Lift Up Your Hearts Keeps Touching Lives

Every morning Annetta and Al Vander Lugt read Scripture together, pray, and then sing at least one song from Lift Up Your Hearts, the Christian Reformed Church’s hymnal that has sold nearly 40,000 copies in its various editions since it was published in 2013.

When the hymnal first came out, the Vander Lugts sang several songs from the book every morning, but soon they had sung through the hymnal twice. 

“Now we pick favorites each day—sometimes old favorites and sometimes new songs that are becoming favorites, like ‘Lord, as the Day Begins’,” says Annetta Vander Lugt, who attends Neland Avenue CRC in Grand Rapids, Mich., along with her husband.

A joint effort between the CRC and the Reformed Church in America, the hymnal is divided into two main sections. The first section reflects the story of redemption from creation to the new creation and includes Christ’s life and the Christian Year.

The second section follows the traditional order of worship, featuring songs for the opening of worship through the concluding blessing. The hymnal also contains versions of songs in different languages.

Faith Alive Christian Resources is currently gearing up for a third printing of the Lift Up Your Hearts pew edition, which has sold more than 36,000 copies. The hymnal is also available in a spiral edition, a complete digital edition, and other digital editions.

Annetta Vander Lugt says she and her husband are grateful for this hymnal that contains such a rich and wide range of songs.

“Our family has a long history of singing as part of family devotions,” she says.

They use the hymnal every Sunday night when their daughter, son-in-law, and two granddaughters, nine and six, come for dinner.

“Our granddaughters are memorizing the numbers of certain hymns because they have become favorites,” she says. 

Singing the songs has become such a joy for the children that the nine-year-old got discouraged recently when they didn’t have time during the supper-table devotions for singing.

“We had had done a number of things already for devotions, so my husband dismissed the girls,” says Annetta.

That’s when the nine-year-old asked: "You mean we aren't going to sing?"

Joyce Borger, worship ministries team lead for the CRC, says she receives stories such as this frequently from people telling her what this hymnal has meant to them.

“We are absolutely delighted by the stories of how the hymnal in its various formats, whether only in the hands of worship planners or in the hands of the entire congregation, has been a tool to give further voice to the prayers, laments, and praises of God's people,” she says.

Bernard Ayoola talks about how significant the hymnal was as part of his recent ordination at Brookside Christian Reformed Church in Grand Rapids.

“We had guests from several African countries, including Nigeria, Liberia, Congo, Kenya, Ghana, Burundi, Zimbabwe, and Rwanda. We also had Americans and some South Americans. It was so meaningful  that the order of worship accommodated the different ethnic cultures at the event,” he says.

After the service, a couple from Zimbabwe came up to him, expressing gratitude that they had sung the song “Uyai Mose” in their native Shona language during worship.

“The husband and wife told me they have been in the U.S. for about 10 years and have never sang in Shona during worship before,” he says.

“I was proud to inform them the new CRC hymnal also has songs in Yoruba, which is my language, Swahili, and other international languages.”

With such a variety of songs in so many languages, he says, “I think the red hymnal is quite a big leap towards true ecumenism. The African community in Grand Rapids is so diverse that it is difficult to find common songs that will accommodate everyone's taste and language.”

Borger says she recently heard of a church in Regina, Saskatchewan, that had a hymn festival based on Lift Up Your Hearts.During the festival, they went through the story of God from creation to new creation, and created visual art to go with it.

“All of this is in answer to the persistent prayers of those involved with the hymnal’s development that it may be a blessing to the church,” says Borger.

Beyond the stories, she says, there are also more resources:

  An app for an iPad for the hymnal was created by Hymnary.org and the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship.

• A new iPad app for Psalms for All Seasons was developed in partnership with the publisher GIA.
• A words—only Large Print edition of Lift Up Your Hearts is in the works.
• The Lift Up Your Hearts website has been updated with links to background notes and performance/usage ideas for each song in the hymnal as well as information on how to reproduce or project each song legally.
•  Also, the Worship Ministries office  is available to the CRC and RCA to support their use of the hymnal.