Do you have a singing heart? I’m thinking of a heart full of love, gratitude, hope, trust, praise, awareness of good, unselfish joy. Even if you think you don’t have a great singing voice, if you have a singing heart these qualities will shine through, no matter what. And you may even discover that you can sing when you thought you couldn’t!

The word hymn comes from the Greek word hymnos, meaning a song of praise. That’s also the origin of the word psalm. The wonderful psalms in the Bible were songs of thanksgiving, gratitude, devout love of God, and were sometimes inspired by deliverance from the depths of doubt or despair. But they were songs!—songs that came straight from the heart, sincere and deeply felt.

Often as we pray for healing we find that we have a need to sing, to praise God, to give thanks, to trust in God in dark times, and to rejoice when the light breaks through. I remember a long drive in my car many years ago when I felt completely numb. I had received some news that disturbed me so much that initially I didn’t even seem able to pray. But I had with me a cassette recording of hymns from the Christian Science Hymnal, beautifully sung in fresh arrangements by a choir, and I put it into the player in my car. At first the music washed over me without having any effect. But then one line of a hymn suddenly broke through: “He whose word cannot be broken.” The full verse reads:

Glorious things of thee are spoken,
   Zion, city of our God;
He whose word cannot be broken,
   Formed thee for His own abode;
On the Rock of Ages founded,
   What can shake thy sure repose?
By salvation’s walls surrounded
   Thou mayst smile at all thy foes.
(John Newton, No. 71)

The singers went on to other hymns, but those words had woken me. I played that hymn over and over, finally joining in as loudly and with as much conviction as I could. For several days those were the only words of spiritual truth that seemed to have meaning to me, and they were a lifeline. They brought me out of that mesmeric mental state and restored my spiritual sense. I became able to handle the situation that had so overwhelmed me, and eventually saw it turned to good. Interestingly, the words were being sung to a fine tune I was not familiar with at the time, but which now appears as No. 440 in the Hymnal Supplement.

Sometimes we sing hymns on our own, but usually hymns are for singing together, and there’s something truly empowering about this shared experience. As part of a church service, hymns draw prayer out into expression. The service isn’t just for breathing in, or listening to, or being inspired, but is designed for breathing out, expressing, giving voice to prayer. This balance—taking in, giving out—is an essential part of worshipping together. We might come to a service with deep needs, but we’re not there just to worship for our own benefit; the service needs us to give as well, and the hymns are part of this giving. It’s recognized today that regular communal worship has a beneficial effect on health and longevity, and singing together is undoubtedly an important part of this.

Providing the musical accompaniment for hymns in church is an art that enables hearts to sing comfortably. Hymns are essentially prayers that live and breathe. The words are important, yet the melodies can sing in our thoughts long after we’ve heard them in a church service. The music is like the clothing that enhances a hymn and enables it to soar. That’s why words can have different musical settings, which bring out different aspects of their meaning and fit them for different occasions.

Hymns reflect the whole spectrum of human experience. There are hymns that glorify God and His whole creation, and hymns that are intensely intimate; hymns of supplication and longing, and hymns of courage and faith; hymns that arouse, and hymns that comfort and console; seasonal hymns and hymns for every day; hymns relating to world government, and hymns for families and relationships; hymns for joyous times, and hymns for hard times. But their common denominator is the way they speak about God and man. This is why the Christian Science Hymnal may use some hymn words that are familiar in other denominations, but with slight variations that reflect the concept of God and man that is specific to Christian Science.

Hymns of all faiths have always been a powerful means of placing trust in God and experiencing His grace and protection. Mary Baker Eddy used to tell her students a story about a soldier in the American Civil War. His job was to walk up and down a barricade defending it from attack. However, he became conscious of a danger that he couldn’t see or hear, and so he began to sing a hymn while he walked. At that very moment his enemies were in the undergrowth aiming to shoot him, but suddenly their leader heard the sound of his singing. He listened until the hymn was finished, and then ordered his men to turn and go back without shooting. Years later the two soldiers met, and the soldier who had been on the barricade said that when he had finished singing he felt the danger had gone. The hymn was the well-loved “Jesus, Lover of My Soul,” which is full of the thought of refuge and safety. Mrs. Eddy used this as an illustration of spiritual watching, which was so much more than merely walking up and down on sentry duty. And how important it was that the sentry sang the hymn aloud so that it touched the hearts of his enemies and saved them from killing their brother man (see We Knew Mary Baker Eddy Expanded Edition, Volume 1, pages 262–263).

It’s moving to read in the Bible that Jesus and his disciples sang a hymn together not long before his betrayal and crucifixion (see Matthew 26:30). They must surely have been strengthening each other and placing unconditional trust in God to bring them all through this trial. The Bible doesn’t tell us whether they sang hymns of joy after Jesus’ resurrection, but the Christian Science Hymnal includes wonderful hymns that sing of Jesus’ victory over the forces that had tried to destroy him. And they’re not just sung at Easter time, but are a year-round celebration of the risen Christ present now and forever to heal and save.

The Hymnal and the Hymnal Supplement are in a special sense the Christian Science prayer books. Their pages offer messages of healing for every possible situation. As we learn them and love them, these messages companion us when we need them most. A hymn by Violet Hay (No. 9) speaks of the messages as God’s angels. I first learned this hymn from my mother, who used to sing it to me when I was a young child, in the way that parents do the world over. To me this symbolizes the love of our Father-Mother God singing itself in our hearts, ministering to us in exactly the way we need:

O longing hearts that wait on God
   Through all the world so wide;
He knows the angels that you need,
   And sends them to your side,
To comfort, guard and guide.

O wake and hear the angel-song
   That bids all discord cease;
From pain and sorrow, doubt and fear,
   It brings us sweet release;
And so our hearts find peace.