Herbert W. Armstrong introduced some original hymns to the Church of God, composed by his brother Dwight, in 1952. Over the next 20 years, more Bible-based hymns were composed and added—derived mainly from the Psalms—until 1974, when it reached the form known in the Church of God today. There is no other hymnal like The Bible Hymnal! Other hymnals have lyrics with poetic fluff, or lies, or praises to the congregation and not to God, or songs about the name or the person of Christ while ignoring His message. But God’s hymnal is built on the psalms of the Bible.
The psalms are songs. They were inspired by God, and He intends them to be sung. He wants us to sing praises to Him, and to sing these beautiful songs.
Mr. Armstrong’s brother had a special talent. He was able to work for 35 years composing this great hymnal.
Mr. Armstrong said when he traveled around, it was wonderful to hear people in congregations around the world singing these hymns. It was beautiful music inspired by God Himself. How special!
I want to focus on one of those hymns, “By the Waters of Babylon,” from page 103 of our Bible Hymnal. It is a powerfully prophetic psalm.
From the Songs of Zion
Psalm 137 begins, “By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion.” Who is speaking here? Who are these people in Babylon, remembering Zion?
These are the Laodiceans—God’s lukewarm saints—in the Great Tribulation. They are in captivity in Babylon, and remembering the righteous Zion, which symbolizes God’s Church. They remember the work of Mr. Armstrong and how God used that man. They even remember the work his brother did to compose a wonderful hymnal!
These saints remember the Zion of God’s end-time Elijah, and they weep. These are the repentant Laodiceans, and they are weeping because of their rebellion against God. They want to change, and here they begin to amend their attitude in an amazing way.
David wrote most of the book of Psalms. He was a prophet, so these are prophecies (Acts 2:29-31). A few of the psalms were written by Jeremiah and Moses, who were also prophets. Psalms is filled with prophecy! Ezra may have written this one after the original Babylonian captivity of the Jews had finished. But this psalm contains prophetic duality. This particular psalm is prophetic in such a specific way that it is astounding!
Psalm 137:8 says, “O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed ….” Who is the daughter of Babylon? The commentaries think only about ancient Babylon and don’t even consider a future Babylon. So they get very little out of this psalm that God intended them to learn a lot from.
This is about an end-time Babylon that will be destroyed by the Second Coming of Jesus Christ—forever! This is great news! This verse dates this psalm. It is for our day specifically, just before the Second Coming. It is a wonderful vision about God destroying the last resurrection of the Holy Roman Empire and the great Communist hordes to bring peace to Earth. That is what this psalm is all about.
What are these Laodiceans doing in captivity? They finally decide to proclaim God’s message—and what a message it is.
Verse 2 says, “We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.” Apparently, these harps are no longer useful. “For there they that carried us away captive required of us a song; and they that wasted us required of us mirth [or joy], saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion” (verse 3). These tormentors tell the captives to be joyful, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion.
The words “song” and “songs” come from the same Hebrew word, but the second is plural. It literally reads, “from the songs of Zion.” That is referring prophetically to our Bible Hymnal! It is talking about the very hymnal that we sing from in every service in God’s Church.
The Hebrew-Greek Key Study Bible says this is about the Song of Songs—Solomon’s masterpiece. That book speaks of it being “The song of songs”—like the greatest among songs (Song 1:1).
In this case, though, these captors want the prisoners to sing the most excellent song in that hymnal. And the Laodiceans sing the perfect song for them—a song that was directed toward them! What could that most excellent psalm be?
The lyrics of “By the Waters of Babylon” say, “Then our captors required of us: Sing a song of Zion now!” This hymn is about the very day prophesied in Psalm 137.
Imagine the impact it would have if these prisoners started singing from the Hymnal, page 103! I believe that is exactly what they are going to sing. That is certainly implied. Nothing would impact the people of the Holy Roman Empire so powerfully. The captors want a song of Zion, and they hear all about what is happening that very day!
Printing the Hymnal
The Worldwide Church of God fought us in court for six years to keep us from getting anything that had the truth of the Herbert W. Armstrong era. But suddenly, on June 28, 2006, they released the hymnal into the public domain so anybody who wanted to could have it. Why? That was the antithesis of what they had been doing with all their other material.
Did God force them to do that because of this prophecy in Psalm 137? I certainly think He did.
We need to realize the value of this wonderful hymnal. It has so much truth of God, and we have the opportunity to sing it to God!
In his autobiography, Mr. Armstrong said that his brother Dwight was one of about 100 people who attended his first evangelistic campaign in Harrisburg, Oregon, in late 1930. The younger Armstrong became one of four people who were baptized as a result of that meeting, the first four baptisms Mr. Armstrong conducted.
Dwight Armstrong was a violinist, a pianist and a composer. Mr. Armstrong wrote, “When we moved to Pasadena to found Ambassador College in 1947, I asked my brother to devote full-time to setting the words of Psalms and/or any other scripture to music in the four-part harmony of the style of hymns. He has devoted the last 35 years of his life to composing the music of these hymns for us. We have an amazing gift from God!”
We had our artist Gary Dorning paint Dwight Armstrong’s portrait—an image of him from 1965. On the 33rd anniversary of his death, we placed that portrait in the lobby of the Dwight Armstrong Performing Arts Conservatory on our campus to honor that man.
When we learned that the wcg was releasing the hymnal into the public domain, we were ecstatic! I don’t think anybody else really wanted it much. But we did! That was a marvelous gift to the pcg.
These hymns were created through God’s end-time Elijah and his brother. They were inspired by God. These are God’s hymns! You won’t find them anyplace else. How beautiful they are!
Why did the wcg release those songbooks? If you look at our copyright battle, the court actually awarded them the victory, technically speaking. But then they turned around and sold us all those books and booklets. God said He would give them to us because they belong to us!
Well, the hymnal also belongs to us. In 2008, we published our version. There is only one Church that I know of that uses these hymns and really believes in them. We are certainly the only one that knows that much of it is prophecy from God! I think we need to understand that better.
Do you think the Laodiceans might even use our hymnals to sing a song to the Holy Roman Empire captors? I’m sure they will have hymnals to sing from; somehow, God will provide them. I think the hymnals printed and posted online by the pcg may well be the very books they will use. And what a powerful message they carry! The hymnal has a great prophecy about this event that is coming very soon!
A Song in Repentance
Psalm 137:4 says, “How shall we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land?” These Laodiceans aren’t in America, Canada, Britain, Australia, New Zealand or any other Israelite country. No, they are by “the rivers of Babylon.” The International Critical Commentary believes the original Hebrew implies that this is where the canals unite the Tigris and Euphrates rivers to fertilize the land. They are singing in Babylon, in the Iraq area, in land the Holy Roman Empire conquers.
God is letting us know that He is helping those Laodiceans repent. They sing this powerful song, “By the Waters of Babylon,” describing everything that is happening to them that very day!
This is a beautiful hymn—but what a dynamically corrective message it is for the Holy Roman Empire. What a wallop that must have against those who demand that they sing it and that they show some joy! These people aren’t joyful—they are weeping. And their tyrants torment them by saying, Hey, sing one of your songs and create some joy in your lives! But God uses that opportunity to begin to turn these lukewarm saints’ lives around right before their eyes.
“If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy” (verses 5-6). God says we need to prefer Jerusalem above our chief joy! Make this personal: Spiritually each one of us should exalt Jerusalem above our greatest joy! Anything of this world is secondary to this Jerusalem vision and what is about to happen in that city. The psalmist then says, If I lose that perspective, you can paralyze parts of my body. That sounds very much like David.
We know that the Eternal has chosen Jerusalem (e.g. Zechariah 3:2; 1 Kings 11:13; 2 Chronicles 6:6; 12:13). At this point in the prophecy, though, Jerusalem will have been conquered. Yet even amid those horrifying conditions, these repentant Laodiceans are singing and giving their captors an intensely strong message. They are telling them, There is a new throne of David, and it’s close by in the place of safety for God’s people—those people you tried to destroy and could not! Your army was swallowed up trying to destroy them! And they have the throne that Jesus Christ is about to sit on. He is going to use His power to reverse everything in this world and fill it with joy and happiness, just like these psalms tell you!
What a wonderful change for the Laodiceans! But just think: Only a short distance from them is David’s throne. And we have it right now! What a glorious honor God has given us.
We need the spirit of David that you see in this psalm. If you want to be a man after God’s own heart, studying these psalms is a major way to become that way! They capture the spirit, the fervor and the excitement David had for God and what God was doing. We all need that!
The Children of Edom
“Remember, O Lord, the children of Edom in the day of Jerusalem; who said, Rase it, rase it [or destroy it, destroy it], even to the foundation thereof” (Psalm 137:7). Who are “the children of Edom”? There is a duality here, and there is a physical understanding of this that we have written about previously. But the primary focus is the spiritual.
These are the Edomite Laodiceans, the 50 percent of God’s people who lose their salvation. It appears some of them may be there as well, hearing this song of warning!
These people sold their birthright for a bowl of soup (Genesis 25:29-34; Malachi 1:2-3). God says, I have loved Jacob, and I hated Esau and laid his mountains and his heritage waste. Why would God do that to the Edomites and not to the Jacobites? Well, the Jacobite Laodiceans repent, while the other 50 percent refuse! Satan has devoured them! They have turned violently against God and are doing all they can to destroy His Work and people. Malachi 1:4 says God will have indignation toward them forever: They will be destroyed eternally. That shows how dangerous this knowledge is that God has given us.
Psalm 137:8 says, “O daughter of Babylon, who art to be destroyed; happy shall he be, that rewardeth thee as thou hast served us.” These repentant saints are singing to the Holy Roman Empire and saying that God will destroy them! The Hebrew says, You are destroyed! It is a done deal because it is prophesied by God!
How amazing that God can work with the Laodiceans like this and have them deliver a scorching message of prophecy to the people of the Holy Roman Empire and their cohorts.
They sing to the daughter of Babylon, Understand this: A great company of armies is coming from the east, and they are going to serve you the way you’ve served us, with all the violence and the hatred you dealt! Because of the evils the beast power will inflict on God’s people, this is how they will be destroyed. The Laodiceans show that they will be treated unmercifully just like they treated Israel.
Verse 9 gets specific: “Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.” You like to take the little ones of Israel and smash their heads against the stones? Well, your enemies are going to do that to you!
I’m sure these tormentors and onlookers will say, Hey, no more psalms. No more singing. But they hear a potent message that day. And I think it comes right out of our songbook that God has given us, The Bible Hymnal!
Psalm 137 is some song! What a powerful message it has!
After the Communist onslaught and their battle with the Holy Roman Empire, Jesus Christ will return and smash both of them and establish His rule on David’s new throne right there in Jerusalem! Then the Millennium begins—the wonderful World Tomorrow. That is almost here!
Sing to God, Sing for God
Think about these psalms. We need the spirit of David, a man after God’s own heart. Really looking at these wonderful hymns can help us appreciate The Bible Hymnal, hymns that God Himself inspired!
I remember in the Worldwide Church of God, there was a minister’s wife who was an outstanding singer. She said she never really had a breakthrough with her talent until she decided to sing to God—singing praises to God! She was singing to God and for God. That was a breakthrough for her.
With The Bible Hymnal, we can sing to God all the time! Sing to God and sing for God! We can praise God and thank God as David did in those psalms. Those hymns are outstanding. We need to learn them deeply and hang onto them and keep singing them—and we will be singing ourselves into the wonderful World Tomorrow, into the very Kingdom of God!