Excerpted from 2025 Advent Guide: Lighting the Way Forward, an Advent Guide for Lectionary Year A from the North Carolina Council of Churches.
Psalm 96
O sing to the Lord a new song;
sing to the Lord, all the earth.
Sing to the Lord; bless his name;
tell of his salvation from day to day.
Declare his glory among the nations,
his marvelous works among all the peoples.
For great is the Lord and greatly to be praised;
he is to be revered above all gods.
For all the gods of the peoples are idols,
but the Lord made the heavens.
Honor and majesty are before him;
strength and beauty are in his sanctuary.
Ascribe to the Lord, O families of the peoples,
ascribe to the Lord glory and strength.
Ascribe to the Lord the glory due his name;
bring an offering, and come into his courts.
Worship the Lord in holy splendor;
tremble before him, all the earth.
Say among the nations, “The Lord is king!
The world is firmly established; it shall never be moved.
He will judge the peoples with equity.”
Let the heavens be glad, and let the earth rejoice;
let the sea roar and all that fills it;
let the field exult and everything in it.
Then shall all the trees of the forest sing for joy
before the Lord, for he is coming,
for he is coming to judge the earth.
He will judge the world with righteousness
and the peoples with his truth.
In recent months, musical choices for many have changed as we have found ourselves humming dirges and penning requiems describing the slow death of Democracy. Even when we tried to lift our voices jubilantly, it felt like we were singing in a strange land. Now, here we are during “the most wonderful time of year,” wondering what to sing with so much uncertainty surrounding our employment, health care, and voting rights.
The psalmist reminds us to sing “a new song.” No, not the newly released Christmas album of our favorite artists, but a song that exalts the reign of a God who is not only in control of our past and current conditions, but a deity of our future reality. Salvation is coming. Help is on the way.
We can sing, looking beyond our fractured earthly government and human rulers, whose decisions have disrupted our lives. We sing because good news has broken through and the ruler of the cosmos is not one in title or executive orders alone.
We are called to righteousness and truth, so while our voices may be weak, we sing because God’s justice will be reflected through our actions and service to our communities and our world.
