In all our debates about what to sing (hymns or songs? old or new? book, screen or service sheet? who decides anyway?), a different niggle surfaces from time to time. For some, it is no niggle at all; it measures our Scriptural obedience, on a par with baptism, evangelism and wearing jeans.
It is this: should our worship of God include psalm-singing, and if so, should we sing anything else? Whole blocks of churches have split on the issue; it was a hot potato before, during and after the Reformation. Luther and Calvin took opposite sides. The trickle of booklets on the subject may be thinning out but rarely dries up altogether. This is not the place to weigh all the arguments. But three points are worth repeating. First, the psalms are great to sing!
Re-establishing psalmody
The past half-century has seen many brave attempts to re-establish psalmody, not so much where its dominance was threatened as where it had lost its place completely. Evangelicals provided collections such as Psalm Praise, The Book of Praises and Songs from the Psalms. As this last title shows, some versions had a looser connection with their source than others. More churchy circles have experimented with Gelineau's arrangements, or the repetition of antiphons and other responses.
