On Sunday, we’re singing a new song called Bless The Lord, O My Soul, AKA 10,000 Reasons.
It’s a fantastic song and this is a good week to learn it. We’re finishing off Jonah this week and in chapter 4 Jonah complains to God that He is so infuriatingly “slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love.” Jonah doesn’t like it but we should praise God for being that way, otherwise we’d have no hope!
The words are really refreshingly simple. We ought to tell ourselves (“O my soul…”) to praise God. Praising Him all day. Praising Him for the endless wonders of His character. Praising Him to the end of our lives and beyond into eternity. Matt Redman says he wrote it after reading Psalm 103, which lists reason after reason to bless the Lord. We too have countless reasons to praise Him.
And to top it off, both the tune and the words are really catchy, which a great thing for a worship song to be! What better thing to get stuck in your head than truth about God and a challenge to praise Him every moment? Watch the video below and sing along with the lyrics under that.
(We’ll be dropping it down from the key of G to a D, so don’t worry if the video makes the song too high for you! It’ll be lower on Sunday!)
Bless the Lord, O my soul, O my soul,
worship His holy name.
Sing like never before, O my soul,
I’ll worship your holy name.
The sun comes up, it’s a new day dawning.
It’s time to sing your song again.
Whatever may pass and whatever lies before me,
Let me be singing when the evening comes.
Bless the Lord, O my soul…
You’re rich in love and you’re slow to anger.
Your name is great and your heart is kind.
For all your goodness I will keep on singing,
Ten thousand reasons for my heart to find.
Bless the Lord, O my soul…
And on that day when my strength is failing,
The end draws near and my time has come,
Still my soul will sing your praise unending;
Ten thousand years and then forevermore.