Heart Songs by Alan Anderson

 

“He put a new song in my mouth, a hymn of praise to our God. Many will see and fear the LORD and put their trust in him.”---Psalm 40:3 (NIV)

 

 

This blog post has we writers contemplating projects, “that make your heart sing.” This makes one think of the precious organ within our bodies as a source of the rhythm of our lives. Every beat of our hearts reminds us we are alive. This may cause us to sing and our feet to dance to this rhythm. There are, however, different rhythms, different songs our hearts may sing.

 

A Dirge Heart Song

When my parents died a few years apart from each other, my heart song struck the beat of a dirge. This expressed a slow-moving mournful lament. The sun dimmed as if I sat among the clouds. I could no longer enjoy the physical presence of the people who gave me life. My heart sang the dirge of an adult orphan.

 

 

A Heart Song of Love

I am not the most romantic guy in the world, but I know how to love. When I met the woman of my dreams, I knew I had to plan my life different than I thought before. In our early lives together we both knew we were a fit with each other. Even after forty-four years of marriage we are a super fit together, love endures, and a medley of love continues.

 

 

A Heart Song of Praise

I became a Christian in 1975 and for the first time in my life my heart could sing praise to God. Life changed and my search for true meaning and purpose ended. As with all of God’s people I can praise Him even in the storms of life. God hears my heart song of praise.

 

A Melody of Nature

 

The warmth of the once winter hidden sun breaks forth and wakes up creation. One’s voice has the freedom to soar like a bird when in the presence of mountains, the parents of the forests. A few minutes from where I live the mountains are close enough to hug. Right now, they are showing off a myriad of their spring green and yellow colours. The evergreen and deciduous trees dance to the rhythm of a spring breeze.

 

Not to be left out, birds let lose with their chirps, warbles, and whistles. The finches, robins, chickadees, juncos, crows, and even starlings, sing praises to God whether off-key or perfect pitch. The melody of nature can overwhelm me to the point my heart sings with the citizens of the sky.

 

 

Dear Friends

Perhaps life for you, even now, may have you in a strangle hold to the point you choke. A pathway in life may even now cause you to sing mournful notes of a dirge. In our society people run from dirges and their hearts try to scream them away.

 

 

As you make your way through this journey of life what makes your heart sing? My friends, beloved of God, my prayer for you is your heart will always know it can sing a song of praise. From experience I know the pain that accompanies one when life calls to sing a dirge. Glory be to God, we can also sing praise even in a storm we feel may rip us from this life.

 

 

“And I'll praise you in this storm

And I will lift my hands

For you are who you are

No matter where I am

 

And every tear I've cried

You hold in your hand

You never left my side

And though my heart is torn

I will praise you in this storm”

Writer(s): John Mark Hall, Bernie Herms, 2006

 

 

Precious Holy One, all praise be to You forever. Oh God, lover of our souls, allow our hearts to sing praise to you, even through the storms in our lives.

 

 

Dear friends and fellow sojourners, allow your hearts to sing, for God loves the sound of your songs.

 

 

Alan lives in Deroche, B.C. with his wife, Terry. He contributed stories to Good Grief People by Angel Hope Publishing, 2017; Story by Story: The Power of a Writer, Unstoppable Writers Publishing, 2018; Easter Stories & More by InScribe Christian Writers’ Fellowship, 2021. Alan periodically writes articles for FellowScript Magazine. He has written posts for our InScribe blog since 2015. Blog: https://scarredjoy.ca.

Do You Sing? by Brenda Leyland

"Just whistle while you work....It won't take long when there's a song to help you set the pace."

Do you remember that catchy little song from the old Disney movie Snow White? Even Snow White and all her happy characters knew that a happy tune can make the time seem to fly, as well as make any workload feel lighter and easier to bear.

Lady Bird Johnson once said that people should work on projects that make their hearts sing. To me, her words ring true, for I do not believe that life is meant to be a drudgery. Rather, we are meant to live beautifully... abundantly.... joyfully. Oh sure, we go through hard experiences and wildernesses, but we don't stay there.

The projects we choose to get involved with, either voluntarily or as a career, should not dampen our spirits, but rather they should provide a venue for contentment, abiding joy, and a sense of adventuring with God. They should energize and fuel us, not drizzle on us till there's only a damp smoldering where passion once burned bright.

Sometimes we find ourselves in a situation where the song in our heart has been slowly dying. We don't feel like whistling or singing anymore. A few years ago, my own song almost died, because I was afraid to move out from a workplace that I had outgrown mentally and emotionally. To me, a signpost of whether or not a person is still doing what he or she should be doing, is whether the song is still in there.

Work on projects that make your heart sing.

~ Lady Bird Johnson

If your heart no longer sings while you work, maybe it's time to think about what will make the music start again. I took great comfort and encouragement from the Psalmist when he declared that if I walk in God's ways, I would eat the fruit of the labor of my hands, and I would be happy, blessed, fortunate, even enviable -- and that it would be well with me.

I'm happy to report that I sing a lot these days. I've found new joy in work that makes my heart sing, writing being just one of those joys.

It's never too late in God's world to start finding those projects -- those works He has uniquely prepared for you, those works that make your heart sing with joy and praise.

Now, I ask you, do you sing?

Brenda lives in Alberta with her husband and their sweet tortoiseshell cat, Miss Kitty. When she's not watching for glimpses of heaven in unexpected places, she's probably writing about them on her blog It's A Beautiful Life.