Speaking to a friend of mine this week about songwriting, they made a comment that got me thinking.
"Using Scripture for lyrics works when you're singing them as Scripture. They start to sound corny when you just use them as a convenient 'safe' lyric." - That really resounded with me, and stuck with me over the last couple of days.
What are we aiming for when we're writing songs? To say something new? To express a truth? To expound a Bible passage? Songs can be different. Some are personal, some are congregational. Some are anthems and some, you might say, are 'album' tracks... 'B-sides'.
Personally I've always had a hunger for the congregation worship songs which bring God's church together with one voice. The struggle when writing these kind of songs can be that we want to say something new and creative rather than always sticking with Scripture. What we can end up with, however, is a dodgy lyric which just ends up sounding obscure - we think the congregation 'won't get it', or that it might stick out like a sore thumb and spoil an otherwise 'normal' song. On the flip side we try so hard to make our songs easily accessible that we end up with typical, predictable, Scriptural lyrics which (although true) don't necessarily bring us a deeper revelation of God.
Really what we need to do is be honest when we write - striking that balance between expressing our worship in a fresh creative way, and declaring God's own words, the Bible.
I don't how accurate my friends comment was in itself, but I sort of agree with the sentiment -
We're not just singing Scripture because it saves us writing lyrics, or it makes our songs sound like 'proper' worship songs. We singing it because it is true, and it is powerful. When we use Scripture in songs it has to be for those reasons. We need to write from our own revelation of those precious words.
God, let our words and Your WORD change peoples' lives as we sing and glorify Your Name.
