Join us for Easter this Sunday, 10am at Deltona High! Click here for more info!

A Better Song

ABetterSongBlog

Music wields a strange, unexplainable power. I’ve read that music is one of the most effective means of therapy for patients suffering from Dementia and Alzheimers. Their eyes grow wide upon hearing a song from their past as memories are awakened.

For better or worse, music grips us. Songs can get in your head and flood your heart with emotions. Songs carry messages. Music is the conduit. Like a syringe, it provides a channel for something powerful to enter and affect us.

Songs carry messages, and some of those messages are hopeless—like Alan Jackson’s "Monday Morning Church”:  

 

You left my heart as empty

As a Monday morning church

It used to be so full of faith and now it only hurts

'Cause the faithful man that you loved

Is nowhere to be found

Since they took all that he believed

And laid it in the ground

 

Or Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida,” which translates, (Long Live Life): 

 

I used to rule the world

Seas would rise when I gave the word

Now in the morning I sleep alone

Sweep the streets I used to own

One minute I held the key

Next the walls were closed on me

And I discovered that my castles stand

Upon pillars of salt and pillars of sand

I don’t hear “It is well with my soul” in those songs. Just buried belief and sinking sand castles. If you read carefully, the cause for despair appears in the lyrics. In the first, a man’s wife, “all that he believed” has died and left him empty. In the second, a man’s power, influence, and authority were stripped, and left him disillusioned.

Songs can expose our hopes. Our identities may rise to the surface. Those things that make us feel secure, immoveable, and valuable. That’s true on the Top Billboard, and it’s true in the Bible, too. Some psalms were composed as music. “To the choirmaster.”

Psalm 11’s truth was put to melody. It’s a song of David. It’s meant to be rehearsed, repeated, and reflected on. But this psalm is strange because it includes lyrics from another song—a song of panic. David begins, “In the Lord I take refuge.” 

But he follows with, “How can you say to my soul, ‘Flee like a bird to your mountain?’” David is responding to the faithless (and godless) advise of his peers. He was a king, so these may have been his royal advisors or cabinet. They’re friends, not enemies. But sometimes, friends give terrible counsel, godless advice. But David sees through it.  

David pledges that his only hope, his only source of strength, his only refuge, is in the Lord. And that’s the reason he’s so triggered by his friends. What are they telling him? “Run! Hide! Give up!” What gives? David again has a bounty on his head. He’s in the crosshairs. “The wicked bend the bow…they shoot at the upright…if the foundations are destroyed, what can the righteous do?” Those are serious words. “What can we do!”  

David’s allies are hopeless and afraid. They’re panicking. David is singing a good song, but they’ve got their air pods set to different music with a dangerous message: “We’re finished, David! Life as we know it is over. All is lost!” But David goes Simon Cowell on his friends and rejects their song. “How can you say that to my soul?” Then he finishes:

The Lord is in his holy temple; 

the Lord’s throne is in heaven; 

his eyes see, his eyelids test the children of man. 

The Lord tests the righteous, 

but his soul hates the wicked and the one who loves violence. 

Let him rain coals on the wicked; 

fire and sulfur and a scorching wind shall be the portion of their cup. 

For the Lord is righteous; 

he loves righteous deeds; 

the upright shall behold his face (Psalm 11:4–7).

David says, “This is only a test. And you’re failing!” All crises are tests. They uncover our foundations—what we’re building our lives on. Remember, only false foundations can be destroyed.

What songs are you singing? What’s the source of your hope? What songs are you listening to? Will it be the voices telling you to get angry, be afraid, freak out, or give up? Psalm 11 is a better song. It’s not easy. You may have to sing it through tears, or clenched teeth. Your voice may shake. Doubt may plague your heart as you sing. But that’s okay.  

Not ready to sing it yet? Then just listen. Let your soul absorb these truths. God is unshaken by the things transpiring around us. He sees. He knows. He is in residence, on His throne, ruling in justice. We can trust Him.The wicked will be judged. The righteous will be vindicated. And those who make the Lord their refuge will see His face. 

Whatever threat King David faced in this psalm, God rescued him from it. The King dodged a bullet—he found refuge. 

King Jesus, on the other hand, was not rescued. He did not escape death. He did not dodge the bullet. He found no refuge. In fact, he wasn’t looking for it. He was providing it. Jesus had nowhere to hide. He was naked upon a cross. Alone. Exposed. Utterly forsaken. For us. He faced God, not as a son faces a father, but as a criminal faces a judge. All so that you and I could “behold His face.” That’s good news—the best news! 

You can build your life on that. In fact, you should. Jesus said so!