3 Reasons to Teach Hymns to Your Children

Do you listen to the radio a lot at your house? Is it something you do in the car while driving around with your little ones? Have you listened to the songs lately? Really listened to the words? Has your soul been refreshed as you absorb what you hear? Have you wondered if you should teach hymns to your children?

If you are like me, than the car is one of the only places you actually listen to the radio, anywhere else it is background noise rather than music therapy. {Confession: While in the car I turn the music up to drown out the incessant talking of my toddler and kindergartner, and sometimes I sing super loud to make them think I can’t hear them.} My heart loves to hear the boys sing along with songs like 10,000 Reasons {Matt Redman}, Down to the River {Allison Krauss and Union Station}, and Diamonds {Reliant K}.

And while I love listening to the modern Christian praise music, I miss, very dearly, the hymns of my childhood, their broad sweeping melodies, the magnifying glass that was placed in areas I needed it, the gospel story spelled out clearly, words of Christ’s suffering and death for me, reminders of where I was before I came to have a personal relationship with Jesus. I miss hearing people sing in harmony and the sound that filled the church when we sing with abandon.

 

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I’m a little worried with the trend away from including hymns in our church services and using strictly modern praise and worship songs. Especially when so many of the favorites of worship leaders seem to have one to two phrases that are repeated over and over. These types of songs, to me, are usually ones that are good for the leader to sing, but leave the congregation feeling like they aren’t even needed to sing… and who wants to sing “break the chains” for two minutes straight anyways?

Why should we teach hymns to our children?

• teaching our children hymns introduces them to the truths of our faith- the fact that we are sinners, that Christ’s blood was shed for us, that our sin separates us from God.
• hymns focus us on God and his attributes.
• teaching our children hymns helps them to have a larger vocabulary. While it is true that we don’t use words like thine {Have Thine Own Way, Lord}, abide {Abide with Me}, incarnate, {O Word of God Incarnate} err/erring, nigh, tarry, etc. it is still helpful for children to hear them in their proper context and to realize that the English language has a rich vocabulary and that there are more words to use than like, cool, and awesomesauce.
• singing hymns out of the hymnal can help with music education. As you read the words out of the hymnal show your children the melody notes, help them to see how the notes go up and down as your tone and pitch goes up and down, show them the different types of notes and help them to correlate the speed of the note/syllable/word with the type of note.

If I want to start teaching hymns to my children, where do I start?

There are a few different ways that you can teach your children hymns, if you have older children you may want to go more in-depth, but for younger children here is how we are teaching hymns at our house:

*repetition- by singing a specific song with our boys each night before bed they are learning the hymn through repetition

*reinforce- talk about what each line means. Especially when learning a new hymn, break down the lines with your child and talk about what each line means, helping them to understand the song fully will help your little one to retain what they are learning

*remember- go over hymns that you haven’t sang in a while to refresh your child’s memory

*read- look up the stories behind the hymns, learn about the author and the circumstances that prompted them to write the hymn. I have Then Sings My Soul, and while I haven’t started it with the boys yet, I loved learning the stories of 150 hymns and I’m inspired when I read the stories it includes.

You can start at the beginning of the hymnal, or just go through and teach your child hymns that you already know. With younger children I suggest teaching them the hymns that are familiar to you and then as your little one grows you can learn the new hymns together.

Some of our favorite hymns are:

I Stand Amazed in the Presence {My Savior’s Love}
Wonderful Grace of Jesus
Amazing Grace
Grace Greater than Our Sin
Victory in Jesus
He Lives
Be Thou My Vision
As the Deer
Cleanse Me O God

If you don’t sing hymns outside of your house it can be helpful to have some cds of different artists’ versions and arrangements of the most well-known hymns. My boys like a cd that we have of a children’s choir singing the hymns. Here are some other suggestions:

Amy Grant~ Legacy…Hymns and Faith
Baby’s First Hymns: Sacred Lullabies for Babies Deep Sleep {I don’t actually have this one, but couldn’t find the children’s cd we like and thought this one looked good.}
Randy Travis~ Worship and Faith
Eric Schrotenboer~ Forever Faithful

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