Why Do We Sing in Church? 5 Reasons

5 Reasons We Sing

Last Sunday at church the music director led us in a song I didn’t know. As I waited to get the tune in my head, I watched people singing around me. I also watched people not singing. Perhaps, like me, they were waiting to join in, or perhaps they were unbelievers who wondered what was happening and what to do. In that moment it dawned on me, What a strange phenomenon—congregational singing! It is not only strange to see people of all ages and from various nations and ethnic backgrounds singing in one voice; it is also strange to see people singing lyrics together to an invisible God (calling him “King” and “Father”) and singing about his crucified Son, our love for him, and the hope of heaven.

In mansions of glory and endless delight
I’ll ever adore Thee in heaven so bright.
I’ll sing with the glittering crown on my brow;
If ever I loved Thee, my Jesus, ’tis now.¹

Why do we sing? Why do Christians, especially as we gather on Sundays for corporate worship, join our voices together and sing to God? Here are five reasons.

1. We imitate and echo our singing God!

In the final chapter of Zephaniah the prophet pronounces judgment on Jerusalem due to its rebellion and oppression, as well as judgment on the nations. Yet he also holds out hope to all the humble who seek refuge in the Lord. The chapter concludes, then, with a shift from God’s judgment to God’s grace—the promise of Israel’s coming king and salvation. The righteous remnant is commanded to “sing aloud” and “rejoice and exult with all your heart” because “the King of Israel, the Lord, is in your midst” and “has taken away the judgments against you” (v. 15). And, in response to God’s gospel, God sings over his redeemed!

The Lord your God is in your midst,
      a mighty one who will save;
he will rejoice over you with gladness;
      he will quiet you by his love;
he will exult over you with loud singing. (Zeph. 3:17)²

First, we sing because we imitate and echo our singing God.

The Sing! Hymnal

Keith Getty, Kristyn Getty, John Martin, Dan Kreider, Douglas Sean O'Donnell

Curated by award-winning hymn writers Keith and Kristyn Getty, The Sing! Hymnal features timeless hymns to deepen corporate worship and unity among believers. With liturgical readings and a durable cover, this edition is ideal for regular church use.

2. We sing because God has written songs for us to sing.

From beginning to end the Bible is filled with God-inspired songs. There are the Psalms, of course—one hundred and fifty hymns in the heart of the Hebrew Scriptures. God has given us songs that help us know how to praise, confess, thank, lament, cry out for justice, and more. But there are also the songs of Moses (Ex. 15; Deut. 32), Deborah (Judges 5), Hannah (1 Sam. 2:1–10), David (2 Sam. 22), Isaiah (5:1–7; 42, 49, 52–53), and Habakkuk (Hab. 3) in the Old Testament and the songs of Mary (Luke 1:46–55), Zechariah (1:68–79), the angels (2:14), Simeon (2:29–32), and Paul (Phil. 2:6–11; Col. 1:15–20; cf. Rom. 11:33–36; 1 Tim. 3:16; 2 Tim. 2:11–13), as well as the heavenly hymns of Revelation (Rev. 4:8; 5:9–10; 7:10–12, 15:3–4; 19:1–8) in the New Testament. We join our voices with the voices of the saints and angels, singing “Hallelujah” (“praise the Lord”) for God’s majesty, holiness, justice, faithfulness, sovereignty, wisdom, power, and mercy, because God has given us songs to sing.

3. God commands us to sing.

Thirty-plus times God’s people are commanded to sing in the Psalms, such as “Sing to him a new song; play skillfully on the strings, with loud shouts” (Ps. 33:3) and “Oh come, let us sing to the Lord; let us make a joyful noise to the rock of our salvation!” (Ps. 95:1).³ Elsewhere David exhorts Israel, “Sing to the Lord, all the earth! Tell of his salvation from day to day” (1 Chron. 16:23), as do Isaiah (12:5–6; 42:10; 44:23; 49:13; 54:1), Jeremiah (20:13; 31:7), Zephaniah (3:14), and Zechariah (2:10). Likewise, Paul commands the church to address “one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart” (Eph. 5:19), and James writes, “Is anyone cheerful? Let him sing praise” (James 5:13). We sing because God in his word commands it.

4. We sing because it is good for our bodies and souls.

What Solomon says of “gracious words” we can say of good songs: they are like “sweetness to the soul and health to the body” (Prov. 16:24). Did you notice that in Paul’s command to sing he ends with the line “singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart” (Eph. 5:19)? He writes similarly in Colossians 3:16, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God.” It is with our “hearts” or “souls” (terms that are used interchangeably at times in the Bible; see Pss. 13:2; 84:2) that we sing, and it is in our hearts that we receive grace from God through song. Don’t you typically feel spiritually nourished when you sing? I do!

It is good for our souls to sing, as it is for our bodies. Throughout the Psalms the psalmists draw connections between the effects of sin and the human body. David, for example, describes his bones wasting away and his strength failing “because of my iniquity” (Ps. 31:10), and he prays, “Be gracious to me, O Lord, for I am in distress; my eye is wasted from grief; my soul and my body also” (v. 9). The opposite is also true: when we sing, we engage our whole selves in a way that builds up the body (the church), as well our bodies. We breathe deeply, using our lungs, vocal cords, mouths, tongues, and lips. Singing often involves physical movement as well: Scripture speaks of standing, kneeling, bowing down, lifting hands, clapping, and even dancing while singing.⁴ It can also require bodily strength, as when “The Levites and the priests praised the Lord day by day, singing with all their might to the Lord” (2 Chron. 30:21). And of course musicians contribute with their hands and mouths as they sing and as they play tambourines, cymbals, trumpets, horns, flutes, harps, lyres, and more. Finally, joy (which might manifest itself with a smile, laugh, or tear) is often the natural companion of such music: “They sang praises with gladness” (2 Chron. 29:30; cf. 23:18); “My heart and flesh sing for joy to the living God” (Ps. 84:2; cf. Isa. 51:11).⁵ We sing because singing is good for the whole person.

As we sing, we remind one another to keep the faith and of our great salvation.

5. Singing in church unites us physically, emotionally, and spiritually as God’s people while it simultaneously witnesses to the world.

Of course we sing to exalt God. Augustine defined a hymn as “a song containing praise of God,”⁶ and John Wesley’s seven standards for “inspired singing” include the instruction “Above all sing spiritually,” meaning “Have an eye to God in every word you sing.”⁷ We sing to exalt God, but we also sing to edify believers and evangelize outsiders. It is clear from Paul’s commands that singing is to be done to one another (“addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,” Eph. 5:18; “teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs,” Col. 3:16). We also find this modeled in the lyrics of many of the great hymns. Think of “Come, Christians, Join to Sing,” the Christmas carol “Good Christian Men, Rejoice,” or of one of my favorites, “If Thou but Suffer God to Guide Thee”:

If thou but suffer God to guide thee
And hope in Him through all thy ways,
He’ll give thee strength, whate’er betide thee,
And bear thee through the evil days.⁸

As we sing, we remind one another to keep the faith and of our great salvation: we “tell his salvation from day to day” (Ps. 96:2). “For us,” Matt Boswell writes, “singing is a means of disciple-making.” Moreover, singing Scripture-saturated songs is also “an apologetics to an onlooking world of our shared salvation.” ⁹ As the psalmist exhorts, “Declare his glory among the nations, his marvelous works among all the peoples!” (Ps. 96:3). I’m reminded of Acts 16:25, which records this remarkable picture of Christian fellowship: “About midnight Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God, and the prisoners were listening to them,” as well as the picture Paul paints in 1 Corinthians 14:24–25 of the “unbeliever or outsider” coming to the Christian gathering, being “convicted by all,” and “having the secrets of his heart . . . disclosed,” and then worshiping God and declaring “that God is really among you.” We sing in church because it unites us—physically, emotionally, and spiritually—as God’s people, while it also bears witness to the world.

I was converted to Christ at the age of nineteen. One of the strange yet beautiful things I noticed as I began attending church was the singing. I had never been in gatherings where men(!), women, and children sang together and sang with energy, joy, and volume. Christians sing! We sing because we echo our singing God; we sing because God has given us songs to sing; we sing because God commands us to sing; we sing because singing benefits both body and soul; and we sing because singing unites believers, edifies the church, and testifies to the world.

Doug O’Donnell is an editor of The Sing! Hymnal created by Keith Getty and Kristyn Getty.

Douglas Sean O’Donnell (PhD, University of Aberdeen) is the senior vice president of Bible and church resources editorial at Crossway and is a member of the ESV Translation Oversight Committee and a Senior Fellow of the Center for Pastor Theologians. He has written over twenty books, including commentaries, Bible studies, devotionals, and a children’s curriculum. In addition to his writing, he contributes editorially to several major commentary series, including Crossway's Commentary on the Greek New Testament,  the Concise Bible Commentary, the Conversational Commentary, and the Reformed Exegetical Theological Commentary on Scripture. He is the general editor of the Knowing the Bible series and the liturgies and Scripture editor of The Sing! Hymnal.

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