My brothers and sisters, my children, O seedlings of the catholic church, O holy and heavenly seed, O you that have been born again in Christ and been born from above, listen to me—or rather, listen to God through me: Sing to the Lord a new song. Well, I am singing, you say. Yes, you are singing, of course you are singing, I can hear you. But do not let your life give evidence against your tongue. Sing with your voices, sing also with your hearts; sing with your mouths, sing also with your conduct. Sing to the Lord a new song. You ask what you should sing about the one you love? For of course you do want to sing about the one you love. You are asking for praises of his to sing. You have been told, Sing to the Lord a new song. You are looking for songs of praise, are you? His praise is in the church of the saints. The praise of the one to be sung about is the singer himself. Do you want to sing God his praises? Be yourselves what you sing. You are his praise if you lead good lives.

His praise, you see, is not to be found in the synagogues of the Jews, or in the madness of the pagans, or in the errors of the heretics or in the applause of the theaters. You ask, Where it is to be found? Look at yourselves: you are it. His praise is in the church of the saints. You ask what to rejoice about when you are singing? Let Israel rejoice in the one who made him, and all he can find to rejoice about is God.

Let them praise his name in the choir; let them play music for him on the timbrel and harp. In an earlier verse he said that we must rejoice in the Lord Christ, but now he says that we must praise the name of the Lord in the choir. That is to say, in the choir that never suffers any scattering, boredom or scandal, but is gathered in the uprightness of merits and always exists with the dearest unity. But another psalm explains what this choir is like and how big it is: From the rising of the sun to its setting, praise the name of the Lord.^[1] The chorus that is gathered from the beginning of the world from the multitude of the heathen also cannot be gathered except in that heavenly homeland.

It is said in the psalm regarding just individuals: The saints will rejoice exceedingly in glory; they will rejoice in their beds; because when they flee evils from the outside, they glory secure within the secret recesses of their minds. Then the joys of their hearts will have been fulfilled when there will have been no external struggles with the flesh. For until the flesh is subdued, one’s bed is disturbed just as the wall of our house shakes.