Author: Harding Bruce

“With all my heart, I praise you, O God!” Psalm 138 is a psalm of praise for God’s infinite goodness and steadfast love, and is our psalm of the day for June 10. In The United Church of Canada, this is also our anniversary Sunday: On June 10, 1925, the UCC came into being, the first interdenominational church union in the world, and we’ll be celebrating at Crossroads United Church with yours truly preaching on what this means for us today… Join us if you dare! And if you live farther afield, feel free to share this joyful new refrain with your community:

• With all my heart (pdf, bulletin graphic and midi)

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Trinity Sunday is a day of celebrating one of the great mysteries of Christian tradition, the multi-faceted aspect of God. Here’s a song to help you celebrate the Trinity in a new way:

• Generations All Shall Sing (pdf)

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May 27 is the day we celebrate Pentecost this year, the birthday of the church and the celebration of the Holy Spirit: “Divided tongues, as of fire, appeared among them, and a tongue rested on each of them. All of them were filled with the Holy Spirit and began to speak in other languages, as the Spirit gave them ability.” (Acts 2:3-4 NRSV).

And so let’s celebrate the gifts of the Spirit in abundance! Here’s a simple rhythmic chant to help you in invocation and praise. We usually start this one with lots of percussion (djembes, shakers, etc.), then introduce one voice at a time, from the bottom up:

• Veni, sancte Spiritus (Come, Holy Spirit) (pdf and bulletin graphic)

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Two songs for Ascension, a lively gospel-flavoured refrain for Psalm 47 and a simple round for the season and throughout the year:

• “God has gone up with a shout” (bulletin graphic and pdf)
• “Where two or three are gathered” (bulletin graphic, pdf, and mp3), from our album Like a Healing Stream

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Sing a new song! Nine times through scripture, we hear the ancient injunction to find new ways to sing to God, in our hearts and in our praise. I guess, since we are creatures of habit, that once wasn’t enough to make it clear!

Psalm 98 comes around again in the lectionary for May 13, so why not reinforce this critical message with a sung refrain?

• “Sing a new song” (pdf and bulletin graphic)

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