why do i sing?

Actually, this is actually an extension of a much bigger question that I am asking myself and God: Why am I ‘here’?  I have been looking at my life right now from a lot of angles, examining why things are the way that they are; why I am a campus pastor, why I am a black man on the UCLA campus, why I am a fundraiser.

One evening I was on the phone with Erina, and we were talking about why I am a black man on the UCLA campus.  As we talked, I began to see images in my mind of myself leading worship in BCF.  I could see myself singing wholeheartedly, and then I could see everyone else in our community.  And I knew that the only thought in my head at that moment was, “I wish everyone out there knew why I sing.”

I would like to return us to “The Beauty of God,” a collection of essays about art and theology which finds their origins at the 2006 Wheaton Theology Conference at Wheaton College in Illinois.  This time, I want to show you the essay “Call Forwarding,” a piece by Bruce Ellis Benson talking about the cyclical nature of our art.  He makes the claim that all of our art is both a call and response; a call to those who will experience the beauty of God in what we create and a response to the voices and images and colors and beauty that has shaped and influenced us every day before this one.  He makes three statements about the call and response of our art:

1. The call always precedes us
2. In responding, I respond on the behalf of myself and others
3. The improvised response is a repetition and an improvisation

It is from the second point that I give you this excerpt:

“…my response is never mine alone.  To be sure, I speak for myself, yet also for others and in their name.  To improvise is always to speak to others, with others (even when one improvises alone) and in the name of others.  Given that the call precedes me, I do not begin the discourse, nor to i bring it to a conclusion.  For instance, if I’m playing one of the perennial standards of jazz, I do so along with so many others – whether those playing alongside me or those playing the tune in some other corner of the world, or all of those who have played it before.  Jazz musicians typically have a sense of what the author of Hebrews calls a “great…cloud of witnesses” (Heb 12.1).  Moreover, when I play a tune, I am never simply improvising on that tune alone.  I am improvising on the tradition formed by the improvisations on that tune…” [page 78]

On a technical level, this is very accurate.  When I sing any song, I am doing so with an eye to simultaneously honor the original singer and to sing a new song entirely.  I am adding my voice to the voice of so many others who have sung the same song, thus adding to the landscape that the song has already painted in the minds and hearts of listeners.

But Benson is actually referring to so much more.  Let me give you the big picture.  In the days of slavery, my people sung songs as they worked in the field.  Some of those songs were actually codes that would go from field to field, telling people that the Underground Railroad was someplace in town, ready to whisk them away to freedom (e.g. Swing Low, Sweet Chariot).  Some of those songs served as encouragement, to remind them that God was among them in the midst of their bondage and pain.

The story of Black people in America can’t be told without the songs that have been our rally cries and inspiration, from slavery to Jim Crow to the Movement to today.  I am in the midst of that story; I am a beneficiary of the inheritance of freedom left to me by slaves and civil rights activists who gave their bodies and souls (many in the name of Jesus) so that God would be glorified and I would be free; in this way, I am responding to a very significant call.

On the other hand, I am making a call, a call to people who are Black and people that aren’t.  As a part of the story of my people, I can see where we have come from and where we are, which allows me to see where we might be going, and I’m not too pleased with where the road leads.  As an American, I can say exactly the same thing.  I can assure young Americans, Black or otherwise, that the foundation we are setting for our children and their children is very questionable and in need of great repairs.

Last week, I was with about 200 other Black students and campus pastors at a conference in Atlanta, and we spent the whole week talking about all the ways that God is calling us out.  We examined the realities that have destroyed our communities for generations; not the drugs, alcohol, and sexual sin that exist on the outside, but the entitlement, efficacy and desires for comfort and celebrity that lie deep within our souls.  We sat in the fact that those things have affected us indivudually, and we sought God’s mercy and freedom on us, that we would be people who follow hard after and receive his love, and are led straight to the places where we can freely give that love away.

My song is all of that.
My song is a collection of the voices that sung in the fields and in secret.
My song is in memory and honor of those who gave their bodies and souls for me.
My song is a cry for freedom and repentance, for myself and my people.
My song is a confession of my sin and rebellion.
My song is a revelation of my desperation and neediness.
My song is a celebration of my hope in Jesus.
My song is an exposition of those things which lift us up and tear us down.
My song is an invitation for God to meet me, lead me, love me, and use me.
My song is an invitation for you to join me…

I don’t just sing because I can, but because I must.  For the sake of telling the story of the past, present, and future redemption of my people, I must sing.  And for the sake of exposing the lies that keep God’s image-bearers captive and the release that has been offered to us in full, I must sing.  I sing for those who have come before me, for you, for me, and for those who have yet to be.