One of my favorite hobbies is writing song analyses. That’s a weird thing to make a hobby, I know. Why not fishing? Why not whittling things? I can’t answer those reasonable questions. All I know is I like listening to music, reflecting on the poetry, and writing interpretations. I do it for secular music all the time. Somewhere on my computer is a three-thousand word essay on the apocalyptic meaning of Don McLean’s American Pie. I’ve got a couple thousand on Bohemian Rhapsody as well. And I just wrote one on Simon and Garfunkel’s beautiful song, The Boxer.

Naturally, I was jazzed (no pun intended) when Alex pitched the idea of us taking half a dozen hymns we don’t sing very often here at North Heights and teaching them to the congregation. He has taught the music to these hymns, and he’s tasked me with teaching the words/meaning. That’s right up my alley. Sadly, I missed this past Sunday night (being at a wedding) so I didn’t get to break down a simple but beautiful hymn, Blessed Be Your Name. I’m sure he did the job without a hiccup but I want to share my thoughts on it as well, because I was really excited to break the song down in terms of the way it was composed and arranged, something I haven’t done yet in this series.

Blessed Be Your Name is a simple song in terms of its meaning, but simple doesn’t mean unimportant; it means that it’s easy to grasp, allowing the singer to understand the meaning immediately and, through repetition, let that meaning take root in the singer’s mind, learning the lesson it wants to convey.

The song explores one basic idea, that being “God is good all the time and all the time God is good.” It is arranged in the old Tin Pan Alley style, which usually has two verses, followed by a chorus, then a third verse, then a repeat of the chorus, then a middle eight/bridge, then another repeat of the chorus that loops to the end. So it’s written in a more modern way than the old style hymns that we usually sing, but that doesn’t mean the song isn’t worthy of use in our worship, because the lyrics are perfect both to teach each other and to exalt the Lord.

Here are the lyrics, which I’ve color-coordinated to break the song into verse, pre-chorus, chorus, and middle eight:

Blessed be Your name
In the land that is plentiful
Where Your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name.

Blessed be Your name
When I’m found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed be Your name.

Every blessing You pour out
I’ll turn back to praise
And when the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say…

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name.

Blessed be Your name
When the sun’s shining down on me
When the world’s all that it should be
Blessed be Your name

Blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there’s pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I’ll turn back to praise
And when the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
“Lord, blessed be Your name”

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
“Lord, blessed be Your name”

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

The first verse declares God is good when things are good. The second declares God is good when things are bad. In the pre-chorus the singer declares that everything—good or bad—will be given back to God in praise. And then, in the chorus, the singer does just that, repeating the words “blessed be the name of the Lord, blessed be your name, blessed be your glorious name” over and over. The third verse returns to the theme of the first two, this time declaring that God is good even when we’re in the midst of suffering. Together, the three verses basically form the crux of the argument made by the Apostle Paul, who reminded the Philippians that contentment means, no matter the circumstances, the Christian can remain faithful to God, our great provider (Philippians 4:6-13).

But then we get to the middle eight, where the song becomes this refrain: “You give and take away, you give and take away, my heart will choose to say ‘Lord, blessed be your name.’“ This text reminds me of Job, who lived the life that Paul wrote about in Philippians 4. Paul told us that if things go bad we must still rely on God. Job lived that and, when the Devil robbed him of his wealth, his health, and most of his family, the patriarch (who mistakenly believed God was directly attacking him) merely commented: “the LORD gave, and the LORD hath taken away; blessed be the name of the LORD” (Job 1:21).

Paul commands us to use our singing to (1) teach one another while we (2) praise the Lord (Colossians 3:16). Some hymns we sing focus more on one of those ideas than the other; some are more about teaching each other (“Stand up for Jesus”) whereas some put the emphasis on exalting the King (“Blessed Assurance”). This song, Blessed Be Your Name, equally teaches us to remember God is worthy of praise no matter what is going on, as well as leads us in refrains of praise that do just that.

The song’s message is simple, but that only means it should never be forgotten:

God is good all the time and all the time God is good.

~ Matthew