I've mentioned here before that I'm a big fan of Albert Mohler's daily podcast, The Briefing. It's a great adjunct to the daily bombardment of news from television and radio, and it helps me maintain my focus and worldview. I've also grown to appreciate Dr. Mohler's other, less frequent podcast, Thinking in Public.
This past April I was listening to this one with Dr. T. David Gordon. In it, among other things, he discussed on the importance of hymns in his own life and his thoughts on the importance of them in the lives of all believers. What he had to say made me realize that I had been taking the hymns that I learned as a child for granted. Here's an excerpt that had my mascara running:
This past April I was listening to this one with Dr. T. David Gordon. In it, among other things, he discussed on the importance of hymns in his own life and his thoughts on the importance of them in the lives of all believers. What he had to say made me realize that I had been taking the hymns that I learned as a child for granted. Here's an excerpt that had my mascara running:
"Many people testify that in some of the difficult moments of their lives what sustains them was the great courage begetting power of a well written hymn. And when our daughter for instance died of leukemia, the first daughter, for years my wife’s favorite hymn afterwards was Whatever My God Ordains Is Right. And it was such a valuable hymn to have already learned before that moment so that it was like an inflated life raft to carry us through a difficult moment. I would hold Marion in the morning in the hospital and sing to her. It’s still very important one day to hold that baby in my arms and sing on her behalf “hold thou thy cross before my closing eyes shine through the gloom and point me to the skies. Heaven’s morning breaks, earth vain shadows flee in life, in death oh Lord abide with me.” She was too young to pray her own prayers or sing her own hymn and so I had to sing that one for her. And there are people who will go through this world they will have a child die, and they will not have the strength and faith that we have because some great hymn writer gave us that gift."
I didn't do much music study with Evey for 3rd grade because adding even one more thing to the curriculum would've just been too much. But I wanted to really devote some time to music in 4th grade, and this podcast gave me an even stronger desire to focus on hymns. I'd already bought The Gift of Music: Great Composers and Their Influence, (the first chapter is all about hymns) but I couldn't find any actual recordings that I liked until I came across Peace Like a River: The Hymns Project by Chris Rice. It's crisp and earthy, and, most importantly, kids can understand the words as they are being sung. I love having these songs on my iPhone and I highly recommend both of these resources if you're homeschooling, or if you just want to study music with your kids, or by yourself.
