Do I have to sing?

September 5, 2026

Maria Job 36, Meditation, Praising God, Psalm 104, Rejoicing , , , 1 Comment

5 September 2026

I will sing to the LORD all my life; I will sing praise to my God as long as I live. May my meditation be pleasing to him, as I rejoice in the LORD.
Psalm 104:33–34 NIV

I am not a singing gal. My mom forced me to take weekly piano lessons for ten years. Practicing regularly was an afterthought for me, leading to shame when my piano teacher would arrive and find me unprepared.

Nowadays when I read the many verses in the Psalms—and throughout Paul’s letters—encouraging us to sing our praises to God, I feel troubled. Of course, I join in with others when I am in church. But that is about the only time I sing.

When I am in the car, exercising, or cooking, I default to podcasts or the audio of YouTube videos. This morning, as I puzzled through these two verses in Psalm 104, I wondered, “Is there something wrong with me?”

Nosing around the Hebrew, I discovered something interesting. While modern translations understand the first verb as “to sing,” older translators sometimes connected the Hebrew form with another root meaning “to behold” or “to look upon.” In fact, in Job 36:24, the King James Version uses “behold” where most modern translations use “sing.”

That caught my attention. Behold. Now that is something I try to do throughout the day. I try to remember to raise my eyes and turn my attention to God.

And then there is the second part of our passage: May my meditation be pleasing to him, as I rejoice in the LORD.  I find it easy to meditate on truths about our God as I focus on Him.

Okay, maybe there is a place for gals like me who, although we enjoy listening to music occasionally, do not give it regular space in our lives.

We non-singers can still  lift our voices and join in with others during corporate worship, but in private we can always be seeking, pondering, chattering to, and praising God all day long.

What’s this ‘joy’ we’re supposed to feel?

September 14, 2023

Maria 1 Thessalonians 5, Hebrews 12, John 4, John 8, Joy, Nehemiah 8, Rejoicing 1 Comment

Rejoice always, 1 Thessalonians 5:16 NIV

….the joy of the LORD is your strength!  Nehemiah 8:10 NIV

The Bible commands us in multiple places to rejoice in God’s goodness. Wait a minute….isn’t joy a feeling?  How can someone command a feeling?  And what about Nehemiah’s flat-out declaration about the source of our joy? What do we make of that? For instance, what does ‘of’ mean?  Does it refer to joy FROM God or God’s OWN joy?

I found one clue in Hebrews 12:2:  Because of the joy awaiting him, he endured the cross, disregarding its shame. (NLT)

What do you think that future joy refers to?  Numerous possibilities likely exist about what would have made Jesus glad and supremely happy. I’ve selected two quotes from our Lord where he mentions what motivates him, that of finding pleasure in doing his father’s will.

I always do what pleases Him. John 8:29 BSB

My food (what satisfies me) is to do the will of Him who sent Me and to finish His work. John 4:34 BSB

Therefore, since we recognize that by carrying out his father’s will Jesus would bring him pleasure, we can picture our Lord anticipating his future experience of his Father’s beaming joy.  A huge celebration waited to kick off his return to the center of divine and happy glory within the trinity.

Another understanding of our Savior’s joy could be his happy and sure reality of one day very soon having us, his brothers and sisters, with him for all of time.

Keeping in mind those two possibilities of the source of the Christ’s future joy, I take Nehemiah’s words to mean the following.  In knowing that by completing the Father’s mission to redeem a people to be with him forever, Jesus endured the suffering because the end result would bring him ‘joy’.

He knew that in completing the law’s requirements to satisfy the Father’s justice (our sin being paid for plus perfect completion of the law for us) our successful journey to that other world would be guaranteed. We, the ones for whom Jesus lived and died, receive the privilege of living with the divine family forever.

So, how do I connect Jesus’ purpose-driven life and death with ‘the joy of the Lord is our strength’?

Let’s go back to Hebrews 12:1 and the first part of verse 2, right before the author talks about Jesus’ joy motivation.

Therefore, since we also have such a great cloud of witnesses surrounding us, let’s rid ourselves of every obstacle and the sin which so easily entangles us, and let’s run with endurance the race that is set before us, looking only at Jesus, the originator and perfecter of the faith, who for the joy set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and has sat down at the right hand of the throne of God. (NASB)

I reason like this:  If enduring that hell of an experience for me brought Jesus joy, given his and his father’s goals and plans for us, then recalling his joy gives me enough confidence-building strength.  What do I need this strength for? Each day you and I bear suffering, our own and that of others we care for.  We need a lot of power to remain uncomplaining and cheerful in the daily trials assigned to us. Jesus’ perspective and goals and how he viewed the purpose of his own ‘staying put’ on the cross can fill us with energy we need to continue on.

How do we fill up or receive this power?  By directing our thoughts to Jesus on the cross.  This is what ‘looking only at Jesus’ means.

I find this explanation for ‘the joy of the Lord’ and ‘rejoice always’ a relief.  Because if I were to depend on my ability to rejoice, I’d feel dismayed most of the time. I don’t have it within me to FEEL joy. But remembering Jesus’ joy gives me hope, a thankful gladness and the lightness I need to carry on.