Sometimes, people tell me that worship should be praise to God. Most Sundays, we start corporate worship with jubilant praise. But often, our minds are not with it, no matter how much praise there is, because our hearts are troubled.
Keith and Kristyn Getty write about why we need to sing Psalms, and their words are so real.
“As we prepare to lead church singing, we often remember Henry David Thoreau’s words: “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”
This is where many of us are as we gather together on a Sunday. Through the course of our lives, we may well know times when it’s easy to have a spring in our step as we stand to sing, but often we come to sing with the heaviness of heart, where our singing chokes a little in our souls, if not in our throats. None of us comes with everything figured out.
We need to have songs that recognize these realities without leaving us to despair of those realities because they lead us to the Rock that is higher than us.”
God wants our hearts, even when we are troubled, desperate, and tired – He wants to hear it all! “The Psalms are incredibly honest, embracing the realities of life and singing through them.”