He Has Made Me Sing

One of the things that first captivated my attention at church was the music. You might say that God put the language of song in me from an early age-- from singing along with vinyl records of Winnie the Pooh in the shaggy carpeted playroom of my childhood home, to singing all the time in pre-school and joining choir in Catholic school. But the grandeur and majesty of God first struck me through music when I was a choir boy at the choir school St. Paul's in Cambridge.  Every morning, we would process into the cold marble church and kneel at the altar, opening with the same a cappella chant each time:

"Repleatur os meum laude tua ut possim cantare; gaudebunt labia mea dum cantavero tibi. (Fill me with praise that I might sing. My lips rejoice when I sing to You.) O Lord our God, through the intercession of the saints, Pius, Gregory, and Cecilia, grant us in thy mercy that through the praises we offer thee during our pilgrimage here on Earth, we may be found worthy to sing to Thee forever in heaven. In Christ our Lord, Amen"

Then the organ would burst forth and we would start the mass. We poked fun at the passionate headmaster and music director and of the songs that we sang; but while nobody would talk about it or admit it, when we sang mass, or liturgical music in a concert, we felt not just a thrill of music, but the majesty of God, if he was indeed real.

As my commitments and ties to the Catholic Church grew more distant when I began high school, I began attending youth group at the Boston Chinese Evangelical Church: a far cry from organs, stone church, and white-surpliced choir boys! But here, it was guitar or piano-led ballads which said something quieter and more personal:

"In the stars his handiwork I see; on wind he speaks with majesty. Though he ruleth over land and sea, what is that to me?... Until one day I met him face to face and felt the wonder of his grace, then I knew that He was more than just a God who didn't care, who lived away up there! Now He walks beside me day by day ever watching o'er me lest I stray, helping me to find the narrow way. He's everything to me!"

And while sometimes I felt like I hated the other kids who were more confident or popular than me, every time we had "Singspiration", my heart was thrilled with how it felt like God was speaking to me. That was before I understood the gospel, but somehow, I knew that what they were singing about was important and intensely valuable. It was songs that framed and taught me how to feel about God; and when I finally became aware of God's call on me to trust and follow Jesus, it was the songs I sang in my head in the hallways at school or while enduring the boredom of taking the train home which trained me to believe I was a new person in Christ.

It made sense then, for me to pick up the guitar. I didn't want to learn to impress people or to play for others. I just wanted to be able to play along while singing on my own at home. For the longest time, it seemed, I couldn't figure out the guitar. I spent money on books and tried to practice, but it was nothing but painful fingers and ugly sounding dead strings forced to plunk aloud by my clumsy strums. I asked the most talented peer I knew to help, but I was too difficult to teach. Then a patient counselor taught me three simple chords: D A G, so that I could play along with "Lord You are more Precious than Diamonds." I practiced it all night, and soon, after many obsessed all-night practice sessions, I could strum along to anything! Before long, singing and making music to the Lord were back as a big part of my life-- but this time, I knew what the words meant. That has continued with me from high school, through several worship teams, into college, into a tiny Vermont church, into a small urban church, and now into my youth ministry.

Worship leading is one of the parts of my current church ministry I enjoy most. As a youth group counselor, I get to work with teens, training and practicing with them to give their ears, hands, voices, and hearts to the Lord-- to show God's grandeur and majesty to others so that they could worship him. This past month, I've assembled a bunch of juniors and seniors from three churches to lead worship for our upcoming Winter Teen Conference, a joint retreat of about 200 kids. It has been a blast: there are moments when you hit a musical groove as a team-- and you're not trying to make something happen musically anymore because suddenly you realize that you're there. Then, the truth of what you're saying about God finds itself to the front of your mind and you look around and see that other folks on the team are in the same place, too; and that becomes a feedback loop of joy and awe, grounded firmly in the one whom you are singing about, but somehow also intimately connected with seeing other people worship God. Then every strum, every movement, every note sung seems to resonate with something greater-- echoes from the praises of the throngs and multitudes that will some day shout aloud in the very presence of God enthroned. It is what I was made for-- and it's that awareness that I hope to instill in this group of seven students this month.

Thank you, God, for your gift of music that speaks your holiness and love to me in a language that I could understand, even before I knew what it meant in words. Teach us to live in harmony with the song that we can glimpse only fleetingly through certain windows, which we try to sing with words and song and instruments, but ultimately must be lived. Make our lives and songs, thoughts and affections point to Christ, through whom you have counted us worthy to sing to you forever in heaven!