Church people have sung “Crown Him with Many Crowns” countless times, but last time I stopped singing and started thinking. First verse: “Crown Him with many crowns, / The Lamb upon His throne; / Hark how the heav’nly anthem drowns / All music but its own.” Wait a minute! The heavenly anthem is drowning out all other music? The heavenly anthem is louder than all the other music, news, and noise we hear day-in and day-out?
What’s the song I’m missing? Psalm 19 says, “The heavens declare the glory of God, and the sky above proclaims his handiwork. Their voice goes out through all the earth” (1, 4). It doesn’t say they are literally singing, but Job 38:7 seems to. At creation, “the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy.” Was it song at the birth of Christ when the angels praised God, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace among those with whom he is pleased?” (Luke 2:14). No question, it was a heavenly anthem when John had a vision of heavenly beings praising Christ for salvation. “And they sang a new song, saying, ‘Worthy are you to take the scroll and to open its seals, for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God” (Revelation 5:9).
Maybe I’m missing the heavenly anthem because I’m not awaking each morning with a conscious decision to hear it. “They may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand” (Mark 4:12). Is our daily life joining in praise for creation and salvation? The communion liturgy says, “therefore with angels and archangels and all the company of heaven, we laud and magnify Your glorious name, evermore praising You and saying…” And then the congregation breaks out in song, breaks out in song with all in heaven. Only one church, you know, some singing there, we sing here. Faith awakes each morning and makes a conscious decision to “hear” the heavenly praise throughout the day.
“Lo, the apostles’ holy train / Join Thy sacred name top hallow;
Prophets swell the glad refrain, / And the white-robed martyrs follow,
And from morn to set of sin / Through the Church the song goes on.”
(Lutheran Service Book, 525:1; 940:3)