Listening to God

In my duties as the rector of churches I never gave my music minister the choice of hymns and songs. They had complete control over the prelude, postlude and choir anthem, but not the other music. I picked the other music by Tuesday when I had no idea what the sermon was going to be. I was consistently amazed when the words in the songs I picked seemed to match the sermon in an uncanny way time and time again. It just seemed inspired but because it was all within my prayer and preparation I thought I already knew the sermon when I picked the songs but not in a conscious reality.
Since coming to The Church of the Resurrection I have the same amazing experience. Now independently of the music ministers I prepare a sermon and two different music ministers pick songs for the two different services where music is used. Once again the words of the songs picked match the sermon message God had given me to preach. Yesterday the rector leaned over to me in the second of those two services and asked if I had talked with the music ministers about song selection. He was amazed at the way the songs matched the message. The message even came from only one small line from the gospel which would be hard to see as the sermon focus.
I don't know why after all these years I still get surprised by God. You would think by now I would just expect the phenomenal. I'm not sure the average church attendee even noticed the match, but I'm sure God knows that when they match it all is more effective. God is good.