Sing A New Song

Another reason that I’ve heard from enough disparate sources that I think it’s fairly widespread is the opening to Psalm 98: “Sing unto the Lord a new song.” The idea being that there’s something powerful about expressing things to God in a fresh new way. I think that’s another reason why worship leaders are into introducing new songs so much.

As for me, I like singing older songs a lot also. Partly because it gives more a sense of continuity. But there’s more to it. I really like what Pastor Dave said once about why we sang hymns at KCPC. In a small way, it connects us to the global church. Both geographically and generationally. And I think that’s really true. Like at Promise Keepers, I looked around a lot and the times when the singing was most united was when we sang hymns. Old men, young men, everyone could all sing together in a familiar way and there was something powerful about that. And you can go to churches around the world and they’ll all know hymns. That’s something that’s kind of cool.

So I kind of dislike the super rapid turnover of modern worship songs because you kind of lose that feeling of connection with the universal church. Not that it’s a critical thing. It’s just kind of nice.