What does Tribe teach about singing?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on singing starts with a word that is easy to rush past: gladness. Looking at the Hebrew behind Psalm 100, Lissa Hunter pointed out that gladness describes a thankfulness that comes from within and solicits a response. You cannot genuinely encounter something and do nothing about it. That means singing to God is not something you do when the feeling shows up. It is a discipline, and it begins by opening your mouth before the feeling arrives and asking God to meet you in that act.
People in the congregation filled that out with their own experience. One person said he memorizes simple praise songs and sings them first thing in the morning before he even wants to, and his feelings follow. Renee said the Lord does not hear your voice, he hears your heart, and that singing truth repeatedly will eventually break things off even when you do not feel what you are singing. The congregation in the Philippines was held up as an example where the instruments were a mess and the chickens were loose and the presence of the Lord was as strong as anywhere Lissa had ever been. The point was that the external conditions are not what make singing worship.
The teaching also acknowledged that for some people, the barrier is not a technique or a habit. Amanda said plainly that unrepented sin puts distance between a person and God, and that if all of this feels true but unreachable, that distance is worth examining. Lissa read from Psalm 32, which names the physical weight of unconfessed sin and the relief that follows confession. One of the quotes that stayed with the room put it simply: "Singing and worry cannot exist in the same space."
Taught from Psalm 100:1-5 · Psalm 32:1-5 · Hebrews 13:15 · Psalm 51:12
“Singing and worry cannot exist in the same space.”
From Worship Is a Sacrifice
The passage taught · 2 Corinthians 9:6-8
6 Remember this: he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly. He who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.
7 Let each man give according as he has determined in his heart; not grudgingly, or under compulsion; for God loves a cheerful giver.
8 And God is able to make all grace abound to you, that you, always having all sufficiency in everything, may abound to every good work.
World English Bible
Messages that go deeper
- May 6, 2024 Worship Is a Sacrifice Tribe's worship team leads a congregation-wide conversation on what it really means to worship, from singing and Scripture to giving and daily obedience.
- May 5, 2024 The Ways We Worship A Jackson Hole congregation talks honestly about what worship really means, covering singing, sitting under Scripture, and giving as three connected acts of devotion.