Psalm 115:1 vs. “My Tribute (To God Be the Glory)”

Why it matters

Psalm 115:1 is the verse people reach for when they want a text behind a line like this one, and Hymnary's index does list it among the passages behind this song. But the verse spends two of its clauses saying no before it says yes, and verse 2 shows that the no is not modesty for its own sake. It is there because watching nations were asking where Israel's God was, and a people taking the credit would have answered that question badly.

A song can be entirely true and still not carry a verse's shape. This one sends credit away from the singer, which is the same direction the psalm travels. What it does not do is make the refusal audible, and the refusal is where Psalm 115:1 does its work.

Helpful comparison

Three different scripture citations circulate for this song, and none of them agree. Worship Together and Word to Worship, the licensing listings that carry its CCLI number, both name Psalm 29:1-2. Hymnary's text authority page lists Psalm 115:1, but it lists it inside a set of roughly thirty passages, which is an index of themes rather than a claim about a source. Crouch's own account, as carried by Songfacts, names neither: he describes waking with the refrain already in his head after a friend told him to read John 17, and says he wrote the song at the piano in about ten minutes. When the writer, the publisher, and the hymnal index all name different passages, the honest conclusion is that the song is not quoting any of them.

There is a second confusion worth clearing. Fanny Crosby published a hymn in 1875 whose first line ascribes the glory to God for what He has done, and it shares a title with Crouch's subtitle. They are two texts by two writers a century apart, with separate entries at Hymnary and different tunes, and the Canterbury Dictionary of Hymnology describes Crouch's refrain as an allusion to Crosby's line. That makes the nearest ancestor of the sung phrase a hymn rather than a psalm. A hymnal index will place the two texts near each other, and readers should not take that proximity for a citation.

Sources

• Andrae Crouch — My Tribute (Light Records catalogue upload) · (the recording checked for this proof; the auto-generated listing credits Andrae Crouch and the Disciples on a Light Records release)
• Hymnary.org — "To God Be the Glory (Crouch)" text authority · (Andraé Crouch, 1971; lists Psalm 115:1 within a set of roughly thirty scripture references; 30 hymnal listings)
• Hymnary.org — "My Tribute" text entry · (second Hymnary entry for the same text; the refrain is a repeated affirmation with no negation clause)
• Canterbury Dictionary of Hymnology — "How can I say thanks (My tribute)" · (1971; Crouch's COGIC background; describes the refrain as an allusion to Fanny Crosby's hymn)
• UMC Discipleship Ministries — History of Hymns: "My Tribute" · (1971; the shift from Crosby's third-person hymn to first-person gratitude; no scripture named as the basis)
• Songfacts — My Tribute (To God Be The Glory) · (Crouch's own account: John 17, the refrain arriving on waking, the song written in about ten minutes; also dates the first recording to 1972)
• Worship Together — My Tribute · (CCLI 11218; licensing scripture reference given as Psalm 29:1-2; chorus-verse-bridge-chorus structure)
• Word to Worship — My Tribute · (second listing citing Psalm 29:1-2; independent confirmation that the lyric contains no denial clause and that the refrain names God's acts as its reason)
• Street Directory lyric listing — My Tribute · (second independent transcription used only for structure: no denial clause, refrain repeated in succession, verse and bridge first-person)
• Hymnary.org — Fanny Crosby, "To God Be the Glory" (1875) · (the separate Crosby hymn, William H. Doane tune, first published in Songs of Devotion)
• Discogs master release data — Keep On Singin' · (album title, 1971, and the track listing including "My Tribute (To God Be The Glory)")
• 100 Greatest CCM Albums of the '70s — Keep On Singin' · (1971, Light Records LS-5546, producer Bill Cole, full track listing)
• Wikipedia — My Tribute (To God Be the Glory) · (dates the first recording to 1972 on Keep on Singin', Light Records; noted here because it disagrees with the 1971 release date given by Discogs and the hymnological sources)