Quotes & Sayings About Singing For God

They are prepared for a God who strikes hard bargains but not for a God who gives as much for an hour's work as for a day's. They are prepared for a mustard-seed kingdom of God no bigger than the eye of a newt but not for the great banyan it becomes with birds in its branches singing Mozart. They are prepared for the potluck supper at First Presbyterian but not for the marriage supper of the lamb ... — Frederick Buechner

I'm surrounding by beautiful sounds, my son singing in his room and a gentle rain. There are so many simple pleasures God gives us we just have to listen for them. — Ron Baratono

In Islam, and especially among the Sufi Orders, siyahat or 'errance' - the action or rhythm of walking - was used as a technique for dissolving the attachments of the world and allowing men to lose themselves in God. The aim of a dervish was to become a 'dead man walking': one whose body stays alive on the earth yet whose soul is already in Heaven. A Sufi manual, the Kashf-al-Mahjub, says that, toward the end of his tourney, the dervish becomes the Way not the wayfarer, i.e. a place over which something is passing, not a traveller following his own free will...it was quite similar to an Aboriginal concept, 'Many men afterwards become country, in that place, Ancestors.' By spending his whole life walking and singing his Ancestor's Songline, a man eventually became the track, the Ancestor and the song. The Wayless Way, where the Sons of God lose themselves and, at the same time, find themselves. — Meister Eckhart

Here was the shattering of the second wall: I had read the Bible many times through, and I saw for myself that it had a holy Author; I saw for myself that it was a canonized collection of sixty-six books with a unified biblical revelation. I heard for myself that when the words "this is mine" came out of my mouth in congregational singing, I was attesting to this one, simple truth: that the line of communication that God ordained for his people required this wrestling with Scripture, and that I truly wanted both to hear God's voice breathed in my life, and I wanted God to hear my pleas. The fog burned away. The whole Bible, each jot and tittle, was my open highway to a holy God. — Rosaria Champagne Butterfield

Only wings evade death. Neruda says so.' As he turns the page he looks at Zara and makes his bright blue eyes big. 'And Neruda knows.' He reaches for his pipe.

Zara stares at him for some time. 'Was he a friend of God?'

Who? Neruda?'

Yes.'

He may have been, I'm not sure, petite. For all we know he may even have been God. — Susan Mann

I am a child of God, therefore I don't have to be afraid or dismayed. I know God is with me. He will strengthen me, help me, and uphold me with His hand (Isa. 41:10). I am a child of God, therefore no weapon formed against me shall succeed. God will disprove every tongue that rises against me in judgment (Isa. 54:17 ESV). I am a child of God, therefore God is in my midst, a mighty one who will save me; He will rejoice over me with gladness; He will quiet me with his love; He will exult over me with loud singing (Zeph. 3:17). I am a child of God, therefore God's Word is there for me. It is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path (Ps. 119:105). — Lysa TerKeurst

Yes, the early leaders and the people generally of this great nation recognized the necessity for spiritual support if the nation was to endure. They gave humble expression to this conviction in the inscription, 'In God We Trust' found on the coins of the land. The holy Sabbath was a day of rest and worship. Religious devotion in the home was a common practice. Family prayer, reading of the holy scriptures, and the singing of hymns were an everyday occurrence. There is every evidence that 'our fathers looked to God for their direction. — Ezra Taft Benson

imagine the desert
mothers, with hair tangled
tighter than their theology
and breasts that flowed milk
and mystic wisdom. they
knew how to draw the singing
sigils in the sand, how to dig
rough and bitten fingers
into desiccated dirt for water
to wet the lips of their young.

women of hips and heft, who
learned how to burn
beneath the wild and searing
sun, who made loud love
against the star-flecked threat
of night, who knew that strength
is not always a matter of muscle.

imagine your ancestresses,
the prophetesses of the arid
lands, before these starched
traditions and pews too hard
to pray from, who bled true
ritual and birthed their own fierce
souls at creation's crowning -- — Beth Morey

Worship is much more than just singing songs. In fact, true worship is first and foremost a condition of heart and a state of mind. We can be worshipping passionately without singing a single note. Worship is born in our hearts; it fills our thoughts and then it is expressed through our mouths and through our bodies. If our hearts are filled with awe for God, we may want to sing, dance, clap, or lift up our hands in worship. We may also be reverently silent and still before God. We may desire to give offerings or offer other forms of outward expression of love for God. But any of these actions done without a right heart are simply formalism and meaningless to God. — Joyce Meyer

The men of the east may search the scrolls,
For sure fates and fame,
But the men that drink the blood of God go singing to their shame. — G.K. Chesterton

15 p Look carefully then how you walk, not as unwise but as wise, 16 p making the best use of the time, because q the days are evil. 17Therefore do not be foolish, but understand what r the will of the Lord is. 18And s do not get drunk with wine, for that is t debauchery, but u be filled with the Spirit, 19addressing one another in v psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, 20 w giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father x in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, 21 y submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. — Anonymous

Since Moses was in Egypt land, Gods people have been struggling for justice while singing freedom songs. Theology can be clarifying. A good sermon has its place. But nothing is more essential for the life of faith in a community than liturgy that invites us to sing the freedom songs that are sung around the throne of God. Brother Ken Sehested is a song leader in that great cloud of witnesses. Receive his words as gift-and keep singing. — Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove

Just then, in that instant, I saw His eyes. I recognised them. They were the eyes of that trembling father in a smoke-filled room on the ninety-third floor of Tower One, dialing his little girls for the last time. Those were the eyes behind that calming voice singing 'Amazing Grace' in a crowded and slippery stairwell, trapped outside a roof door when the ceilings began to cave. The eyes of the people who stayed behind with the handicapped victims waiting for police officers who never made it up the stairs. Those were the eyes of firemen who pushed me to safety, the doctor who cared for me for more than a year free of charge, the therapist who visited my home regularly so that I could sleep a little, the children who loved me, the brother who prayed nonstop, and the pastor who became my friend. Those were the eyes of God. — Leslie Haskin

Because He lives and was dead He has the keys of Hell and of death. By virtue of His humiliation He reigns. For the suffering of death He is crowned with Glory and honor. The heavenly host proclaim His worthiness to take the Book and open its seven seals, singing, "For You were slain and have redeemed us to God by Your blood." He descended that He might ascend above all things and fill all things! He laid aside His Glory that He might be crowned with this new Glory and honor and might have all things put under His feet as the Son of Man. We speak, therefore, of Jesus Christ the Risen One, who once died, but has now risen from the tomb and quit this earth for the splendors of the New Jerusalem. — Charles Haddon Spurgeon

And while he waited in the castle court,
The voice of Enid, Yniol's daughter, rang
Clear through the open casement of the hall,
Singing; and as the sweet voice of a bird,
Heard by the lander in a lonely isle,
Moves him to think what kind of bird it is
That sings so delicately clear, and make
Conjecture of the plumage and the form;
So the sweet voice of Enid moved Geraint;
And made him like a man abroad at morn
When first the liquid note beloved of men
Comes flying over many a windy wave
To Britain, and in April suddenly
Breaks from a coppice gemmed with green and red,
And he suspends his converse with a friend,
Or it may be the labour of his hands,
To think or say, 'There is the nightingale;'
So fared it with Geraint, who thought and said,
'Here, by God's grace, is the one voice for me. — Alfred Tennyson

In the deepest night of trouble and sorrow God gives us so much to be thankful for that we need never cease our singing. With all our wisdom and foresight we can take a lesson in gladness and gratitude from the happy bird that sings all night, as if the day were not long enough to tell its joy. — Samuel Taylor Coleridge

My dad sung and played piano. But he was also a man of God. He was a minister. So when Sam Cooke would come in town, you know, with The Soul Stirrers at that time, he was singing gospel, they would end up at my dad's church, and it would always be a guest singer for Sunday morning. — Merry Clayton

If a man just stops to think what he has to praise God for, he will find there is enough to keep him singing praises for a week. — Dwight L. Moody

Vorobyaninov, I've got a pressing artistic task for you,' he whispered. 'Go over to the exit from the first-class hallway and stand there. If somebody approaches, start singing, loudly.'
The old man was taken aback. 'But what should I sing?'
'Not "God Save the Tsar," that's for sure! — Ilya Ilf

It's what I'll be singing in the morning. It won't be God Save the Ruddy King or All Things bleeding Bright and Beautiful. It'll be Orange and Lemons for Big Joe, for all of us. — Michael Morpurgo

You can take lessons to become almost anything: flying lessons, piano lessons, skydiving lessons, acting lessons, race car driving lessons, singing lessons. But there's no class for comedy. You have to be born with it. God has to give you this gift. — Steve Harvey

She gathered a circle of children around her and commenced singing 'For Those Who Peril on the Sea' over their little heads. But no, 'safety from storms' wasn't enough for her. God had to keep them from being blown up too. She set about ordering the poor things to pray for their parents every night- who knew what the German soldiers might do to them? Then she said to be especially good little boys and girls so Mama and Daddy could look down on them from heaven and BE PROUD OF THEM ... she had those children crying and sobbing fit to die.
I was too shocked to move, but no, not Elizabeth. No, quick as an adder's tongue, she had ahold of Adelaide's arm and told her to SHUT UP.
'Let me go!' Adelaide cried. 'I am speaking the Word of God!'
Elizabeth, she got a look on her that would turn the devil to stone, and then she slapped Adelaide right across the face! — Mary Ann Shaffer

SOON, he replied, which makes better sense under the rules of that country than ours. VERY SOON! he added, clasping my hands; then, unable to keep from laughing, he pushed off from the rock like a boy going for the first cold swim of spring; and the current got him. The stream was singing aloud, and I heard him singing with it until he dropped away over the edge. — Leif Enger

Devotional singing induces in you a desire for experiencing the truth, to glimpse the beauty that is God, to taste the bliss that is the Self. It encourages man to dive into himself and be genuinely his real Self. — Sathya Sai Baba

Singing has opened so many doors for me. And that's definitely a true passion of mine. It's a natural, God-given gift. — V. Bozeman

Mind how you pray. Make real business of it. Let it never be a dead formality ... plead the promise in a truthful, business-like way ... Ask for what you want, because the Lord has promised it. Believe that you have the blessing, and go forth to your work in full assurance of it. Go from your knees singing, because the promise is fulfilled: thus will your prayer be answered ... the strength [not length] of your prayer ... wins ... God; and the strength of prayer lies in your faith in the promise which you pleaded before the Lord. — Charles Spurgeon

Now suppose both death and hell were utterly defeated. Suppose the fight was fixed. Suppose God took you on a crystal ball trip into your future and you saw with indubitable certainty that despite everything - your sin, your smallness, your stupidity - you could have free for the asking your whole crazy heart's deepest desire: heaven, eternal joy. Would you not return fearless and singing? What can earth do to you, if you are guaranteed heaven? To fear the worst earthly loss would be like a millionaire fearing the loss of a penny - less, a scratch on a penny. — Peter Kreeft

Singing in the midst of evil is what it means to be disciples. Like Mary Magdalene, the reason we stand and weep and listen for Jesus is because we, like Mary, are bearers of resurrection, we are made new. On the third day, Jesus rose again, and we do not need to be afraid. To sing to God amidst sorrow is to defiantly proclaim, like Mary Magdalene did to the apostles, and like my friend Don did at Dylan Klebold's funeral,t hat death is not the final word. To defiantly say, once again, that a light shines in the darkness and the darkness cannot, will not, shall not overcome it. And so, evil be damned, because even as we go to the grave, we still make our song alleluia. Alleluia. Alleluia. — Nadia Bolz-Weber

Oh, yes, we'll be in chains, and there will be no freedom, but then, in our great grief, we will arise once more into joy, without which it's not possible for man to live, or for God to be, for God gives joy, it's his prerogative, a great one ... Lord, let man dissolve in prayer! How would I be there underground without God? Rakitin's lying: if God is driven from the earth, we'll meet him underground! It's impossible for a convict to be without God, even more impossible than for a non-convict! And then from the depths of the earth, we, the men underground, will start singing a tragic hymn to God, in who there is joy! Hail to God and his joy! I love him! — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

O God, when I listen to the voices of animals, the sounds of trees, the murmurings of water, the singing of birds, the whistling of the wind, or the boom of thunder, I see in them evidence of Your unity; I feel that You are supreme power, omniscience, supreme knowledge, and supreme justice.
I recognize You, O God, in the trials I am going through. May Your pleasure be my pleasure, too. May I be Your joy, the joy that a Father feels for a son. And may I think of You calmly and with determination, even when I find it hard to say I love You. — Paulo Coelho

All these angels start coming out of the boxes and everywhere, guys carrying crucifixes and stuff all over the place, and the whole bunch of them - thousands of them - singing "Come All Ye Faithful" like mad. Big deal. It's supposed to be religious as hell, I know, and very pretty and all, but I can't see anything religious or pretty, for God's sake, about a bunch of actors carrying crucifixes all over the stage. When they all finished and started going out the boxes again, you could tell they could hardly wait to get a cigarette of something. I saw it with old Sally Hayes the year before, and she kept saying how beautiful it was, the costumes and all. I said old jesus probably would've puked if he could see it. — J.D. Salinger

Rev. King continued, chanting, singing his prophetic litany. We were one people, indivisible in the sight of God, responsible to each other and for each other.
We, the black people, the most displaced, the poorest, the most maligned and scourged, we had the glorious task of reclaiming the soul and saving the honor of the country. We, the most hated, must take hate into our hands and by the miracle of love, turn loathing into love. We, the most feared and apprehensive, must take fear and by love, change it into hope. We, who die daily in large and small ways, must take the demon death and turn it into Life.
His head was thrown back and his words rolled out with the rumbling of thunder. We had to pray without ceasing and work without tiring. We had to know evil will not forever stay on the throne. That right, dashed to the ground, will rise, rise again and again. — Maya Angelou

Never had he thought, never once, that such a woman existed, one who stood so close to God that God's own voice poured from her. How far she must have gone inside herself to call up that voice. It was as if the voice came from the center part of the earth and by the sheer effort and diligence of her will she had pulled it up through the dirt and rock and through the floorboards of the house, up into her feet, where it pulled through her, reaching, lifting, warmed by her, and then out of the white lily of her throat and straight to God in heaven. It was a miracle and he wept for the gift of bearing witness. — Ann Patchett

All our time spent making lists would be better spent painting, or writing, Or singing, or learning to speak stories. Sometimes I feel as though the Church has a kind of pity for Scripture, Always having to come behind it and explain everything, put everything into actionable steps, acronyms and hidden secrets, as though the original writers, and for that matter the Holy Spirit Who worked in the lives of the original writers, were a bunch of you literate hillbillies. I think the methodology God used to explain His Truth is quite superior. My life is a story, more than a list. I don't feel that a list could ever explain the complexity of all this beauty. — Donald Miller

Somehow I get puzzled when I see so many Christians living in luxury and singing 'Jesus, I my cross have taken, all to leave and follow Thee,' and remember how my wife died in a tenement in New York City, gasping for air and asking God to take the little girl too. Of course
I
don't expect you people can prevent every one from dying of starvation, lack of proper nourishment
and tenement air, but what does following Jesus mean? — Charles M. Sheldon

In today's church, the word "music" is often freely substituted for the idea of "worship"; however, music is not necessarily synonymous, or automatically interchangeable with, the idea of worship. People will often say, "It's time to worship" and what they mean is that it is time to begin singing. But, music is merely one form or means by which individuals can act on and express their worship to God. The substantive content of worship does not change, but there are many different ways in which worship of God is manifested through the actions of individuals. — Rick Ryan

That's the thing about great love. It elevates everything around it. You walk through a forest together and it becomes a great temple. You eat a meal together and you sit at God's banquet table. You merge your bodies and all heaven breaks loose. That's why we can't stop singing about love. Every verse is a cry for wholeness. — Jeff Brown

He said focus. The word focus. I hear angels singing. Everything goes dark except for a light that beams down on Sean. It is a God-given sign- like when people see the Virgin Mary in their grilled cheese, except this isn't religious and I'm actually not a big fan of dairy. I stare at the back of his head. His HEAD. Something I see every day but never really see because it's been there forever. Since the first day of third grade.
I crumple up my web. I don't need it. Praise be, the Focus Gods have spoken.
I am going to write about Sean Griswold's Head. — Lindsey Leavitt

I'm not sure why God made us the way He did ... As to why we're here, well, I think maybe we're here to learn to love Him. To learn to love God and to want to be with Him. I think we're here to cultivate our longing for heaven. '
Luke sighed. 'Heaven,' he said, 'seems like a long, long way off, Dad.'
Jack nodded. 'It does. But I think God gives us glimpses of heaven from time to time to help up nurture the desire ... I see glimpses every spring when the earth renews itself. And sometimes I see glimpses in a worship service when I'm singing about Jesus and all of a sudden I feel like I'm right there in His arms. — Susan Meissner

My God, what do we want? What does any human being want? Take away an accident of pigmentation of a thin layer of our outer skin and there is no difference between me and anyone else. All we want is for that trivial difference to make no difference. What can I say to a man who asks that? All I can do is try to explain to him why he asks the question. You have looked at us for years as different from you that you may never see us really. You don't understand because you think of us as second-class humans. We have been passive and accommodating through so many years of your insults and delays that you think the way things used to be is normal. When the good-natured, spiritual-singing boys and girls rise up against the white man and demand to be treated like he is, you are bewildered. All we want is what you want, no less and no more. (Chapter 13). — Shirley Chisholm

It's only when we understand [Jesus'] presence in the church as being the fulfillment of God's promise in Zephaniah 3:17 to "quiet you with his love" and "rejoice over you with singing" that a crucial aspect of our salvation comes into perspective. Jesus didn't coldly settle accounts for us. He doesn't bark us into improving ourselves. He united us to himself in the glorious communion he has enjoyed for eternity with his heavenly Father. He resides within us to heal the broken places and refresh cauterized hearts. He sings us into a new mode of existence ... When, as Paul does, we imagine Jesus singing nations into submission to his rule, our hearts come joyfully under the sway of a love that is infinite and powerful. — Reggie M. Kidd

(Everyone, I guess, sees their position as the neutral one and everyone else's position as biassed. I wonder why 177 minutes of the Today programme is completely secular; you feel horribly excluded by 3 minutes of Thought for Today. I see a sinister anti-religious bias when David Attenborough goes through a whole series without ever once aying "On the other hand maybe God made it all"; you feel that 30 minutes of hymn singing on Sunday evening amounts to theocratic oppression.) — Andrew Rilstone

Psalm 63 A psalm of David. When he was in the Desert of Judah. 1 O God, you are my God, earnestly I seek you; my soul thirsts for you, my body longs for you, in a dry and weary land where there is no water. 2 I have seen you in the sanctuary and beheld your power and your glory. 3 Because your love is better than life, my lips will glorify you. 4 I will praise you as long as I live, and in your name I will lift up my hands. 5 My soul will be satisfied as with the richest of foods; with singing lips my mouth will praise you. 6 On my bed I remember you; I think of you through the watches of the night. 7 Because you are my help, I sing in the shadow of your wings. — Beth Moore

When we gather for worship, whether with a handful in a storefront chapel or with thousands in St. Peter's Square, we perform a drama with different parts-speaking and singing and praying and giving money and baptizing and eating bread and drinking wine-all for the delight of God. — David Jeremiah

Beware of singing divine psalms for an ordinary recreation, as do men of impure spirits, who sing holy psalms intermingled with profane ballads: They are God's word: take them not in thy mouth in vain. — Lewis Bayly

For what St. Augustine said is true, that one can sing nothing worthy of God save what one has received from Him. Wherefore though we look far and wide we will find no better songs nor songs more suitable to that purpose than the Psalms of David, which the Holy Spirit made and imparted to him. Thus, singing them we may be sure that our words come from God just as if He were to sing in us for His own exaltation. Wherefore, Chrysostom exhorts men, women, and children alike to get used to singing them, so as through this act of meditation to become as one with the choir of angels. — William Romaine

This is me, God! Elisa. I once saw you in all the world. But the world is dark now, Lord. Full. Full of darkness. Close your eyes for a moment, God, and let me sing to you. Let me remember that you are here. Here in the notes. Smiling down as I play for you. Just this moment, God, let me sing to you. And maybe in the song, I will forget whether I am singing to you, or you are singing to me ... — Bodie Thoene

The point of the resurrection ... is that the present bodily life is not valueless just because it will die ... What you do with your body in the present matters because God has a great future in store for it ... What you do in the present - by painting, preaching, singing, sewing, praying, teaching, building hospitals, digging wells, campaigning for justice, writing poems, caring for the needy, loving your neighbor as yourself - will last into God's future. These activities are not simply ways of making the present life a little less beastly, a little more bearable, until the day when we leave it behind altogether (as the hymn so mistakenly puts it ... ). They are part of what we may call building for God's kingdom. — N. T. Wright

The music had ceased. Alex walked over to the gramophone, wound it up again, and put on more blues, a woman singing this time, gay and sad at once, like a stranded angel who had traded holiness for humanity but remembered what it used to be like to know God. — Barbara Hambly

A worshiping community is made up of individuals whose lives are centered around the Savior they worship together each week. A worshiping community expects to encounter God's presence not only on Sunday morning but every day. A worshiping community recognizes that passionate times of singing God's praise flow from and lead to passionate lives lived for the glory of Jesus Christ. — Bob Kauflin

When God creates Eve, he calls her an ezer kenegdo. 'It is not good for the man to be alone, I shall make him [an ezer kenegdo]' (Gen. 2:18 Alter). Hebrew scholar Robert Alter, who has spent years translating the book of Genesis, says that this phrase is 'notoriously difficult to translate.' The various attempts we have in English are "helper" or "companion" or the notorious "help meet." Why are these translations so incredibly wimpy, boring, flat ... disappointing? What is a help meet, anyway? What little girl dances through the house singing "One day I shall be a help meet?" Companion? A dog can be a companion. Helper? Sounds like Hamburger Helper. Alter is getting close when he translates it "sustainer beside him"
The word ezer is used only twenty other places in the entire Old Testament. And in every other instance the person being described is God himself, when you need him to come through for you desperately. — Stasi Eldredge

(Speaking of the Cistercian monks) A grim fraternity, passing grim lives in that sweet spot, that God had made so bright! Strange that Nature's voices all around them
the soft singing of the waters, the wisperings of the river grass, the music of the rushing wind
should not have taught them a truer meaning of life than this. They listened there, through the long days, in silence, waiting for a voice from heaven; and all day long and through the solemn night it spoke to them in myriad tones, and they heard it not. — Jerome K. Jerome

The condition of mankind is, and always has been, so miserable and depraved that, if anyone were to say to the poet: "For God's sake stop singing and do something useful like putting on the kettle or fetching bandages," what just reason could he give for refusing? — W. H. Auden

I raised my spear to heaven. 'For God and Britain!' I cried, and my cry was answered in kind. And then I was racing down the hillside, my cloak rippling out behind me, the wind singing from my dark-glinting spearhead. — Stephen R. Lawhead

They found grace out in the desert,
these people who survived the killing.
Israel, out looking for a place to rest,
met God out looking for them!"
God told them, "I've never quit loving you and never will.
Expect love, love, and more love!
And so now I'll start over with you and build you up again,
dear virgin Israel.
You'll resume your singing,
grabbing tambourines and joining the dance.
You'll go back to your old work of planting vineyards
on the Samaritan hillsides,
And sit back and enjoy the fruit
oh, how you'll enjoy those harvests!
The time's coming when watchmen will call out
from the hilltops of Ephraim:
'On your feet! Let's go to Zion,
go to meet our God! — Anonymous

If we think we will have joy only by praying and singing psalms, we will be disillusioned. But if we fill our lives with simple good things and constantly thank God for them, we will be joyful, that is, full of joy. And what about our problems? When we determine to dwell on the good and excellent things in life, we will be so full of those things that they will tend to swallow our problems. — Richard J. Foster

I am a confused Musician who got sidetracked into this goddamn Word business for so long that I never got back to music - except maybe when I find myself oddly alone in a quiet room with only a typewriter to strum on and a yen to write a song. Who knows why? Maybe I just feel like singing - so I type.
These quick electric keys are my Instrument, my harp, my RCA glass-tube microphone, and my fine soprano saxophone all at once. That is my music, for good or ill, and on some nights it will make me feel like a god. Veni, Vidi, Vici ... That is when the fun starts ... — Hunter S. Thompson

The Song of the Defeated
My master has bid me while I stand at the roadside,
to sing the song of Defeat,
for that is the bride whom He woos in secret.
She has put on the dark veil,
hiding her face from the crowd,
but the jewel glows on her breast in the dark.
She is forsaken of the day,
and God's night is waiting for her with its lamps lighted and flowers wet with dew.
She is silent with her eyes downcast;
she has left her home behind her,
from her home has come that wailing in the wind.
But the stars are singing the love-song of the eternal to a face sweet with shame and suffering.
The door has been opened in the lonely chamber,
the call has sounded,
and the heart of the darkness throbs with awe
because of the coming tryst. — Rabindranath Tagore

I change the channel to another movie. An old one, but new to me. And, ironically, a thin, gorgeous blonde - Meg Ryan, maybe - rides her bike on a country road. She smiles like she has no cares in the world. Like no one ever judges her. Like her life is perfect. Wind through her hair and sunshine on her face. The only thing missing are the rainbows and butterflies and cartoon birds singing on her shoulder.

Maybe I should grab my bike and try to catch up with Mom, Mike, and the kids. They can't be going very fast. I would love to feel like that, even if it's just for a second - free and peaceful and normal.
Suddenly, there's a truck. It can't be headed toward Meg Ryan. Could it? Yes. Oh my God. No! Meg Ryan just got hit by that truck.

Figures. See what happens when you exercise? — K.A. Barson

And I've been thinking: if the human race manages to destroy itself, as it often seems to want to do, or if some great disaster comes, as it did for the dinosaurs, then the birds will still manage to survive. When our gardens and fields and farms and woods have turned wild, when the park at the end of Falconer Road has turned into a wilderness, when our cities are in ruins, the birds will go on flying and singing and making their nests and laying their eggs and raising their young. It could be that the birds will exist for ever and for ever until the earth itself comes to an end, no matter what might happen to the other creatures. They'll sing until the end of time. So here's my thought: If there is a God, could it be that He's chosen the birds to speak for Him. Could it be true? The voice of God speaks through the beaks of birds. — David Almond

The help of God does not come to us when we are indifferent. It comes to the man who is depending on God in the thick of the light. It comes to the one who tarries for the vision in faith. It comes to the one who believes that he who waits upon The Lord shall never be confounded. It comes to the one who rests upon the promises of the Word. It comes to the one who beleives that before he calls, God will answer. It comes to the man who lives by faith as if in the actual possession of the answer to his prayer, although the enemy is still around him. It is faith which turns distress into singing. — Alan Redpath

Jesus is infinite. he does not finish. there is no start time for Jesus. he has always existed and will always exist. and his love for us is vaster than we are able to comprehend ... And i have to remind myself that God is not 30 minutes of accessible group singing. — Brenton Brown

Here I am looking at my lovely ten-year-old daughter, Maggie, in her white dress, singing Protestant hymns with the choir at the Plymouth Church of the Brethren when I should be at Mass praying for the repose of the soul of my mother, Angela McCourt, mother of seven, believer, sinner, though when I contemplate her seventy-three years on this earth I can't believe the Lord God Almighty on His throne would even dream of consigning her to the flames. A God like that wouldn't deserve the time of day. — Frank McCourt

Every day I remind myself of all that I have been given ... With singing, you never know when you are going to lose the voice, and that makes you appreciate the time that you have when you are still singing well. I am always thanking God for another season, another month, another performance. — Anita O'Day

Leave this chanting and singing and telling of beads! Whom dost thou worship in this lonely dark corner of a temple with doors all shut? Open thine eyes and see thy God is not before thee!
He is there where the tiller is tilling the hard ground and where the pathmaker is breaking stones. He is with them in sun and in shower, and his garment is covered with dust. Put of thy holy mantle and even like him come down on the dusty soil!
Deliverance? Where is this deliverance to be found? Our master himself has joyfully taken upon him the bonds of creation; he is bound with us all for ever.
Come out of thy meditations and leave aside thy flowers and incense! What harm is there if thy clothes become tattered and stained? Meet him and stand by him in toil and in sweat of thy brow — Rabindranath Tagore

For years and years, Christians have been singing about their wandering hearts. Our hearts need to be recalibrated and realigned and reoriented by God. — Tullian Tchividjian

It fits to glorify God - it not only fits reality, because God is infinitely and supremely praiseworthy, but it fits us as nothing else does. All the beauty we have looked for in art or faces or places - and all the love we have looked for in the arms of other people - is only fully present in God himself. And so in every action by which we treat him as glorious as he is, whether through prayer, singing, trusting, obeying, or hoping, we are at once giving God his due and fulfilling our own design. — Timothy Keller

He has something of the same feeling about the hymn singing, I am told. Much as he loves it himself, and music is in him to his very fingertips, be feels - I judge both from the hearsay and from watching him break into the midst of the singing when, in a way they have in Wales, they repeat over and over the same stirring melody - that too much singing moves only surface emotions and takes the congregations' mind from the deeper influence of prayer and close communion with God. He believes completely in the efficacy of prayer, and he has for many years spent a considerable amount of time daily upon his knees. — Evan Roberts

My mother told me to keep on singing, and that kept me working through the cotton fields. She said God has his hand on you. You'll be singing for the world someday. — Johnny Cash

God created woman as a Warrior. I think about the tragedies the women in my life have faced. How every time a child gets sick or a man leaves or a parent dies or a community crumbles, the women are the ones who carry on, who do what must be done for their people in the midst of their own pain. While those around them fall away, the women hold the sick and nurse the weak, put food on the table, carry their families' sadness and anger and love and hope. They keep showing up for their lives and their people with the odds stacked against them and the weight of the world on their shoulders. They never stop singing songs of truth, love, and redemption in the face of hopelessness. They are inexhaustible, ferocious, relentless cocreators with God, and they make beautiful worlds out of nothing. Have women been the Warriors all along? — Glennon Doyle Melton

All our life is like a day of celebration for us; we are convinced, in fact, that God is always everywhere. We work while singing, we sail while reciting hymns, we accomplish all other occupations of life while praying. — Clement Of Alexandria

Passover is about more than saying the right prayers and singing the right songs. It is about experiencing the love God felt for humanity and which God expressed by freeing the Jewish people from Egypt. Our obligation as human beings and people of faith is to trust in that love and, like the Israelites, let it guide us to the next step on our journey. — Evan Moffic

There's a story ... a legend, about a bird that sings just once in its life. From the moment it leaves its nest, it searches for a thorn tree ... and never rests until it's found one. And then it sings ... more sweetly than any other creature on the face of the earth. And singing, it impales itself on the longest, sharpest thorn. But, as it dies, it rises above its own agony, to outsing the lark and the nightingale. The thorn bird pays its life for just one song, but the whole world stills to listen, and God in his heaven smiles. — Colleen McCullough

A cap of good acid costs five dollars and for that you can hear the Universal Symphony with God singing solo and Holy Ghost on drums. — Hunter S. Thompson