Music has a strange quality. Well, it has a few, but I am thinking specifically of how it can bring people together. I have just come from a local concert where my choir and some other performers came together to provide an evening of music in a small venue. The first half was general tunes, the second half Christmas songs.
It has struck me before how the choir I lead brings people from different walks of life together. But I was struck again this evening by the power music has on the listener as well as the producer. An audience can sit and listen and somehow connect with the music. It becomes a talking point between strangers in the queue for refreshments. They can join in or just sit and let the sound wash over them – and somehow there is a connection between the listener and the performer. The performer is giving something which lasts only a moment, and yet can leave a lasting impression, and the listener is receiving something that they cannot grasp or even share with others – as they hear it, it creates a personal internal response that will differ from person to person and is often hard to explain.
Some songs make us smile, while others may draw a tear. Some will help us get festive, others will get our toes tapping, while others will have us reaching for the off switch (or the ear plugs). But it will create some sort of reaction. And if human-created music can elicit such a response, I wonder what it sounds like to hear divine music?
At the birth of Jesus, angels appear in the sky singing their joyful song, at key moments people are overcome with emotion and have no choice but to sing (Miriam and Moses when they are rescued from Egypt, Mary when she finds out she will have Jesus, Simeon when he sees baby Jesus at the temple, David in the Psalms…)
But more importantly, God sings. Zephaniah 3: 17 says, ‘The Lord your God is with you, the Mighty Warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you; in his love he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing.’
I wonder what it would be like to stop and hear God’s song. Maybe it’s in the birds and the breeze, or maybe it’s something more gently in our hearts. A shared experience with other Christians, and yet also deeply personal between us and God. Music has the power to reach us on an emotional level and bring us closer to our neighbour. Maybe try and listen to God the Musician and the song he is singing over you tonight.
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