Reviewed by Tom Lennie

This collection of kids worship songs - or should I say psalms - was written, arranged, recorded and programmed by Matt Huesmann, the award winning Nashville-based songwriter and producer. The songs are predominantly high energy, consisting of modern dance, urban and pop sounds, with careful, catchy programming. "His Love Goes On Forever", for example, is an edgy funk number with added rap. Many tracks have a strong pop beat. Another tune has something of a calypso feel. The vocals - by a dozen or so kids - is energetic and tuneful, and guitars - by long-time Amy Grant sideman Jerry MacPherson - are a bonus. Certainly these sounds are varied, interesting and fairly compelling. The problem is when you begin to compare the lyrics to the matching Scriptures. A couple of tracks - eg, "Shout For Joy" supposedly comprises just one biblical verse, Psalm 100:1, while in fact several verses are included in this song's lyrics. Conversely, "Praise The Lord" is intended to represent Psalm 103, though in fact it only picks a couple of verses from that psalm. Slightly more disturbing is that numerous songs only contain one or two lines from the stated psalm - all other lines are not to be found in that or any other psalm, nor indeed anywhere in the Bible. There's nothing necessarily wrong with that. But if a main purpose of this disc is that it acts as a "great Scripture memory aid", then it could lead to considerable misunderstanding. Are kids really going to come away from these songs knowing which verses they've memorised are actually to be found in the Book of Psalms and which aren't? Thankfully, tracks like "The Lord Is My Shepherd" (Psalm 23) and "My Rock" (Psalm 18) fare much better, quoting the entirety of each psalm. A mixed blessing, therefore.

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms. Any expressed views were accurate at the time of publishing but may or may not reflect the views of the individuals concerned at a later date.

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