Suffering, faith, and singing
Lately, I’ve found myself gravitating towards hymns. This isn’t anything new for me. I tend to listen to contemporary worship for a time but then always find my way back to older songs. There’s something so rich about them—theologically and worshipfully. This is not a critique of contemporary worship songs, although perhaps it could be, but rather it’s simply that my heart needs deep truth. I love the catchy, rhythmic tune from time to time and I’m grateful for the simplicity of many of the songs today. And yet I’m still drawn to hymns.
Today, Trevin Wax has a post highlighting the potential problem of one of those catchy songs. Here is an excerpt:
There’s a popular worship song I’ve heard in recent years that I just can’t sing. The heart behind the lyrics is right, and the overall focus of the song is the goodness of the Lord, but at one point, it repeats a line over and over again—that God is never going to let us down. Every time I hear it, I just can’t bring myself to sing those words.
I’ve wrestled for months now about my hesitation in saying that God is never going to let me down.
Is it because I still feel wounded by tragedy that has affected our family?
Is it because of my hardness of heart?
Is it because I resist confessing something true in an ultimate sense—that God will eventually fulfill all of his promises and will satisfy us with his presence for all eternity—if the lyrics run up against common experience here on earth?
I’ve wrestled similarly with this particular song. God is so good. Yes! We should shout it from the mountaintops. But we need something with greater depth for our hearts and minds than to declare that he will “never let us down” to fight tragedies and endure through suffering.
I will sing this song with all my heart and hopefully you will, too! But if you have struggled with singing that refrain, feel free to check out the rest of Trevin’s post as he finishes his thoughts on suffering, faith, and singing: https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/trevin-wax/true-god-wont-ever-let/
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