by Randall Goodgame
It was unseasonably warm in Nashville this week. Inspired by the prospect of spring, I sowed a tray of candelabra primrose seeds. They make a gorgeous flower, both delicate and showy, with whirling white blooms that tier upward. This is my third year to plant candelabra primrose. And – you’d never know it from my garden.
Thankfully, failure sows many crops: knowledge, skill, experience, patience. And for gardeners, success has quite the upside. We bear witness to tiny, slow-motion explosions of God’s most colorful creations.
This is not a gardening article, but flower gardening is a lot like scripture song writing, which may be why I love them both so much.
Last fall, The Rabbit Room published the Scripture Hymnal, a collection of 106 word-for-word scripture songs written specifically for congregational singing – by myself and a dozen other writers. For over a decade, I’ve witnessed the transformational power of singing scripture through Slugs & Bugs – the children and family music ministry I’ve been running since 2010. And now, the Scripture Hymnal brings that opportunity to the corporate Church.
Of course, singing scripture is an ancient practice. Thousands of years ago, the psalms were simply David’s songs. Those scriptures were born as music, and psalm singing remains standard practice in most liturgical churches from Nashville to Nepal. And yet, what the Scripture Hymnal offers is decidedly new.
These songs span the whole Bible, including many passages that were not originally written as lyrics. They are stylistically diverse, indexed as traditional, contemporary, or children-and-family worship. And most importantly, they are beautifully singable. This whole project would die on the vine if the songs didn’t work, so in 2023 we gathered a group of thirty-odd worship leaders from in and out of Nashville to pick apart every song.
Those worship leaders provided feedback that lifted the whole project. They affirmed songs that were already working, but they also inspired changes as small as a half-step key change, and as large as entire sections re-written to ensure congregational singability.
All of that rigor was right and proper. Because if these songs are truly congregational, truly beautiful, and useful and singable, then the Scripture Hymnal is nothing less than a dangerous weapon for spiritual warfare, new and ancient, “with divine power to destroy strongholds.” It makes me want to sing:
Hey devil! Get behind me!You’re gonna get under my feet! - CeCe Winans “Hey Devil”
Think of how you learned all the song lyrics you know by heart. Your brain doesn’t care if it’s learning Ecclesiastes or Eminem. Memorable music makes the words stay put. And the more of God’s word that we have stored away, the more the Holy Spirit can bring it to mind when we need it.
According to a 2019 Lifeway survey, more than half of church-going Christians don’t read the Bible even once a week. A church that uses the Scripture Hymnal provides a significant onramp for getting the Bible inside the biblically illiterate. And for the daily Bible reader, these songs offer a source of refreshment and renewal into the gospel they already know so well.
In addition to its biblical engagement/memorization value, the Scripture Hymnal offers an alternative to the disappointing transience of the modern worship song. For so many churches, worship songs that were exciting and new four years ago have vanished today. Likewise, most new songs we are singing today will cycle out within a few years.
There are wonderful exceptions, like Sandra McCracken’s We Will Feast In The House of Zion. But in general, the lack of a consistent canon of songs has crippled the modern church like lazy sins of omission. Familiar songs, when they find their power in truth and beauty, connect churchgoers from generation to generation. They root in the mind of the wayward wanderer, and her own tears welcome her back when she finds the courage to return to church and hears a familiar refrain. And finally, these kinds of songs inspire true singing.
Have you ever been in a worship service where the congregation all of a sudden sings twice as loud? It’s always because the leader finally added a song like “Come Thou Fount” or “Crown Him With Many Crowns” or “We Will Feast In The House Of Zion” to the worship order.
Those songs arouse our passions because
They are easy to sing
They brilliantly articulate a strain of thought that we long to express
They are artistically beautiful
And that is the bar we’ve set for the Scripture Hymnal. Every song won’t work for every congregation, but every congregation can find multiple songs that will fit their aesthetic.
Of course, all art is personal. Preferences are subjective. But beauty also has a standard, and humans as a group know it when we experience it.
Which brings me back to the garden and writing scripture songs. In 2022/2023, I was writing a scripture song every week. And my little family was going through the most difficult time in our history. What started as weeks and months of pain and hardship eventually became years and felt like an eternity.
Whenever I got overwhelmed or hit a writer’s block, I took a break and pulled weeds in the garden, still muttering the scripture through the materializing melody. Many times, I realized I had found the melody when I started to cry. The words of scripture would score my soul like a hard rake on dry soil, and when the right melody appeared, it felt like fresh rain. And I wept.
Of course, in any scripture passage, all the meaning is already there in the words. Singing doesn’t create more meaning, but it does add something. For me, it brings the meaning inside me in a way that reading doesn’t achieve. It brings the understanding down into my body, into my heart. Sort of like the difference between seeing a picture of a hand and holding a hand.
Writing scripture songs feels like flower gardening because the beauty feels revealed rather than created. I don’t make anything in the garden, but I participate – by sowing seed and keeping the soil moist and carefully transplanting and keeping the weeds down. Eventually something beautiful emerges. And I feel the same way about writing scripture songs. The words are already there, and deep down I think the melodies are too.
So, why a Scripture Hymnal? Because the most important word in a life of faith is remember. And scripture songs help me remember the gospel like nothing else.
So folks that don’t read music can enjoy it too, we’ve recorded every song in the hymnal, and there’s a QR code inside that connects you to the recordings. We’re also releasing the songs in albums of 10-12 songs at a time. And last week, we released Scripture Hymnal Vol 3.
All the songs are produced by Kyle Schonewill, and you will recognize many friends of the Rabbit Room among the singers and players.
Randall Goodgame is a songwriter, TV show host, and leader of the Slugs & Bugs universe. The Scripture Hymnal is available via Rabbit Room Press, for more information, visit www.scripturehymnal.com.
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Photo by Elena Mozhvilo on Unsplash