My ancestors knew how to sing songs that would heal people. The people, I am told, would call on the gods who would teach them the song that was needed to heal an ailment, the land, the community. I frequently mourn this missing piece of my heritage, lost to generations of slavery and forced relocation. I long for it most when I encounter brokenness for which I have no words - let alone songs - to mend.
When I hear today’s song selection, I think of my ancestors and am captured by the idea that God could teach us a song for redemption. And on days when I am waiting, when I am telling the truth about this world, my heart longs for such a song, to sing into the disappointed silence and the broken dissonance around us.
My mouth hungers for new words, my soul sighs for the release of a melody,
Lord, give me a song!
A song to tap the toes of the old, to sway the hips of the young.
A song for the darkness and one for the cold.
A song to hold the deep sorrows.
One to sing to the mama whose son never came home
and one to wrap round the teenager who sleeps at the train station.
Teach me the lyrics to ward off evil and those that soften the hardest of hearts. Sing me the harmony that obliterates the disease of greed and the one that roots out those internalized tentacles of inferiority.
Give me a rhythm that keeps the collective memory of the peoples’ strength and an accompaniment to nourish the tender sprouts of our dreams. It is too long since we have sung together, too long since we have sung for healing, too long since we have sung redemption.
"New Redemption Song" by Over the Rhine.
Forgive the overshare at the beginning of the video, but I love her comment about this being a blessing song.
Forgive the overshare at the beginning of the video, but I love her comment about this being a blessing song.
We long to sing Lord, give us the song.
The Lord, your God, is in your midst, a warrior who gives victory; The Lord will rejoice over you with gladness, will renew you in love; God will exult over you with loud singing. -Zephaniah 3:17
-Lindsey
So this also makes me think about COMMUNAL singing - not just performance, but everyone joining in. We rarely do that with real conviction anymore except when campfires are present or its the holidays. If this is "a blessing song for our country" then maybe we should also imagine singing it together, one big crazy group of confused people seeking a new way forward. Or, rather, what would THAT song even look like?
ReplyDeleteAnna, communal singing is one big reason I came back to the church. There are very few places where people get to raise our voices and sing as one - and, as someone with a degree in vocal performance, I can tell you, people LOVE to sing. The number of times I've been told, "I love to sing, but I'm no good at it" is nearly as many as the number of times I've told people about my major. Singing communally is one of the most powerful, visceral things we can do.
ReplyDeleteThe Song of the Universe is one of my favorite metaphors for God (or is God one of my favorite metaphors for the Song?). When a god with a name and a face and intention just seems too remote, too authoritarian, too co-opted by institutions or by sad history, I'll often think of God the Rhythm of the Universe. I often imagine myself sitting still and quiet - stop moving, stop shouting, just be still and quiet - and listening for the song inside me, for my own unique melody and rhythm that joins with everyone else's to make our universal music. And when I hear it, I start to sing and I start to move, and I hold on tight to the melody that's mine, because I know that's my calling, and I pray for everyone else to listen hard, too, to abandon their discordant, half-hearted shouts and spasms and to turn themselves over to the song and the dance in their souls. That's how we'll make our symphony.