This week we've been reflecting on singing. I think it's a remarkable fact that the average

Christian probably sings many more times in the week than the average person who isn't

a Christian. Yes, I know some non-Christians sing a great deal and some Christians don't

sing nearly enough, but I'm talking in general terms. But I wonder if you've thought

about something that's even more significant? Christians sing differently. The teenager

enjoying the latest rap song, the would-be operatic tenor singing Ness and Dorma in the

shower, or for that matter the 70-something-year-old pensioner humming beetles or beach boys tunes

from the 60s and 70s. None of them sings the way Christians sing. Let me try to express

it this way. Non-Christians always sing on a horizontal plane. Yes, the songs they sing

are often about me or about you or about them or about it. Now Christians also sing

horizontally. Think about some of the Psalms. You're singing horizontally when you sing,

although my soul bless God the Lord, and all that in me is be stirred up. Or if you prefer

contemporary when you sing, bless the Lord, oh my soul, you're taking first to yourself

when you sing these words. And we're also singing horizontally when we sing, come we

that love the Lord and let our joys be known, or if you want contemporary, come people

of the risen king. Now you're talking to others, to your fellow believers, and you're

saying to them, come on now, let's sing together. But that too is on the horizontal plane.

Is that wrong? No, not at all. But it's not the same way as non-Christians sing on

a horizontal plane. Because when Christians sing on a horizontal plane, we don't actually

stay on that horizontal plane. We sing to ourselves and we sing to others, but we do so to

encourage both ourselves and others to sing vertically, to sing in the presence of the

Lord and upwards to the Lord. Yes, many of the spiritual songs we sing begin in a horizontal

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