assembly refreshed and edified. These are the grand ends to sought in everything that transpires in the assembly, and they will be attained in proportion as we all cultivate a spirit of worship, and a spirit of service. May our gracious God grant us a very much larger measure of both the one and the other!