Psalms 43-45, 49, 84-85, 87

There are some passages in psalms that stand out to me that I remember from my childhood, Psalms 84 is one of them. One thing I love about good biblical worship/praise music is when the lyricist does little than rearrange the words of the psalmist into verse, chorus and bridge format with modern arrangements. In my opinion, few musicians do this better than Matt Redman.

Psalm 84:1-2,10 (NKJV) "How lovely is your tabernacle O LORD of hosts! My soul longs, yes, even faints for the courts of the LORD; My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God...For a day in your courts is better than a thousand."

Better Is One Day was the song that instantly fills my head and transports my mind back to the late 90s and early 2000s reminiscing about how praise and worship at the church I grew up in, New Song Christian Fellowship (now New Song Nashville), was straight from the Bible - nothing more added. One of my favorite things to do when worshipping personally with my acoustic guitar is first starting with written songs and spiritual songs, then pivot to strumming a two chord pattern with my Bible open to the psalms to sing out new songs unto the LORD stringing together phrases from the psalms glorifying and praising the name of the LORD (I learned this technique from a Turkish missionary named Carolyn Parr). In a way these personal times of worship alone in my room are some of the sweetest and best times of worship I've ever had with the LORD, though nothing compares to the joining of voices in one accord on a Sunday morning, collective worship of the LORD God Almighty unifies the body of Christ. Singing new songs to the LORD from the psalms, call it spontaneous or improve worship, I believe that praising and worshipping the LORD in this manner straight from the psalms is a form of perfect praise because the Bible is God-inspired truth therefore coming into alignment with the word of God through our praise brings our Holy God perfect glory. 

P.S. One other song that Psalm 84 reminds me of is Hillsong's Blessed, if you haven't listened to the entire Blessed album it's a masterpiece of modern contemporary worship music and greatly influenced my guitar playing as I grew up playing many of the songs on electric and acoustic guitar. 

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