3 “Hear, O kings; give ear, O princes;
    to the Lord I will sing,
   I will make melody to the Lord, the God of Israel.

10 “Tell of it, you who ride on white donkeys,
    you who sit on rich carpets
    and you who walk by the way.
11 To the sound of musicians at the watering places,
    there they repeat the triumphs of the Lord,
    the triumphs of his peasantry in Israel.

“Then down to the gates marched the people of the Lord.

12 “Awake, awake, Deborah!
    Awake, awake, utter a song!
Arise, Barak, lead away your captives,
    O son of Abinoam.

In our house growing up, we sang about everything.  Every. Thing.  We sang to get up.  When Colin (my youngest brother) wouldn’t put on his jammies at night, the entire family did this little sing/chant thing up the stairs with him. “Jam-boni, Macaroni and don’t for get the cheese.” Or we would sing “Jammdoodles to the rescue.”   We would sing about just going to school or sing to the cats.  We sang while we just walked around if we felt like it.  We just made up songs.

For me, this has definitely bled into my adult life.  It is a rare day that goes by without some made up song along the way….about what the day is doing, what the dog is doing, what I am about to do.  You name it.  My life could be its own little rock opera.

Most of my songs come out of just being grateful for the day and just being me.  This usually doesn’t happen just out in the world but it can definitely seep out. Just ask the staff that I work with.

My brother Andrew as the best at making up songs.  He would even make up moves to go along with his songs.  One of my favs that I can remember is the hit, “I lost my ring and I don’t know where it is.”  We were in Sunriver and he sat down by some rocks and belted out this new song while he pretended the rocks were his drums.  He had an alter ego superhero called, “Burnerman” that would run across the beach with this foot move and perhaps a song to go with.  He was so cute!  And yes, he is on this blog list. 🙂 Hey little bro! Love you! 😉

This is a way that kids definitely know how to express themselves but letting their lives move to music. Sometimes we still remember that and sometimes we forget what it means to be so full of gratitude that we just can’t help but belt out in song some fantastic reason we are alive.

Our scripture today comes from Judges.  What a weird time in Israel’s history.  In Judges,the people of Israel choose different judges to rule them as they figure out what it means to be a society.  This book is full of war and destruction.  They just can’t figure out how to be with each other.  The people mess up, are forgiven by God and then continue to mess up more.  Judges is one fight after another but it DOES give us this amazing woman character. Deborah is the only female Judge and really the only female ruler in the bible.  She is pretty kick ass if you ask me.  She is successful in her leadership.  Part of the most important contribution she gives to us is this song.  Many times, biblical characters sing out their gratitude to God.  This particular song is an early Hebrew poem (maybe dated to about 12th century BCE). It is significant in highlighting this amazing woman and her gratitude.

She also calls out to the people to also sing of God’s greatness in the world.  Deborah is so moved by what God has done, that she belts out this beautiful poetry and sets an example to us of a skill that so often we have forgotten.

When was the last time you sang praise (besides the opening hymn in Sunday morning worship)? When was the last time that you were so full of gratitude that you just had to sing to the day?

I must say, I kinda felt this way this morning as I got up in a warm house and the sun was blaring outside through the beautiful crisp fall colors.

Time to sing again.
Peace,
Court