Crosswalk Talk: Celebrity Christian Interviews - Chris Tomlin on The First Hymn, Early Church, and Worship

0:00I'm Christi Graham, host of On the Ground with Samaritan's Purse, and I recently interviewed one of our pilots whose plane was hijacked in Africa. I encouraged myself with that reality. That at some point, this is going to end in two hours. It'll end good if I'm on the ground somewhere walking around with the testimony. It'll end great if he pulls the trigger for me. It will end great. That day, Jim, experienced the power of prayer and witnessed just how mighty the name of Jesus is. If you want to hear this full story, tune in at Samaritan's Purse.org slash listen. Music in Scripture, but this is the oldest known Christian hymn, complete, I believe, with lyrics and musical notations. What was your reaction when you first heard about this

1:04and when they asked you to be involved in this? Yeah, my buddy, Ben Fielding, who's an incredible songwriter, people would know his songs, amazing songs, and he called me and said, I got an idea and I want to run by you. If you'd be interested, and he shared with me this idea of this early, this is the first time ever discovered, the first song ever discovered from the two hundreds. And it had musical notations, not musical notations that we would know. It's completely foreign to us, but it had some notations and it had a lyric and it was a piece of papyrus that was torn and it was in a trash heap that was discovered. It has been an evolved in Oxford and it's like, and he said, my friend John Dixon, he said, look, if you get on the call with us, if you would, and talk it through, so I get on a call, I zoom call with this guy John Dixon, who is this Australian historian and theologian, and this has been his project, he's something he's been wanting to do for years, bring this to life,

2:07bring this song back to the church, well, to be like to bring this song back to the church. So you can imagine, it was fear and trembling for me. I'm like, that's a massive responsibility to take something so precious. I mean, this is the earliest known lyric ever discovered. Obviously, outside, like you said, outside the Psalms and some of the songs in the Bible, this is the earliest known since, and so, yeah, he's like, what do you guys, could you guys, what do you think about taking this and creating it in a modern way? And I was like, wow, what a privilege. Ben and I just began, we began to go to work and said, you know, no promises, but let's see what happens, you know, and that was the start of the journey. What is the challenge then of honoring the original text while making it kind of new, I guess, for today? What's really cool is what John, to be able to have someone like John alongside us, who is in the story, who is theologian who knows so much more about this than I would ever know, who's given this life to the study of these things. He said, what you need to know, a couple of things, guys, one is this melody,

3:07although it's foreign to us, was a common melody of the day. It would have been like a pop melody of the day. It wasn't some, it's not some Gregorian chant. It's not some, you think of the ancient songs of the church. It's not that at all. This would have just been a common song of the day, the way they would have sung it. This melody had been very common to the Egyptian people. So that was interesting. So it's like, he says, all what you have the freedom to make it in the common language of today, a common melody that people would think of today. And then he began to just, and then we get to share a little bit about some of the melodies and how they worked. So we pulled some of that in to the song. Like I said, it's a piece of papyrus that is torn. And so we don't have the full lyric. And so we had, I think it's about 39 words or something like that that was on there. And so there was a, so Ben and I added a couple little phrases to kind of make it all feel like a song today and just started going, we just throwing different ideas and what resonated,

4:11and just praying and asking God, what was the right way to do this? And just asking God for a melody and asking him, you know, and writing this together. And I'm really pleased that I came out. I think so. If I remember correctly, the hymn reference is the Trinity. It does, which comes a full century before the Council of Nicaea. Right. In the 325, which of course, makes this, like it takes it up a level in terms of significant and important. So that's exciting for you guys to be able to tackle that. I was going to ask you about hymns. Christian, Christian, of course, often debate hymns versus contemporary worship songs. Yeah, after working on this, how do you see those two traditions fitting together? Did this change a perspective? I mean, I know you guys, even someone who's always embraced both, but how does perhaps this change a perspective? And what do you think about that question of times? Yeah, that's a great question. Because I love, this is probably my favorite part about the song, but hymns have always been a part, a big part of me. I feel like there's a songwriter you got to know. It's especially for the church. You need to immerse yourself in what's come before you.

5:13And I'd love to, I dig into the hymns always. I love the lyrics. I love just letting that. And I've always spoken to me and they're powerful. And some of the best songs I've ever written, there's a reason some of them lasted a couple hundred years. Three or four hundred years, there's a reason for that because they're so beautifully and powerfully written. What I love about this is that it connects us obviously to the early church and it reminds us that, and this is before, think about it. This is before, we're singing this. This is before, there was, well, that's that, that's coming from the Baptist stream. That's coming from the Pentecostal stream. That's come, that's a Catholic. That's coming from this, this just predates all of it. This is just the early band of believers who would have maybe lost their life for their faith. Grab it in a somewhere in a church, somewhere in a little meeting spot, somewhere underground. This is what they're singing. And wow, and to connect us to that, and to connect, it takes me to the pure place for me.

6:13And where it's not about the latest thing or the thing, it is just about the pure place and bringing praise to God. And my goal wasn't setting about this. As I've always said, that the great, that, and I've tried to write songs that point people, that point people to the greater story to live there. I think worship lists their eyes off ourself and points people to the greater story. That's what the great songs do. And there's this song, the very first, so to think about this, the very first song we see, there's a lot of songs. I always call them songs of deliverance and songs of transcendence. The songs of deliverance are those worship songs of Lord I need you, amazing grace. It's saved a rich like me. Those songs of, the songs are full of it. They're amazing. But those songs, those songs of transcendence, the holy, holy, holy, right? And the songs of how great is our God? The, all the songs that are just about God are they change the room. And isn't it amazing that the very first song that we find in a scrap heap in Egypt

7:13is let all be silent, let the rivers stop, let the map, let the, let the stars stop shining, let all be still to, and we him, the father's son and the Holy Spirit, to the only giver of all good gifts. I mean, it's just this pure praise. And I remind us of that, man. That's what it's about. It bringing praise, I'm grabbing the people of God and bringing our praise to God. Delifting our eyes to remembering this God and worshipping him and bringing our praise to the, in joining the eternal song. You know, I think about let the lung answer to your question, I think about holy, I think about time out, ties them with holy forever. And you're like, what do you mean? Think about it. The first verse, this is what I was thinking of when we wrote holy forever. I was actually, this is holy forever, but was before this opportunity. But I was even thinking about this when I wrote a thousand generations falling down in worship, to sing the song of ages to the Lamb,

8:14and all who've gone before us, and all who will believe, will sing the song of ages to the Lamb, singing this song is, we're joining those who've gone before us in a very powerful, powerful way. And just, we're the next to take that torch, right? And to lift our song to Jesus. I'm Christi Graham, host of On the Ground with Samaritan's Purse. And I recently interviewed one of our pilots whose plane was hijacked in Africa. I encouraged myself with that reality. That at some point, this is going to end in two hours. It'll end good if I'm on the ground somewhere walking around with the testimony. It'll end great if he pulls the trigger for me. It will end great. That day, Jim, experienced the power of prayer and witnessed just how mighty the name of Jesus is. If you want to hear this full story, tune in at Samaritan's Purse.org slash listen. What if you could study the Bible in the land where it was written? Dr. Susan Michael, USA President

9:15of the International Christian Embassy Jerusalem takes you there every episode out of Zion as a journey through scripture, Israel, and God's unfolding story for our times. Biblical prophecy, real world insight, faith that goes deeper. Listen now, free at oneplace.com. Amen of that. Before we close, I want to chat with you about what you're doing right now, where you are on a tour right now with Lynch and Jam. I should also mention you have a new album, The King is still the King, which released I believe last September. Yes, you're currently on the winner, Jam. What are one or two things that God is teaching you on this tour? Perhaps something you're inspired by daily about the body of Christ or maybe even personally. It's people. I mean, I'm just seeing a lot. I'm getting to connect with on winner jam. I'm connected with a lot of people that I've really, I'm being greased. Everybody's like, I've never seen you play before. I've been like, because winner jam kind of has its crowd, right?

10:16Every year, people go to winner jam no matter who's playing this. But I've never, this is my first time on winner jam. And so I love the hunger. I feel like there's a hunger right now. So connect you with these, I'm going to do it. I've been doing this 30, 30 years. And so many people that are coming to this. This is the first time I've gotten to play and lead worship with these people. And so I've been really blown away, surprised in a good way of just the hunger of people. When we, just the hunger of worship and we ending that every night, holy forever, and how great is our God. After all the music, you get a winner jam. It was a lot of fun. After all the music, you get a winner jam. It was a long day of music. It's a long out of music. It's a lot of bands. And to the estimation mark, just ending with holy forever, is how great is our God. Just pointing people to God is singing. What a privilege. I just, I'm so inspired every day. And love seeing the people worship God.

11:17And it never, my daughter asked me this past week. But I got out and she goes, Dad, does everybody get tired of playing your own songs? And I can honestly answer like, you know what? I don't. I get tired of the travel. I get tired of being away from home. But I love that moment of being with the people every time. It's just worshiping God together. It's just so special. Well, there's so much negativity in the world. But it seems like I would think coming together, multiple nights, with thousands of other people in worship, transforms you, especially if you're on stage leading it. I mean, do you, do you find it? How does that? I guess what I'm asking is Chris, what are your thoughts after a long day of maybe watching the news come in together and doing what you do at night during winter jammed? Is it, does it change how you view maybe culture, the world, society, the future? It's what worship does. It's what worship should do. And it reminds us,

12:17lifts our eyes to the greater story. There's a, there's a, there's a lot of stories going on over the rest of the days. There's a lot of things going on, a lot of brokenness, a lot of hurt, wars, things that we don't agree with, things we do agree with, things that we're just so frustrated and it's just so much like, you know, it's this, it's mankind, it's like broken, it's sin, it's awful. And it's all you're inundated with. And if you don't have those times of light, just step in back and go, wait a minute, governments rise, governments fall, kingdoms rise, kingdoms fall, people rise, people fall, but there is one thing that is everlasting. There's one everlasting king. That's why I called my record. The king is still the king. That thread has woven through this whole, the whole album. Everything is, everything I'll try to say in worship is pointing people to that. That we are part of an everlasting kingdom that reigns forever. And things on this, and that is our hope. If there, if we didn't have that, what kind of hope do you have in this world? I mean, like you said,

13:17you watch the news, you're like, but our hope is then an everlasting kingdom that one day all things will be made right. And that this world is broken, and it's, and the scripture tells us that. And that is something that, that's what we live in, but we are the light of the world. We're sharing that light. Get to share that light every day. Remind people of that. And I know people walk in and every night to win a jam. There's thousands of people, so people are carrying different things. People carry it handly burdens. People are carrying brokenness. People are carrying so many things. And I pray every night, the presence of God touches people, enlists their spirit, and fills them. The scripture says, the joy of the Lord is our strength. It fills them with joy. And again, and that's, that's one opportunity every night that we have to do that. And I'm, I'm so honored to do it. It's such a privilege to do it. If you enjoyed today's interview, please make sure to subscribe and share the episode with a friend. A big thanks to the team at Life Audio for their partnership with us on the podcast. If you go to LifeAudio.com,

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