'They stood in their office, according to their order.'--1 CHRON. vi.
32 (R.V. margin).
This brief note is buried in the catalogue of the singers appointed by
David for 'the service of song in the house of the Lord.' The waves of
their choral praise have long ages since ceased to eddy round the
'tabernacle of the tent of meeting,' and all that is left of their
melodious companies is a dry list of names, in spite of which the dead
owners of them are nameless. But the chronicler's description of them
may carry some lessons for us, for is not the Church of Christ a
choir, chosen to 'shew forth the praises of Him who has called us out
of darkness into His marvellous light'? We take a permissible liberty
with this fragment, when we use it to point lessons that may help that
great band of choristers who are charged with the office of making the
name of Jesus ring through the world. Now, in making such a use of the
text, we may linger on each important word in it and find each
fruitful in suggestions which we shall be the better for expanding in
our own meditations.
We pause on the first word, which is rendered in the Authorised and
Revised Versions 'waited,' and in the margin of the latter 'stood.'
The former rendering brings into prominence the mental attitude with
which the singers held themselves ready to take their turns in the
service, the latter points rather to their bodily attitude as they
fulfilled their office. We get a picture of the ranked files gathered
round their three leaders, Heman, Asaph, and Ethan. These three names
are familiar to us from the Psalter, but how all the ranks behind them
have fallen dim to us, and how their song has floated into inaudible
distance! They 'stood,' a melodious multitude, girt and attent on
their song, or waiting their turn to fill the else silent air with the
high praises of Jehovah, and glad when it came to their turn to open
their lips in full-throated melody.
Now may we not catch the spirit of that long vanished chorus, and find
in the two possible renderings of this word a twofold example, the
faithful following of which would put new vigour into our service? We
are called to a loftier office, and have heavenly harmonies entrusted
to us to be made vocal by our lips, compared with which theirs were
poor. 'They waited on' their office, and shall not we, in a higher
fashion, wait on our ministry, and suffer no inferior claims to block
our way or hamper our preparedness to discharge it? To let ourselves
be entangled with 'the affairs of this life,' or to 'drowse in idle
cell,' sleepily letting summonses that should wake us to work sound
unheeded and almost unheard, is flagrant despite done to our high
vocation as Christians. 'They also serve who only stand and wait,' but
not if in their waiting their eyes are straying everywhere but to
their Master's pointing hand or directing eye. The world is full of
voices calling Christ's folk to help; but what a host of so-called
Christians fail to hear these piteous and despairing cries, because
the noise of their own whims, fancies, and self-centred desires keeps
buzzing in their ears. A constant accompaniment of deafness is
constant noises in the head; and the Christians who are hardest of
hearing when Christ calls are generally afflicted with noises which
are probably the cause, and not merely an accompaniment, of their
deafness. For indeed it demands no little detachment of spirit from
self and sense, from the world and its clamant suitors, if a Christian
soul is to be ready to mark the first signal of the great Conductor's
baton, and to answer the lightest whisper, intrusting it with a task
for Him, with its self-consecrating 'Here am I. Send me.'
It used to be said that they who watched for providences never wanted
providences to watch for; it is equally true that they who are on the
watch for opportunities for service never fail to find them, and that
ears pricked to 'hear what God the Lord shall speak,' summoning to
work for Him, will not listen in vain. Paul saw in a vision 'a
_man_ of Macedonia' begging for his help, and 'straightway' he
concluded that '_God_ had called' him to preach in Europe. Happy
are these Christian workers who hear God's voice speaking through
men's needs, and recognise a divine imperative in human cries!
May we not see in the attitude of David's choristers as they sang,
hints for our own discharge of the tasks of our Christian service?
There was a curse of old on him who did the work of the Lord
'negligently,' and its weight falls still on workers and work. For who
can measure the harm done to the Christian life of the negligent
worker, and who can expect any blessing to come either to him or to
others from such half-hearted seeming service? The devil's kingdom is
not to be cast down nor Christ's to be builded up by workers who put
less than their whole selves, the entire weight of their bodies, into
their toil. A pavior on the street brings down his rammer at every
stroke with an accompanying exclamation expressing effort, and there
is no place in Christ's service for dainty people who will not sweat
at their task, and are in mortal fear of over-work. Strenuousness, the
gathering together of all our powers, are implied in the attitude of
Heman and his band as they 'stood' in their office. Idle revellers
might loll on their rose-strewn couches as they 'sing idle songs to
the sound of the viol and devise for themselves instruments of music,
like David,' but the austerer choir of the Temple despised ease, and
stood ready for service and in the best bodily posture for song.
The second important word of the text brings other thoughts no less
valuable and rich in practical counsel. The singers in the Temple
stood in their 'office,' which was song. Their special work was
praise. And that is the highest task of the Church. As a matter of
fact, every period of quickened earnestness in the Church's life has
been a period marked by a great outburst of Christian song. All
intense emotion seeks expression in poetry, and music is the natural
speech of a vivid faith. Luther chanted the Marseillaise of the
Reformation, 'A safe stronghold our God is still,' and many another
sweet strain blended strangely with the fiery and sometimes savage
words from his lips. The Scottish Reformation, grim in some of its
features as it was, had yet its 'Gude and Godly Ballads.' At the birth
of Methodism, as round the cradle at Bethlehem, hovered as it were
angel voices singing, 'Glory to God in the highest.' A flock of
singing birds let loose attends every revival of Christian life.
The Church's praise is the noblest expression of the Church's life.
Its hymns go deeper than its creeds, touch hearts more to the quick,
minister to the faith which they enshrine, and often draw others to
see the preciousness of the Christ whom they celebrate. How little we
should have known of Old Testament religion, notwithstanding law and
prophets, if the Psalter had perished!
And it is true, in a very deep sense, that we shall do more for Christ
and men by voicing our own deep thankfulness for His great gifts and
speaking simply our valuation of, and our thankfulness for, what we
draw from Him than by any other form of so-called Christian work. We
can offend none by saying: 'We have found the Messias,' and are
adoringly glad that we have. The most effectual way of moving other
souls to participate in our joy is to let our joy speak. 'If you wish
me to weep,' your own tears must not be held back, and if you wish
others to know the preciousness of Christ, you must ring out His name
with fervour of emotion and the triumphant confidence. We are the
'secretaries of God's praise,' as George Herbert has it, for we have
possession of His greatest gift, and have learned to know Him in
loftier fashion than Heman's choristers dreamed of, having seen 'the
glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ,' and tasted the sweetness of
redeeming love. The Apocalyptic seer sets forth a great truth when he
tells us that he first heard a new song from the lips of the
representatives of the Church, who could sing, 'Thou wast slain and
didst redeem us to God with Thy blood,' and then heard their adoration
echoed from 'many angels round about the throne,' and finally heard
the song reverberated from every created thing in heaven and earth, in
the sea and all deep places. A praising Church has experiences of its
own which angels cannot share, and it sets in motion the great sea of
praise whose surges break in music and roll from every side of the
universe in melodious thunder to the great white throne. Without our
song even angel voices would lack somewhat.
'God said, "A praise is in Mine ear;
There is no doubt in it, no fear:
Clearer loves sound other ways:
I miss My little human praise."'
The song of the redeemed has in it a minor strain that gives a
sweetness far more poignant than belongs to those who cannot say: 'Out
of the depths I cried unto Thee.' 'The sweetest songs are those which
tell of saddest thought,' and recount experiences of conquered sin and
life springing from death.
But it is also true that no kind of Christian service will be
effectual, if it lacks the element of grateful praise as its motive
and mainspring. Perhaps there would be fewer complaints of toiling all
night and wearily hauling in empty nets, if the nets were oftener let
down not only 'at Thy word' but with glad remembrance of the
fishermen's debt to Jesus, and in the spirit of praise. When all our
work is a sacrifice of praise, it is pleasing to God and profitable to
ourselves and to others. If we would oftener bethink ourselves, and
herald every deed with a silent dedication of it and of ourselves to
Him who died for us, we should less often have to complain that we
have sowed much and brought back little. A pinch of incense cast into
the common domestic fire makes its flame sacrificial and fragrant.
The last important word of the text is also fertile in hints for us.
The singers stood in their office 'according to their order.' That
last expression may either refer to rotation of service or to
distribution of parts in the chorus. They did not sing in unison,
grand as the effect of such a song from a multitude sometimes is, but
they had their several parts. The harmonious complexity of a great
chorus is the ideal for the Church. Paul puts the same thought in a
sterner metaphor when he tells the Colossian Christians that he joys
'beholding your order and the steadfastness of your faith in Christ,'
where he is evidently thinking of the Roman legion with its rigid
discipline and its solid, irresistible, ranked weight. Division of
function and consequent concordant action of different parts is the
lesson taught by both metaphors, and by the many modern examples of
the immense results gained in machinery that almost simulates vital
action, and by organisations for great purposes in which men combine.
The Church should be the highest example of such combination, for it
is the shrine of the noblest life, even the life of its indwelling
Lord. Every member of it should have and know his place. Every
Christian should know his part in the great chorus, for he has a part,
even if it is only that of tinkling the triangle in the orchestra or
beating a drum. That division of function and concordance of action
apply to all forms of the Church's action, and are enforced most
chiefly by the great Apostolic metaphor of the body and its members.
Paul did not delight in 'uniformity.' Inferiors calling themselves his
successors have often aimed at enforcing it, but nature has been too
strong for them, and the hedge will grow its own way in spite of
pedants' shears. 'If the whole body were an eye, where the hearing?'
The monotony of a church in which uniformity was the ideal would be
intolerable. The chorus has its parts, and the soprano cannot say to
the bass, 'I have no need of you,' nor the bass to the tenor, 'I have
no need of thee.'
So let us see that we find our own place, and see that we fill it,
singing our own part lustily, and not being either confused or made
dumb because another has other notes to sing than are written on our
score. Let us recognise unity made more melodious by diversity, the
importance of the humblest, and 'having gifts differing according to
the grace given unto us let us wait on our ministry,' and stand in our
office according to our order.