Psalm 71:23-24 vs. “O, For A Thousand Tongues To Sing”

David Crowder Band · checked 2026-08-02

What we checked

PassagePsalm 71:23-24 chapter ↗

Translation shownBSB (Berean Standard Bible)

Presents itself asinspired-by

Categorynot a quote

AlbumRemedy · 2007

Words addressed tovaries by section

Teaching or experienceteaching (states truths)

Graded against the standard

Quotation criteria not graded: this song never presents its words as scripture

Applies to every song the Name held holy · God shown holy · true of God · the standard

✓Reverent treatment

✓ What's good

Six of Wesley's stanzas are kept, and they dwell on Christ's name and works: fear calmed, cancelled sin's power broken, life spoken to the dead. Each image has scripture standing behind it
The famous line is honest about itself. It is a wish, in the hymn's own voice, and neither Wesley nor this recording bills it as a Bible verse
What repetition plants here is mostly statements about Jesus, not descriptions of the singer
The occasion is documented and fitting: Wesley wrote it for the first anniversary of his conversion, gratitude on a calendar

⚠ Cautions

The opening line is often assumed to be scriptural. Its documented source is Peter Böhler's saying, itself echoing Johann Mentzer's German hymn, so it should be loved as hymnody, not quoted as a verse
The recording adds a modern section of the band's own that turns from declaration to crowd invitation. Know where Wesley stops and the addition begins
Hymnal editors built the familiar hymn from stanza seven onward of an eighteen-stanza poem. The version you know is a selection, as most sung hymns are

Verse Proof

Psalm 71:23-24

The text in BSB (Berean Standard Bible)

“When I sing praise to You my lips will shout for joy, along with my soul, which You have redeemed. My tongue will indeed proclaim Your righteousness all day long, for those who seek my harm are disgraced and confounded.”

Psalm 71 is the prayer of an old believer. The psalmist has trusted God from youth (verse 5), asks not to be cast off in old age (verse 9), and promises to declare God's power to the next generation (verse 18). Verses 23 and 24 are the closing vow: when he sings, his lips will shout for joy, because his soul has been redeemed, and his one tongue will proclaim God's righteousness all day long, because the people who sought his harm have been disgraced. The vow is made with the equipment he has, for the rest of the life he has.

What the song says, described not quoted

This recording sets six stanzas of Charles Wesley's 1739 hymn to the AZMON tune and adds a section of the band's own. Wesley's stanzas open with a wish for far more tongues than one, so that the Redeemer's praise could be sung at the scale it deserves. One stanza prays directly to God for help in spreading that honor. The rest are declarations about the name of Jesus: it calms fear, it is good news to a sinner, it breaks the power of sin already cancelled, and at his word the dead receive life and the broken are comforted. The band's added section turns to the room, saying that the name of Jesus holds, and inviting the congregation to sing it louder together. Nothing is presented as a Bible quotation and no verse is cited.

The hymn cites no verse, and its most famous line has a documented human genealogy rather than a biblical one. Wesley wrote the hymn for May 21, 1739, the first anniversary of his conversion, as an eighteen-stanza poem later trimmed by hymnal editors; the familiar opening is stanza seven of the original. The thousand-tongues image is traced by the standard accounts to a remark of the Moravian Peter Böhler, rendered by one source as "Had I a thousand tongues, I would praise him with them all" and by another as "If I had a thousand tongues, I would praise Christ with them all," and Böhler in turn was echoing Johann Mentzer's 1704 German hymn about a thousand tongues. Even the saying arrives in two wordings. Psalm 71:23-24 sits beside it here because it is the nearest scripture posture: a tongue recruited for lifelong praise. The psalmist's move is different in one respect. He does not wish for a thousand; he vows the one.

· Not a quote: The hymn presents nothing as scripture. Its famous opening wish is documented as coming from Peter Böhler's remark by way of a German hymn rather than from a Bible verse. What its stanzas say of Christ is not something the text contradicts.

▸ Official upload. Now listen with the proof in mind.

Wesley wished for a thousand tongues; the psalmist vowed the one he had, all day long.

Why it matters

This hymn stood first in Methodist hymnals for two centuries, and a line that familiar starts to feel like scripture whether or not anyone claims it is. Knowing its actual source protects the singer in both directions: the line is not demoted when it turns out to be a friend's remark, and it is not quoted as a verse when it never was one. The psalm supplies the comparison worth keeping. The wish for a thousand tongues and the vow of one tongue, all day long, are two shapes of the same desire, and only one of them can be kept before breakfast tomorrow.

Is it safe to dwell on?

Sung on repeat, this song fixes your attention on God.

Looping this song plants two things. The first is a stack of true statements about the name of Jesus, and that is about as safe a deposit as repetition can make; the words are about him, and the singer appears mostly as the one doing the announcing. The second is the wish itself, and a wish is worth watching as it settles in. Sung rightly, it is an admission that praise outruns the equipment, which is the same instinct behind the psalmist's shouting lips. But a wish for a thousand tongues can also postpone the one tongue's work, the way a plan to do much someday excuses doing little now. Psalm 71 is the corrective sung from the far end of a life: one tongue, one day at a time, all day long. Loop the hymn, and let the psalm tell you what to do between now and the thousand.

Sources

David Crowder Band — O, For A Thousand Tongues To Sing (official audio) · (the recording checked for this proof; the listing reads "Provided to YouTube by Universal Music Group … Remedy ℗ 2007 sixstepsrecords/Sparrow Records", on the band's Topic channel)
Songfacts — O For A Thousand Tongues To Sing, David Crowder Band · (recorded for the 2007 album Remedy; their eight-stanza version includes two additional verses of their own)
Hymnary.org — O for a Thousand Tongues · (written 1739 for the first anniversary of Wesley's conversion; originally eighteen stanzas published in Hymns and Sacred Poems, 1740; hymnals print stanzas 7-12; Böhler's saying, quoting Johann Mentzer's German hymn "O daß ich tausend Zungen hätte")
UMC Discipleship — History of Hymns: O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing · (written May 21, 1739, the anniversary of Wesley's Pentecost 1738 conversion; Böhler's remark "Had I a thousand tongues, I would praise him with them all"; the familiar hymn begins at stanza seven; placed first in the 1780 Collection)
Wikipedia — O for a Thousand Tongues to Sing · (Wesley's 1738 illness and renewal under Böhler; the 1740 publication under the title "For the anniversary day of one's conversion"; opening hymn of Methodist hymnals until 1983; the AZMON tune by Carl G. Gläser, arranged by Lowell Mason)

Corrections

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