God’s Very Repetitive Song Lyric

Psalm 136: God’s Very Repetitive Song Lyric

“…for His steadfast love endures forever.”

I’ve been thinking about this idea of repetitive songs and lyrics quite a bit lately. Usually when I hear a song on the radio that just keeps repeating the same phrase or chorus over and over and over again, I will admittedly get annoyed and switch the station. Even one of my favorite artists in the world, Paul McCartney, sings “A Wonderful Christmastime.” After the 10,00th time he sings the chorus, I’m getting pretty tired of it, even though I do love that song!

And sometimes when it comes to Christian songs and hymns, accusations are often hurled against songs that are too repetitive in nature. We may say things like, “This is just a simple phrase that is repeated over and over again.” Sometimes our bias can be against the simple songs in favor of songs with tons of complexity and depth. Our bias leads us to think that the simple songs (that we may call cotton candy, feel good, contemporary songs) should be discarded in favor of the deep, theologically rich songs. Sometimes our bias leads to make unfair accusations that people are just shallow and these superficial lyrics will lead to superficial Christians. I can certainly understand this reasoning in light of some songs I’ve heard, but I reject the premise (as does Scripture) that simple lyrics are by default less “spiritual” than lyrics full of sophistication.

I want to suggest to you from Scripture that the simple songs with a basic lyric repeated over and over are not only Scriptural and designed by God, but they are just as valuable and important in the fulfillment of Colossians 3:16 and Ephesians 5:19 as the complex songs. They all have a purpose. Psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs implies that we have a variety of songs in our repertoire to worship God and encourage each other.

Read Psalm 136. Notice the phrase at the end of every single verse.

“…for His steadfast love endures forever.”

How does verse 1 end? “…for His steadfast love endures forever.”

How does verse 2 end? “…for His steadfast love endures forever.”

How does verse 3 end? “…for His steadfast love endures forever.”

Read all 26 verses! How do they all end?

“…for His steadfast love endures forever.”

Steadfast love is the Hebrew word “hesed.” It is God’s grace. The people of Israel and the church today who are singing Psalms are being reminded by God’s own designed song lyric, 26 times over and over and over and over again, that “…His steadfast love endures forever.”

I can just imagine the complaints in the worship service after the people had repeated that phrase 10 to 15 times and they’re not even finished with the song yet. “Good grief, this is so repetitive!” “When will this end?” “There is no originality to this song.” “Who decided it was a good idea to sing the same lyric 26 times?” “We’re just saying the same phrase over and over again.” “Who wrote this song anyway?”

God. God wrote it.

Psalm 136 is a history song. God is telling Israel (and the church today) about who He is and how He has consistently provided for His people and that He has been there for us all the time. Most likely, a priest would sing the first phrase and the people would respond by answering “…for His steadfast love endures forever.” Each line of history in Psalm 136 tells us about God’s character and faithfulness and provision. It then is followed by the same simple repetitive phrase, “…for His steadfast love endures forever.”

You may need to be challenged to rethink your narrative that simple phrases repeated over and over are somehow not deep theologically. Will someone have the audacity to claim that “His steadfast love (hesed, GRACE) endures forever,” is not theologically deep? Can anyone really say we don’t need to hear this powerful lyric repeated in our lives over and over and over again? God is the one who sometimes wrote simple, repetitive lyrics. It is God who commanded His people to sing this truth 26 times in a single song. God wants you to repeat this phrase to yourself and to others 26 times.

His steadfast love (GRACE) endures forever. How often do you and I need to be reminded of that deep theologically important point? How many times through the days, weeks, months and years do we need to be reminded of the grace of God and His love and His kindness and His care for us? Apparently, God knows we need to be reminded of this all the time! By the way, look for that phrase in the rest of the Psalms to see how often the Holy Spirit put that simple lyric (or some variation of it) into the songs of God’s people. You’ll be astounded.

If we can’t even remember where we parked our cars in the grocery store, and if we can’t even remember where we placed our keys, it seems to me that we might have a hard time remembering a lot of things, including some very important matters of life. God was pretty wise in having us take the Lord’s Supper every Sunday, wasn’t He? We need that reminder all the time!

Paul knew his faithful brothers in Philippi needed reminders, because that was “safe” for them (Philippians 3:1). “Finally, my brothers, rejoice in the Lord. To write the same things to you is no trouble to me and is safe for you.”

Peter knew his Christian family needed many reminders in order to stir up their pure minds. 2 Peter 3:1, “This is now the second letter that I am writing to you, beloved. In both of them I am stirring up your sincere mind by way of reminder.”

Can you think of other songs that we have sung for decades / centuries that have become beloved favorites of Christians that have a simple lyric often repeated in a song?

Like “This is my story, this is my song.”

Like “Give me the Bible.”

Like “Yes Jesus loves me…Yes Jesus loves me.”

Like “God is so good”

We all need these phrases repeated in our hearts and souls on a daily (sometimes hourly basis).

So, meditate today and sing this beautiful phrase over and over. It is God’s very repetitive song lyric.