How Do We Sing in the Storm?
When the winds are strong and the rain is heavy.
In the worship song “Raise a Hallelujah” the chorus opens with the following lyrics:
I’m gonna sing, in the middle of the storm
Louder and louder, you’re gonna hear my praises roar
That first line has rattled around in my head since the first time I heard the song over four years ago. I’ve written it down over and over, I’ve gone on internal tangents about it in the middle of Sunday service, I’ve thought about it on loop and wondered if I’m capable of it.
When I first heard the lyric, I pictured it in a literal sense: a person in the pouring rain, amongst the high winds and swelling waves, with sirens blaring in the background, stepping out into a storm with their hands raised, falling to their knees to sing.
To be honest, it’s still what I picture, but I understand that storm can be a metaphor for the tumultuous times in our lives, when things are chaotic and out of control. And for many years I’ve thought that I was incapable of the kind of faith that allows you to sing during a storm.
Because that kind of faith—or so I believed—was faith that allowed you to wriggle out of the wrath of the human experience. To be unaffected by heartbreak and loss, to never doubt or worry. I thought that for some, faith was always easy and obvious, while I sometimes found it nearly impossible.
The truth is, no person, no human, is ever going to be free from the human experience.
Not even Jesus.
John 11:35 says, “Jesus wept.”
John 13:21 says, “After saying these things, Jesus was troubled in his spirit.”
In Luke 22, as Jesus prays on the Mount of Olives, verse 44 says, “and being in anguish, he prayed more earnestly.”
Jesus was perfect but that doesn’t mean he didn’t struggle. I think God made Jesus human so that we might find comfort in knowing he understands us fully, and so he could set an example to trust God even when things feel out of control. To sing even in the midst of a terrible storm.
God knows that singing is not often our first instinct. He knows we tend to lean towards screaming or crying or cursing. God knows storms can be exhausting and discouraging; that they can make us angry—angry that things aren’t going right, angry that things are going so wrong, angry that we are being forced to endure so much pain and heartbreak.
God knows.
And because he knows, he doesn’t expect us to cast off our humanness amidst a storm. He doesn’t expect us to never doubt, never worry, never try to take control, never be tempted to believe that darkness is all that’s left in the world.
Which is why I believe that singing in the storm can look different for everyone. Sometimes it is simply proclaiming that God is with you. It is saying, God, I need your help. God, I’m terrified. God, how could this happen? God, I feel like I’m drowning.
Because believing God can hear you, believing God can help, believing God is bigger than biggest storm, is singing louder than the loudest storm.
Singing is praying, singing is listening, singing is believing, singing is choosing, singing is shouting and whispering, singing can be done in joy and in anguish.
For so long I thought that those able to sing in the storm found faith easy, but I’m beginning to realize that they know faith is hard, they know darkness is strong, but they know that God is bigger, God is stronger, and that faith is what calms the storm, faith makes it survivable.
John 16:33 says, “I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.”
God is bigger than any storm, and in him you can find peace in any chaos. So don’t be afraid to step out into those high winds, into that beating rain, and raise up your hands in praise.