A New Song

"Sing to the LORD a new song," the Psalm says, and then it spends thirty verses telling us why singing is the right response to who our God is. The Psalm walks across the whole created order — the word of the LORD that made the heavens, the breath of His mouth that hung the stars, the seas gathered into His storerooms, the nations governed by His counsel. The kings of the earth do not save themselves by the strength of their armies; the warhorse does not save by his great strength. There is one Maker behind all of it and His eye is on those who hope in His steadfast love. The Psalm could end with a treatise; instead it ends with a song. The right response to the God who runs the cosmos is not analysis. It is music.

And the new song the Psalm asks for has been given. There is one song now sung in every nation under heaven that is genuinely new — the song of the redeemed gathered around a Lamb who was slain. It is sung by ordinary people whose names are not famous, in languages the writer of Psalm 33 had never heard, on hills he never climbed. It is sung in cellars and on prison floors. It is sung at funerals and at weddings and at breakfast tables. The new song is the song of Christ, and His church carries it. So the Psalm closes with the posture that becomes us: "Our soul waits for the LORD; he is our help and our shield... Let your steadfast love, O LORD, be upon us, even as we hope in you." Make our song new today, friend. Sing it skillfully, with loud shouts. The God who made everything is the God who has saved us.