I suspect that some of you have used musical settings for scripture memory for either yourself or your children.  Well, thanks to a discussion begun by sjonee at PuritanBoard I have been made aware of songs for learning about the Westminster Confession.

The PuritanBoard discussion begins with a pointer to Songs For Saplings and their Questions With Answers series.  From listening to the samples and reading the lyrics these all appear to be songs in the context of catechism-like questions with Westminster-like answers.  While there are close echos of the Westminster Confession, and Larger and Shorter Catechisms here, it does not appear to be a literal musical setting of them.  But it takes a question, like “Who is God?” (note that Westminster asks “What is God?”) and answers with something like the Westminster Confession, in this case:

God is the only living and true God. He’s
the all-glorious, almighty, all-knowing
Sovereign Creator and Lord of the whole universe.
God
is perfect and holy, infinite, eternal and unchanging.

The Westminster Confession section says:

There is but one only living and true God, who is infinite in being and perfection, a most pure spirit, invisible, without body, parts, or passions, immutable, immense, eternal, incomprehensible, almighty; most wise, most holy, most free, most absolute, working all things according to the counsel of his own immutable and most righteous will, for his own glory; most loving, gracious, merciful, long-suffering, abundant in goodness and truth, forgiving iniquity, transgression, and sin; the rewarder of them that diligently seek him; and withalh most just and terrible in his judgments; hating all sin, and who will by no means clear the guilty.

Probably a reasonable summation of the section for children ages 3-5.  There are three CD’s on the market so far, each for a slightly older age range.

But the PuritanBoard discussion brought out a couple of other similar recordings.  One is the Baptist Catechism Set To Music.  There is also a four volume set of the Westminster Shorter Catechism Songs.  And you can find some on YouTube as well:  Here is YouTube – Singing – Shorter Catechism Q1.

And now for something completely different…

A while back I ran across a CD of lulliby music for children drawn from the classical tradition.  Preformed by Eric and Susan Davis it includes some well known and contemporary music and is all instrumental.  But what caught my attention was the title:

Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep

It seems innocent enough, and there is nothing really wrong with it, but I had to wonder what the target audiance would think if they were aware of the source of the line.  As I am sure many of you are aware it comes from an 18th century children’s prayer:

Now I lay me down to sleep
I pray the Lord my soul to keep;
Should I die before I wake
I pray the Lord my soul to take.

As I said, I have no problem with the prayer and I know many new parents who would probably be fine with it.  But I suspect that some a modern parents would not be as comfortable because it is a prayer or because of the content.  It is not like our modern society to worry about dying in our sleep, to say nothing of the fact that many modern parents are not religious enough to even consider praying for the Lord’s protection.

Or maybe this is just my unusual mind overinterpreting modern culture.  Maybe no one would really care.